OREANDA-NEWS. ITM Power (AIM: ITM), the energy storage and clean fuel company, is pleased to announce the completion of the Phaedrus project.  The project focussed on the development of an all electrochemical hydrogen refuelling station including on-site production by electrolysis.  The contribution of ITM Power has been the development of an electrolyser design capable of delivering 200kg/day of hydrogen at high pressure, with a system efficiency of up to 75% at high current density. The design has been validated at the 5kg/day scale and integrated with an electrochemical compressor developed by HyEt, at ITM's facilities in Sheffield, adjacent to the recently opened hydrogen refueling station at the Advanced Manufacturing Park, just off the M1 motorway. The Group currently has ?10.49m of projects under contract and ?7.92m of contracts in the final stages of negotiation.

On 28 November 2012 the company announced that it has received confirmation of a €3.59m grant award from a programme of the European Union's Joint Technology Initiatives. The award was to a consortium for the development of an advanced refuelling system using ITM Power's high pressure hydrogen electrolysis technology. The Company's share of this award is €0.87m. The programme, known as the PHAEDRUS project and funded under the Seventh Framework Programme (SP1-JTI-FCH.2011.1.8), aimed to develop an all electrochemical 70MPa (700 bar) hydrogen refuelling station (HRS) for fuel cell electric vehicles (FCEV) in the passenger car segment. This aimed to demonstrate the applicability of electrochemical hydrogen compression technology in combination with self-pressurising Polymer Electrolyte Membrane (PEM) electrolyser technology.

 In the three year programme, ITM Power has worked with consortium members Hydrogen Efficiency Technologies B.V. (HyET); H2 Logic A/S; Hexagon Composites ASA; Daimler AG; Shell Global Solutions International B.V; Bundesanstalt f?r Materialforschung und -pr?fung; Association pour la Recherche et le D?veloppement des M?thodes Processus Industriels (ARMINES); European Commission, Directorate-General Joint Research Centre, Institute for Energy (JRC-IE); Hochschule Esslingen and Uniresearch B.V. which had overall management responsibility for the project.

 The project has successfully developed:

·     A model for the most energy efficient method of generating, compressing and dispensing hydrogen at 70MPa (700 bar) from the University of Applied Sciences, Esslingen

·     Extensive durability data for high pressure and high current density electrolyser stack components

·     Low cost injection moulding processes to provide proven high pressure electrolyser stack components

·     Optimisation of an electrochemical compressor offering a route to hydrogen compression without moving parts

·     Successful development and use of a high pressure, high current density stack test rig and integration with electrochemical compressor

·     Technology cost comparison undertaken with Daimler

 Dr Simon Bourne, CTO, ITM Power plc commented: "PHAEDRUS has been an excellent platform from which to develop, test and qualify our next generation electrolyser components.  Increasing current density and pressure are two effective ways to reduce capital cost and footprint, further enhancing our clean fuel offering.  I am grateful to our project partners and the FCH-JU for their support."