2021 UNDP Hydrogen Industry Conference

The 2021 UNDP Hydrogen Energy Industry Conference was held from December 8th to 10th in Xiqiao Mountain Cultural Center, Nanhai District, Foshan City, Guangdong Province. The conference is guided by the National Development and Reform Commission and the National Energy Administration, co-hosted by the United Nations Development Program and the China International Economic Exchange Center, and fully supported by the Guangdong Provincial Development and Reform Commission, the Foshan Municipal People's Government, and the Foshan Nanhai District People's Government.

      With the theme of "Creating the Hydrogen Era and Creating Carbon Neutrality Together", the conference brought together many guests from global organizations, government departments, scientific research institutions, and key enterprises in the hydrogen energy and fuel cell industries to discuss the "Double Carbon Era". "In the background, new opportunities for the development of China's hydrogen energy industry.

      In the special forum, top experts in the industry shared the research progress of cutting-edge technologies in the hydrogen energy industry. Sun Gongquan, chairman of Zhongke Jiahong (Foshan) New Energy Technology Co., Ltd., was invited to attend the conference and made a keynote report on "High Temperature Methanol Fuel Cell Technology" at the Fairy Lake Technology Forum.

Keynote Report "High Temperature Methanol Fuel Cell Technology"

Leaders, experts and colleagues, hello everyone! My name is Sun Gongquan, I am from Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, and I am also the chairman of Zhongke Jiahong Company.

      The contents of my report today mainly include the following aspects: First, the national strategic needs. Achieving carbon peaking and carbon neutrality is a solemn commitment my country has made to the world, and it is also an extensive and profound economic and social transformation. It is obligatory to put energy and power first.

     From the perspective of energy security, our country's total oil imports last year were 456 million tons, with a foreign dependence rate of 70.24%, especially through the Strait of Hormuz and the Strait of Malacca, accounting for 70% of the total imports. Therefore, oil substitution and cleanliness Energy development is imminent.

      There are many types of clean energy sources. The installed capacity of wind power that has been connected to the grid exceeded 300 million kilowatts this year, ranking first in the world for 12 consecutive years; the installed capacity of solar energy also exceeded 250 million kilowatts, an increase of 24%. At present, the power generation of hydrogen energy is still far below this value, but hydrogen energy has special strategic significance. Hydrogen can be burned, including aerospace engines, using liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen. Germany inputs hydrogen into natural gas pipelines as fuel for combustion; hydrogen can be used to prepare chemical There are many hydrogenation reactions in chemical reactions; hydrogen can generate electricity, which is of great significance and has broad application prospects in many fields of land, sea, air and sky.

      In fact, the hydrogen energy economy was proposed by the United States in the 1970s. The basic idea is that the reserves of water on the earth's surface are huge. We often say "three mountains and six waters and one field". In 1985, the ITER plan was proposed internationally. The idea is that if the hydrogen in seawater can be extracted, the human energy problem will be solved. The idea at the time was to use nuclear fusion. In 2003, my country participated in the negotiation of the ITER plan, and officially joined in 2006. At present, the project has made great progress. Today, the connotation of hydrogen energy is more abundant, and the sources of hydrogen are wider, including the use of solar energy for photolysis of water, electrolysis of water and so on.

      The fuel cell was born in 1839. In terms of application, the output power of the fuel cell ranges from sub-watt to tens of megawatts, and has broad application prospects on land, sea, air and sky. The reason why we consider methanol fuel cells is that in several mainstream power sources, such as supercapacitors, lead-acid batteries, nickel-hydrogen batteries, lithium-ion batteries, etc., the specific energy of methanol fuel cells is very high, which can exceed 1kWh/kg.

      The fuel cell industry has developed rapidly in recent years, the technology maturity has improved significantly, and the commercialization process has accelerated. Today, Mr. Tang and many people are talking about industrialization. In terms of the market, low-temperature hydrogen fuel cells are currently the mainstay, with a compound growth rate of more than 40%. Methanol fuel cell is a rising star with a relatively low market share. In the past few years, the cumulative capital investment of fuel cells has exceeded 300 billion yuan, and thousands of new companies have been born. The national policy continues to be favorable. There are currently three fuel cell vehicle demonstration and application city clusters, of which Foshan is also the leading city in the Guangdong city cluster.

      In the field of electric vehicles, there may also be several five-year plans for participating countries. The development plan recently issued by the General Office of the State Council has given new connotations to the "three verticals and three horizontals", which include pure electric vehicles, plug-in hybrid vehicles, and fuel cell vehicles. Three horizontals are power battery and management system, drive motor and power electronics, as well as newly added networking and intelligent technologies.

      The traditional battery structure is relatively simple, while the fuel cell chain is long. As far as fuel is concerned, gaseous fuels include hydrogen, ammonia, and natural gas; liquid fuels include methanol, ethanol, fuel oil, etc., and solid fuels, such as light metal magnesium, aluminum, and zinc.

      Fuel cell product development includes key materials, core components, system integration, etc. In terms of intelligent management, including battery electronic control, energy management, intelligent interconnection, etc. Finally, it can be really applied to electric vehicles, ships, engine stations, etc.

     Let's talk about the characteristics and economy of methanol fuel. When we talk about the hydrogen energy economy, everyone is thinking about how to use hydrogen. Hydrogen is a gas at room temperature. It has many advantages but also has pain points. Methanol is liquid at room temperature. In addition to solving the pain points of hydrogen storage, transportation, and filling, it actually has many advantages. As a hydrogen storage material, the best hydrocarbon is methane, but methane is gaseous at room temperature, and it is difficult to break the carbon-hydrogen bond. The hydrogen storage capacity of methanol as a liquid fuel is 12.5%. The hydrogen storage capacity of foreign hydrogen storage materials is about 1.4%, while that of domestic hydrogen storage materials is about 1.2%-1.3%. Methanol, liquefied natural gas, liquid ammonia, liquid hydrogen, etc. are all liquid fuels. In terms of energy, the energy density per unit volume of methanol has obvious advantages, even higher than that of liquid hydrogen.

      Methanol emission problem. The methanol reaction produces carbon dioxide. With the advancement of technology, methanol can be regenerated by hydrogenation after carbon dioxide capture. In recent years, China has also advocated liquid sunlight to produce carbon-neutral methanol fuel with green hydrogen. Compared with gasoline and diesel, the carbon dioxide emission of methanol can be reduced by 40%, and the emission of sulfur oxides, nitrogen oxides and particulate matter is almost zero.

      Methanol safety issues. It can be seen from this table that the safety of methanol is obviously better than that of several conventional fuels.

      Methanol toxicity issues. In water, the half-lethal concentration of methanol is much better than other fuels, and its toxicity is far lower than gasoline, diesel, etc.

      Why do we do methanol fuel cells, especially high temperature methanol fuel cells? Let's take a look. The hydrogen energy economy has been favored by the world. In fact, if hydrogen is replaced by methanol, the difference is that the product contains carbon dioxide. However, with the development of technologies such as carbon dioxide capture and utilization, this is not a big problem.

      In 2006, Nobel Prize winner George Andrew Olah of the University of Southern California first proposed the methanol economy, which is actually part of the hydrogen economy.

      Low-temperature hydrogen fuel cells have obvious advantages, high energy conversion efficiency, and environmental friendliness. The pain point is that the preparation, storage, transportation, and filling of hydrogen are complicated, and they are sensitive to the carbon monoxide content in the fuel gas, usually less than 10ppm.

      High-temperature methanol fuel cells use liquid fuel, which is more convenient to store, carry and refill. After increasing the temperature, the carbon monoxide problem is almost negligible and the electrode reaction rate doubles. However, the development of high temperature polymer electrolyte membrane materials has been slow, and a lot of human and financial resources have been invested internationally, and breakthroughs have been made in recent years.

      The working principle of methanol fuel cells is the same as that of conventional primary/secondary batteries, and the energy conversion efficiency is high; the working mode is similar to that of gasoline/diesel generators, as long as fuel is continuously supplied, it can generate electricity continuously and stably. Methanol fuel cells are mainly divided into the following three types: First, direct methanol fuel cells, which we have developed for nearly 30 years, are characterized by direct injection of fuel into the stack, simple battery structure, convenient use and portability, high battery energy density, but energy The conversion efficiency is low; the second is that methanol is separated and purified by catalytic reforming and then enters the low-temperature PEMFC. Since the carbon monoxide content in the reformed gas is as high as tens of thousands of ppm, it usually requires multi-stage separation and purification, the system is complex and the cost is high. The third is the high temperature methanol fuel cell. Due to the birth of the high temperature resistant electrolyte membrane, the carbon monoxide resistance of the cell has been greatly improved. The methanol fuel reformed gas is directly passed into the high temperature stack, omitting the separation and purification steps, and the electrode reaction rate has been significantly improved. In recent years, it has become a One of the international research and development hotspots. The high-temperature methanol fuel cell technology system is similar to the low-temperature PEMFC, including key materials, core components, system integration, intelligent control, and multi-energy combined utilization.

      We have been conducting research and development of methanol fuel cells for nearly 30 years. From electrocatalysts, electrolyte membranes, membrane electrodes, single and bipolar plates to system integration, intelligent control, etc., we have completed production lines for electrolyte membranes, porous electrodes, membrane electrodes, and stacks. building. It has more than 230 authorized patents, and won 9 provincial and ministerial awards, including 3 national awards.

      Market applications mainly include electric vehicle power supply, ship power/auxiliary power supply, small decentralized power station, etc. Our strategy is to develop 1, 5, 10, and 30kW modules, which can basically cover practical applications of 1-120kW.

      In 2016, we assembled the first high-temperature methanol fuel cell-driven passenger car. The operation results showed that the emission of sulfur oxides and nitrogen oxides was nearly zero, and the fuel consumption per 100 kilometers was less than RMB 20. Three vehicles were tested in Dalian. The operation has been well received by experts and peers. In addition, high-temperature methanol fuel cells have broad application prospects in scenic vehicles, RVs, engineering command vehicles, and emergency power supply vehicles.

      In ship propulsion/auxiliary power supply. The promulgation and implementation of the United Nations Convention on the Oceans and the seas have higher and higher requirements for the marine environment. Most of the international shipping fuel is heavy oil, which is seriously polluted.

      On November 8, the high-temperature methanol fuel cell cruise ship developed by us was launched in Danzao Xian Lake. The power supply is 25kW, and the auxiliary power supply is 5kW to meet the needs of lighting, air conditioning, and hot water. Compared with traditional fuel, the advantages are obvious. Welcome everyone here to experience the Fairy Lake for yourself.

      In terms of small decentralized power stations, the energy conversion efficiency of heat-electricity cogeneration is high, and its application prospects are broad.

      Summary: I personally believe that hydrogen energy may be the ultimate goal of energy, and low-temperature PEMFC has broad application prospects; methanol fuel cells have obvious advantages, abundant methanol fuel resources and low prices, and are indispensable to cross the era of oil and gas; secondary batteries, low-temperature PEMFC, high-temperature Methanol fuel cells have their own advantages and disadvantages, and the market segments may be different, but coexistence and complementarity are the general trend; the national policy orientation of fuel cells continues to be favorable. I hope everyone will join hands and work together to create a better future. Thank you.