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Safe, low-cost hydrogen storage
Cella Energy Ltd makes safe, low-cost hydrogen storage materials. Our materials use nano-structuring to safely encapsulate hydrogen at ambient temperatures and pressures. This sidesteps the requirement for an expensive hydrogen infrastructure.
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How we deliver safe, low-cost hydrogen fuels using the existing transport infrastructure : animation See video |
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Cella Energy wins Shell Springboard Award 2011 : See video |
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Hydrogen allows drivers to step on the gas : Reuters video news See video |
Latest
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Space Florida leads new investment round : Cella to open new facility at NASA Kennedy Space Centre |
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Cella Energy wins $250,000 to develop hydrogen fuel technology in global Energy Storage Challenge |
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Jennifer Carroll kicks off trade mission to the UK and Spain |
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Shell Springboard overall UK winner Cella Energy is making hydrogen fuelled cars – and zero emissions - one step closer to reality |
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2011 Energy Storage Challenge global finalist Click here to view
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Future 50 winner: Cella Energy |
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Cella Energy wins Energy Innovation Award – consumer benefit 23 June 2011 |
- Most existing car, marine and aircraft engines can be adapted to run on hydrogen
- This eliminates all carbon emissions at the point of use
- At $100 a barrel, hydrogen is price competitive to oil and provides greater energy security
- The barrier to adoption so far has been an expensive hydrogen infrastructure
- Cella Energy's breakthrough technology allows hydrogen fuels to be introduced into the existing vehicle and fuel infrastructure at minimal cost
- For the driver it means lower-costs at the pumps, and an ease of refilling that is safer than gasoline
Hydrogen has been talked about for many years as an alternative fuel for transport. When hydrogen is used in an existing internal combustion engine vehicle or a fuel cell vehicle, there are no carbon emissions. However, the barrier to entry so far has been the massive investment required in a hydrogen refilling infrastructure, and the importance of making hydrogen in a low-carbon way. Further, it is clear that hydrogen would be only be adopted if it was no more dangerous or difficult to use than regular gasoline or diesel, and would cost less at the pumps.
In 2007 work began at the prestigious STFC Rutherford Appleton Laboratory RAL near Oxford, UK to develop new hydrogen fuels. The patented technology uses a technique called coaxial electrospinning to safely encapsulate complex hydrides using nanostructuring techniques. The result was a hydrogen fuel that could be handled quite safely in the open air and pumped like a fluid. In early 2011 Cella Energy Ltd was formed as a spin-out company from RAL with the exclusive rights to the IP. Funding has been provided by Thomas Swan & Co. Ltd, a UK chemical company established in 1926.
Portable – Better batteries, laptops that last a week between charges and military power for 72-hour missions, unmanned drones and UAVs.
- Powering portable fuel cell systems from a safe Hydrogen Bag™
Vehicles – Hydrogen fuels for vehicles you can pump like regular gasoline at room temperature and pressure, safer to use than gasoline or diesel but with zero carbon emissions.
- Fuel additives that could allow a regular vehicle to meet the Euro 6 emission standards with minimal modifications
Planes – Aircraft that can fly with less emissions with jet-fuel, JP8 or kerosene fuel additives, but with minor modifications to jet-engine design.
- Significant reduction in harmful emissions in the upper atmosphere
Space travel – Space rockets use hydrogen fuel, Cella's low-pressure ambient temperature hydrogen storage means rockets can be made ready at a moment's notice.
- Liquid hydrogen does not need to be stored at -423°F or -253°C
- Cella Energy hydrogen materials can also act as a radiation shield
Offshore wind turbines – Replacing expensive undersea copper cables with low-cost hydrogen storage.
- Reducing the cost of off-shore wind
Elevator Pitch:
Cella Energy makes safe, low-cost hydrogen storage materials.
As the world population grows, our demand for energy will increase rapidly. Fossil fuels alone cannot provide this growth, so we must find alternatives, and an increasingly important alternative is hydrogen. Hydrogen is in many ways the perfect fuel, because when used in a conventional automobile or aircraft engine, or in a fuel cell, there are no carbon emissions.
In 2002 the US Department of Energy published a number of challenges that we would have to overcome to make hydrogen a viable alternative to gasoline in cars. A key challenge was to overcome the '3 minute, 300 mile rule'. We love our cars, and we may not like the high price of gasoline, but we can all fill our cars from a simple-to-use liquid fuel pump with enough energy in 3 minutes to drive 300 miles. New hydrogen fuels should be no more hazardous than gasoline or diesel, and should match their cost, or ideally cost less.
The electric and hydrogen vehicles currently used do not overcome these challenges. Electric vehicles can take hours to recharge, and then provide ranges of only 100 miles. The hydrogen vehicles use highly pressurised tanks of hydrogen gas, gas that not only requires a great deal of energy to compress, but is hazardous to use. Worse, this type of hydrogen use would requires massive investment in a pressurised hydrogen refilling infrastructure.
In 2007 work began at the prestigious STFC Rutherford Appleton Laboratory near Oxford, UK to develop new synthetic fuels. The team was led by Professor Stephen Bennington, who is now the Chief Scientific Officer of Cella Energy. The team used a technique called coaxial electrospinning to safely encapsulate complex hydrides using nanostructuring techniques. The result was a fuel with more energy than gasoline or lithium-ion batteries that could be handled quite safely in the open air and pumped like a fluid. This meant we could meet the most important DoE criteria.
In 2010 Cella Energy was formed as a spin-out company from the STFC Rutherford Appleton Laboratory with the exclusive rights to the IP. Initial funding has been provided by Thomas Swan & Co. Ltd, a UK chemical company established in 1926. Thomas Swan bring experience of how to scale chemical production rapidly and cost effectively. They also have one of the largest nanotube manufacturing facilities in Europe.
In September 2011 Space Florida lead a further investment round. Cella is opening a new facility at the NASA Kennedy Space Centre KSC in Florida. Over 30 years of the Space Shuttle program, KSC has become one of the largest users of hydrogen worldwide.
As well as working with NASA, the large auto-makers and automotive tier 1's, Cella is also working on innovative solutions to provide longer-lasting batteries for laptops and for the military, radiation shielding for space travel, and bulk hydrogen storage to lower emissions from aircraft and to provide alternatives to transporting energy from off-shore wind farms.
The hydrogen fuels will be rolled out in two stages. The first stage will be as a fuel additive, enabling lower emissions without any change to the fuelling infrastructure or to regular vehicles. The second stage would require changes to vehicles, but this would provide a pure hydrogen solution with zero carbon emissions.
Cella has won a string of awards including the prestigious Shell Springboard Award.
At Cella Energy we dare to dream
We dream of a world where there are no carbon emissions from our cars and from our planes, and a world where we can significantly reduce our use of oil and fossil fuels.
Hydrogen is the most abundant element in the Universe, but the challenge on our planet has been making and storing hydrogen safely. We can use hydrogen in fuel cell systems where the only emissions are water. We can also convert regular gasoline cars or aircraft jet-engines to hydrogen with minimal modifications. If we burn hydrogen instead of fossil fuels in internal combustion engines or in jet-engines there are no carbon emissions.
According to the UN, by 2050 the world population will grow from 6.8 billion to surpass 9 billion. During the next 40 years, we will double the number of vehicles that we drive to 2 billion and dramatically increase our demand for energy, food and manufactured goods, all of which will have to be transported. Humans face an unprecedented challenge to maintain their standard of living while reducing the environmental impact of fossil fuels. The rapid introduction of new technologies such as those based on hydrogen is essential.
Fundamental to the widespread introduction of hydrogen technologies is a low-cost, practical way of storing hydrogen. This is particularly challenging for transport applications, which places stringent requirements on cost, safety, volume and weight. Hydrogen storage is also vital for the smart-grid to operate effectively.
Features:
- low-pressure
- safe
- ambient temperatures
- rapid desorption of hydrogen
- pure hydrogen
- can be handled safely in the open air
Benefits:
- increases revenue for customer
- fast introduction into market
- saves money and time on packaging
- end customer can travel further without refuelling
Our vision
The search for low-carbon and alternative fuels for transport is driven by the need to reduce carbon dioxide CO2 emissions and by energy security concerns. Hydrogen is a clean energy store, which is potentially usable for all forms of transport: air, sea and land; and where the only significant emissions are water vapour.
The ultimate goal for vehicular transport will be electric vehicles driven by hydrogen fuel cells. But today these are new, unproven and expensive technologies. Alternatively, it is possible to convert a conventional internal combustion engine (ICE) to run on hydrogen, with minimal engine modifications. This H2-ICE route offers quick, low-cost and low-risk access to low-carbon motoring for a fraction of the cost of developing fuel cell or lithium-ion battery powered vehicles.
In addition hydrogen can be used for long term energy storage, where batteries alone would not be sufficient. For example, buffering the intermittency of renewable energy generation technologies such as wind, solar and wave.
Liquid fuels
Today we are used to refuelling our cars with liquid fuels and it takes a few minutes to fill our tanks, so we can travel hundreds of miles. Cella's vision is to provide this same experience, but with fuels that do not create the emissions of existing fossil fuels. For more information please contact us info@cellaenergy.com
