Fuel cells are a promising technology. Therefore they are also considered in the maritime sector for future 'Green Ship' applications. Fuel cells meet the demands as regards environment, comfort and - which is essential for the naval market - signature. However, since hydrogen is the 'natural' fuel for most types of fuel cells, but will not be a logistic marine fuel, there is a need for the conversion of logistic liquid marine fuel (today diesel, tomorrow biodiesel, sunfuel, etc.) to a hydrogen rich gas, suitable for fuel cells. This paper gives a brief overview of current fuel cell-related maritime projects specifying the first approach, the containerized Fuel Cell for Maritime Application (FCMA) and the Diesel-Reformer for fuel cells in greater detail. After the desulphurization step, steam was added to the diesel before entering the prereformer. In the pre-reformer the hydrocarbons were converted to a methane rich gas containing also CO2, CO and H2. Due to the poisoning effect of sulphur towards the catalyst in the pre-reformer reactor and the fact that marine diesel fuel contains a high content of sulphur, a number of test have been performed to obtain insight in the performance of commercially available catalysts. The outcome of the tests with respect to the pre-reformer was the observation of a deactivation of the pre-reformer catalyst. However, it is reactivated to a large extent after a restart, so the deactivation is largely reversible. The steam reformer also converts the unconverted higher hydrocarbons originating from the pre-reformer, which is an unforeseen advantage of the steam reformer. The most important parameter, the conversion of the incoming methane and higher hydrocarbons to CO and H2, is performed with a yield of approximately 98 %, at 780 deg C maximum catalyst tube tip temperature, which satisfies the design. A lot of work has already been achieved in the field of fuel cells for surface maritime application (merchant as well as naval ships). In a next step HDW-Fuel Cell Systems is going to operate the containerized Fuel Cell for Maritime Applications (FCMA) on board a ship parallel to the electric ship net.
Fuel cell power for maritime applications
Brennstoffzellenantrieb für maritime Anwendungen
2005
6 Seiten, 3 Bilder
Aufsatz (Konferenz)
Englisch
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