Revolutionizing electrolyzer technology to meet future needs for cost-effective hydrogen

“A grow­ing new area that we are look­ing at right now is tech­nol­o­gy for ener­gy con­ver­sion, specif­i­cal­ly elec­trolyz­ers for hydro­gen-based ener­gy sys­tems, where we have already filed sev­er­al patent appli­ca­tions,” says Elli­nor Ehrn­berg, head of Smoltek Innovation.

Dis­trib­uted hydro­gen pro­duc­tion will play a sig­nif­i­cant role in the future, includ­ing as an infra­struc­ture com­po­nent for heavy vehi­cles that in the future will be pow­ered by fuel cells, as well as in fos­sil-free steel pro­duc­tion, where sev­er­al Swedish projects are cur­rent­ly under­way. More and more play­ers are review­ing the pos­si­bil­i­ties of stor­ing ener­gy when oth­er renew­able ener­gy sources such as solar, wind and water do not deliver.

The Swedish Ener­gy Agency has, on behalf of the gov­ern­ment, devel­oped a nation­al hydro­gen strat­e­gy to facil­i­tate the tran­si­tion to fossil-free.

“There are many that are talk­ing about stor­ing and dis­trib­ut­ing hydro­gen, but few are inter­est­ed in mod­ern­iz­ing the pro­duc­tion technology,”

Elli­nor Ehrn­berg continues.

Of par­tic­u­lar inter­est is Pro­ton Exchange Mem­brane (PEM) elec­trol­y­sis where the cells con­tain a water-absorb­ing elec­trolyte of a poly­mer mem­brane. Expen­sive met­als such as plat­inum or irid­i­um are used as cat­a­lyst mate­ri­als, but these par­ti­cles are placed ran­dom­ly and part­ly hid­den in cur­rent PEM cells. Smoltek’s tech­nol­o­gy enables these expen­sive par­ti­cles to be orga­nized to come into full con­tact with the mem­brane and thus reach­es full hydro­gen pro­duc­tion with a less­er amount of expen­sive metals.

“Our tech­nol­o­gy should be able to pro­duce two to three times more hydro­gen per cell com­pared to exist­ing tech­nol­o­gy. This is because two to three times more cat­a­lyst par­ti­cles can be in con­tact with the mem­brane at the same time.”

“It is all based on the fact that our tech­nol­o­gy can grow the nanos­truc­tures in a way that gives a ver­ti­cal 3D effect, which opti­mizes the func­tion­al sur­face lay­er. This makes our tech­nol­o­gy both eco­nom­i­callay and envi­ron­men­tal­ly sustainable.”

Elli­nor Ehrn­berg explains.

In the auto­mo­tive indus­try, it is said that per­haps 20 per­cent of the elec­tric cars of the future will not be pow­ered by bat­ter­ies, but fuel cells. Espe­cial­ly in heavy trans­ports, as the hydro­gen reduces weight per stored ener­gy, which makes it more suit­able than a bat­tery when you need a longer range. Elli­nor Ehrn­berg exem­pli­fies with the Vol­vo Group, which recent­ly formed a joint ven­ture with Daim­ler Truck AG for large-scale pro­duc­tion of fuel cells.

“This is very much some­thing that is on the rise. The same applies, of course, to the marine and aero­space indus­tries, where they also want to invest in sus­tain­able, ener­gy- dense alter­na­tives, which are suit­able for long dis­tances and which can be stored direct­ly in vehi­cles with­out sig­nif­i­cant­ly increas­ing weight,”

Elli­nor Ehrn­berg concludes.

Smoltek is still in an ear­ly research phase, Proof of con­cept, to demon­strate the fea­si­bil­i­ty of the tech­nol­o­gy, but since the con­cept is so promis­ing and the poten­tial mar­ket is so large, the com­pa­ny wants to act quick­ly and is now look­ing for part­ners with whom they want to real­ize the new elec­trolyz­er concept.

Image: Elli­nor Ehrn­berg, Pres­i­dent at Smoltek Innovation

This con­tent is trans­lat­ed from an edi­to­r­i­al ad in Ny Teknik, April 15 2021.