The path to a sustainable and climate neutral industrial society requires the use of defossilized regenerative energy carriers. The development of efficient storage technologies and the secured energy supply without the use of fossil energy sources are the major challenges of the energy transition. Without these, a sustainable and climate-neutral mobility is not possible.
There are three concepts for a CO2-neutral and sustainable mobility: First, the direct use of electric energy for battery-electric vehicles (BEV). Secondly, hydrogen as energy carrier for fuel cell electric vehicles (FCEV) by the transition of regeneratively produced electricity into green hydrogen and lastly, by the transition of synthetic fuels out of green hydrogen. The technologies will complement each other in terms of vehicle weight, distance and required drive power.
As the lightest and at the same time most abundant element with its high energy density, hydrogen offers great potential for the future. Sustainable mobility requires “green” hydrogen, which is obtained from the electrolysis of water using renewable energies. Water is decomposed into its components hydrogen and oxygen.
Because electrical energy is required for electrolysis, this process is only climate-neutral if the electricity comes from renewable sources. Since the economic generation of renewable energy does not take place geographically where it is needed to meet energy demand, transport and storage technology is crucial. Here, hydrogen has clear advantages over electrical energy, so that the hydrogen energy chain is the basis for a defossilized, sustainable energy supply and mobility.
For a successful implementation, the economic production of electrochemical cells for electrolyzers and fuel cells in serial scale is the missing link. These mainly consist of bipolar plates. For the development and production of these, the competences in material technology, electrochemistry, the forming and joining technology as well as coating technology are successfully utilized. A more efficient serial production and the according progress in the specific production technologies leads to a successful technical implementation and distribution. Moreover, by using cost-efficient materials and a clear reduction of noble metals like platin due to great progress in material- and coating technologies, the costs and the product carbon footprint could be reduced significantly. By the development of an extremely thin, noble metal free and performant coating in nano- to micrometer range, it could be achieved to use cost-efficient and well processable steel as base material, instead of titanium or graphite. Compared to alternative, precious metal-based coatings, the coating has a CO2 footprint reduced by approximately 99 percent. Therefore, the overall CO2-balance of the bipolar plate is reduced by approximately 20% compared to conventional products. This pioneering development will make an important contribution to the successful hydrogen energy chain and -mobility and was awarded with the CLEPA Award 2022 in the category “Clean & Sustainable Mobility”.
