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January 29, 2008 – Vol. 12 No. 45 CALSTART: Five Major Fuel Cell Bus Projects Now Underway. The projects are a program with Federal Transit Administration (FTA) to push fuel cell technology toward faster commercialization in transit applications. The $24-million effort is a multi-year strategy to speed key improvements in fuel cell reliability, system design and component design. Overall, the goal is more affordable, higher performance fuel cell systems becoming available for transit bus and other uses. The FTA is providing $12-million in funding; the private companies involved provide the balance. CALSTART’s strategy to rapidly advance fuel cell technology utilizes three parallel development paths: a direct route that develops and accelerates testing on the best existing fuel cells; an evolutionary route that combines smaller fuel cells with other supporting technologies; and a component route that develops the core enabling sub-systems fuel cells will need to succeed. The five projects include: --- SunLine Transit Agency’s American Fuel Cell Bus – The focus of this direct path project is to develop a purpose-built, next generation fuel cell bus. The bus features an upgraded 120-kilowatt fuel cell system from UTC, an advanced lithium-ion energy storage system, an advanced electric motive drive system from ISE Corp. and an advanced New Flyer bus design using composite materials and modern electronics for weight reduction. SunLine will operate the bus in the nine cities of the Coachella Valley in California.
--- AC Transit “HyRoad” – In this direct-path project AC Transit will accelerate testing and identification of the weakest areas of fuel cell and hybrid systems, root cause analysis, fuel cell technology development, and component upgrades with more reliable and durable systems. Data collected from benchmarking current systems will lead to fuel cell and component upgrades roughly one year into the project. --- BAE Systems Compound Fuel Cell Hybrid Bus – The goal of this evolutionary path project is to trim capital cost and reduce operating costs by building on a highly efficient, commercial Orion hybrid bus design that balances a moderately-sized Hydrogenics fuel cell (15-25-kilowatt) as an auxiliary power unit (APU), BAE Systems’ advanced HybriDriveÆ Propulsion System, and advanced energy storage. The design is called “compound” because it links fuel cell, conventional engine and battery energy sources in one system, the bus targets doubling the fuel efficiency of a diesel bus in an affordable package. It will operate with San Francisco’s Municipal Transportation Agency (SFMTA) transit system for up to one year. --- US Hybrid – Integrated Auxiliary Module (IAM) – US Hybrid will develop critical enabling systems for more reliable and lower-cost fuel cell bus operation. The Integrated Auxiliary Module (IAM) project will develop and demonstrate a single, low-cost, compact unit housing the 200 amp (A), 24 volt (V) DC-DC converter and dual 10 horsepower (hp) motor drives with CAN interface for auxiliary power needs aboard a fuel cell or hybrid fuel cell bus. --- US Hybrid – Fuel Cell Bi-directional DC-DC Power Converter (BDC) project will optimize and streamline the complex energy flow between multiple devices, such as fuel cells, batteries and electric drive system. By standardizing the 400A rated bi-directional DC-DC converter module design, the unit can reduce weight and costs, and increase efficiency of the fuel cell systems. WestStart-CALSTART is North America’s leading advanced transportation technologies consortium. It is a participant-supported, non-profit organization of approximately 155 firms and organizations worldwide. (1/29/08)
Links: WestStart-CALSTART AC Transit UTC ISE Corp. New Flyer SunLine Transit Agency Hydrogenics BAE Systems US Hybrid
Disclaimer, Forward-Looking or Safe Harbor Statement on original press release: No
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