Connecticut Global Fuel Cell Center

The Connecticut Global Fuel Cell Center (CGFCC) was awarded nearly $2 million from the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) to research the effects of impurities on fuel cell performance and durability. Secretary of Energy Samuel Bodman announced in October '06 that the agency would fund 25 R&D projects nationwide in support of President Bush's Advanced Energy Initiative. The winning proposals included the CGFCC submission prepared by a team of UConn engineering faculty and colleagues from FuelCell Energy and UTC/Hamilton Sundstrand. A total of $100 million was awarded by DOE for research projects aimed at overcoming cost and durability barriers associated with hydrogen fuel cells.

The team, headed up by principal investigator Trent Molter, a Research Scientist and Business Development Officer for the CGFCC, will focus on improving the reliable performance of proton exchange membrane (PEM) fuel cells. A PEM fuel cell uses a simple electrochemical reaction to combine hydrogen and oxygen into water, producing electric current in the process. The defining feature of PEM fuel cells is the solid polymer membrane, which is typically made of DuPont Nafion®. PEM cells were first used during the 1960's to power the Gemini spacecraft. Today, they are being refined for use in transportation applications, including automobiles and buses, where the cells are exposed to challenging operating conditions. In these applications, the cells are required to produce power reliably for several thousand hours. But when fuel cells are exposed to a contaminated environment, performance becomes compromised there by limiting the widespread use of PEM fuel cells in automobiles and other vehicles.

The team will seek to achieve invariant performance of PEM fuel cells over extended periods by focusing on contaminants that penetrate the fuel cell system and affect the performance of the membrane. In particular, the team will characterize and identify the specific contaminants that impact performance, develop analytical procedures and tools for detecting and tracking the contaminants as they proceed through the system, model and validate the effects of contaminants, develop technologies for reducing the impacts of contaminants, and make their results widely available so others may capitalize on their findings.

Mr. Molter's collaborators at UConn include Drs. Kenneth Reifsnider, Research Professor; Nigel Sammes, Research Professor; and Xinyu Huang, Assistant Research Professor - all associated with the CGFCC; Drs. Wilson Chiu, Ugur Pasaogullari and Jiong Tang of Mechanical Engineering; Drs. Mark Aindow, Can Erkey, Ben Wilhite, Luke Achenie and Alevtina Smirnova - all associated with the Chemical, Materials & Biomolecular Engineering Department; Dr. Sanguthevar Rajasekaran, UTC Professor of Computer Science & Engineering, and Dr. Reda Ammar, Head of Computer Science & Engineering. UConn Board of Trustees Distinguished Professor and Department Head of Chemistry Dr. Steven Suib is also collaborating, along with colleagues at FuelCell Energy and Hamilton Sundstrand.

FuelCell Energy has led research into the effects of contamination on gaseous fuels for commercial fuel cells, and UTC's Hamilton Sundstrand holds the durability records for PEM technology. Both companies bring extensive experience to the collaboration.

The Connecticut Global Fuel Cell Center - perhaps the largest academic fuel cell center in the nation, with more than 40 associated faculty members and research expenditures of more than $9 million - was founded in 2001 as a partnership between the UConn School of Engineering, Connecticut Innovations and Connecticut industry.