NREL is a national laboratory of the U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, operated by the Alliance for Sustainable Energy, LLC.

Stationary Fuel Cell 

Evaluation

2012 DOE Annual Merit Review

Jennifer Kurtz (PI), Keith Wipke, Sam Sprik, Todd Ramsden, 

Chris Ainscough

National Renewable Energy Laboratory

May 17, 2012

NREL/PR-5600-54477

This presentation does not contain any proprietary, confidential, or otherwise restricted information.

Project ID# TV-016
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Overview

Timeline

Project start date: October 2011

Project end date: September 

2012*

Percent complete: On-going

Barriers

Performance validation and 

reporting of stationary fuel cell 

systems under real-world 

operating conditions

Budget

Total project funding

DOE share: $65k

Contractor share: $0

Planned funding in FY12: $65k

Partners

In the process of establishing 

partnerships

*Project continuation and direction determined annually by DOE
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Objectives - Relevance

• Independent assessment, 

validation, and reporting of 

operation targets and system 

performance under realistic 

operating conditions.

 Real World Operation Data 

from the field and state-of-the-art lab

 Collection

 Analysis for independent technology 

validation

 Collaboration with industry and end 

users operating stationary fuel cell systems

 Reporting on technology status, 

progress, and technical challenges

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Milestones - Approach and Accomplishments

• Quarterly data analysis (based on available 

data)

• Publication of first technical stationary fuel 

cell composite data products (data through 

June 2012) 

FY12 Q1 FY12 Q2 FY12 Q3 FY12 Q4
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Technology Validation Project Leveraging - Approach

2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012

Published performance reports

76,242

154,407

563,178

495

Hours :

MHE

FCEV

FCB
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Hydrogen Secure Data Center Data Collection - Approach

Bundled data (operation, 

maintenance, safety, & cost) 

delivered securely to NREL quarterly

Data stored, processed, and analyzed 

quarterly within the HSDC, which is not 

connected to an external network.

Access to the HSDC is limited by 

badge access for only NREL’s 

technology validation team. Proprietary 

data is protected with aggregated 

public results.
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Hydrogen Secure Data Center Analysis and Reporting -

Approach

CDPs

DDPs

Composite Data Products (CDPs) 

• Aggregated data across multiple systems, 

sites, and teams

• Publish analysis results without revealing 

proprietary data every 6 months2

Detailed Data Products (DDPs) 

• Individual data analyses

• Identify individual contribution to CDPs

• Only shared with partner who supplied 

data every 6 months1

1) Data exchange may happen more frequently based on data, analysis, and collaboration

2) Results published via NREL Tech Val website, conferences, and reports

Results

Confidential

Public
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Stationary Fuel Cell Systems - Approach

• Includes systems providing prime, 

continuous, or regular power to a site

• Includes multiple fuel cell types - proton 

exchange membrane (high and low 

temperature), solid oxide, phosphoric acid, 

and molten carbonate

• Small, kilowatt-scale to large, megawatt-scale 
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Data Processing, Analysis, and Reporting Tools - Approach 

and Accomplishments

• NREL Fleet Analysis Toolkit (NRELFAT)

— Developed first under fuel cell vehicle 

Learning Demonstration

— Restructured architecture and interface to 

effectively handle new applications and 

projects and for flexible analysis

— Leverage analyses already created

• Report results

– Detailed and composite results

– Target key stakeholders such as fuel cell and hydrogen developers, 

and end users
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Stationary Fuel Cell Processing - Accomplishment

Raw data processing

Operating data 

processing & analysis

Fuel cell degradation 

processing & analysis

Application Company & project

Composite results

Data management

Stationary Processing and 

Analysis Capabilities in NRELFAT
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Stationary FC Data Templates - Accomplishments

Site Overview

Maintenance

Operation

All OEM Site Operation

Safety

Site Operation Summary

Data templates constructed based 

on other technology validation 

projects for consistent and 

complete data sharing
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Collaborations

• Partners for data delivered at the end of FY12 

(~40 MW)

o National Fuel Cell Research Center

o California Stationary Fuel Cell Collaboration

• Communicating with several organizations to 

establish agreements for sharing data with NREL

o State and regional fuel cell organizations

o Fuel cell developers
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Proposed Future Work

• Establish partnerships with end users, state 

collaborations, and fuel cell developers to 

create data sets of stationary fuel cell 

systems operating in real-world conditions

• Receive first delivery of data from NFCRC and 

CaSFCC

• Publish first set of composite data products 

for stationary fuel cell operation in Fall 2012
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Summary

Relevance: Validating the performance of technologies in 

integrated systems, under real-world conditions supports 

market growth, product awareness, and technology growth.

Approach: Leverage capabilities established under other 

technology validation activities like NRELFAT to address a 

gap in performance results for stationary fuel cell systems.

Accomplishments: Data templates have been created and 

NRELFAT is capable of raw data processing, operation 

summary, and voltage degradation analyses for stationary 

data sets.

Collaborations and Future Work: Establish partnerships 

and stationary field data sets for the first set of results to be 

published in Fall 2012.