International Durability Working Group
MillionMile Fuel Cell Consortium has established an International Durability Working Group (I-DWG) with representation from the United States, European Union, Japan and Korea to better coordinate international efforts currently underway to help commercialize fuel cells for trucks and heavy-duty applications.
International Durability Working Group
We have established, in 2021, an International Durability Working Group (I-DWG) with representation from the US, European Union (EU), Japan and Korea to better coordinate international efforts currently underway to help commercialize fuel cells for trucks and heavy-duty applications.
This effort has been jointly led by researchers from M2FCT, the EU's IMMORTAL (IMproved lifetiMe stacks fOR heavy-duty Trucks through ultra-durabLe components) project funded by FCH 2 JU and Japan’s FC-Platform project funded by NEDO.
The M2FCT consortium had a very productive meeting with members of the IMMORTAL Consortium where researchers from both M2FCT and IMMORTAL presented their work scope and identified areas of cooperation and collaboration. The first international (virtual) meeting of researchers from the US ASTWG, M2FCT, IMMORTAL, FC-Platform, and International OEMs was held on the 27th of May 2021 with over 40 participants representing governments, universities, labs, and companies from Asia, the EU, and the USA.
Several scientists from CEA-Grenoble have joined this effort in October of 2021 as part of an Embassy Science Fellows (ESF) program focusing on fostering collaboration between CEA-Grenoble and the Million Mile Fuel Cell Truck (M2FCT) consortium. This 3-month effort will conclude in December of 2021 with a preliminary exchange of materials to highlight complementary capabilities and the rich opportunity for future collaboration supporting the clean energy policies of both nations.
The working group has been expanding rapidly since 2021 and exceeded 100 members from over 40 institutions (as of October 2022).
The group meets every two months with an initial focus on facilitating data sharing to promote AST development for fuel cells in heavy-duty applications. Three different sub-groups have now been created under the umbrella of this International Durability Working Group (I-DWG) focussed on fostering collaborations in three specific areas:
- Stressors related to Heavy Duty
- Characterization
- Benchmarking and Protocols
The primary goal of this group is to ensure all relevant stressors are taken into account while developing heavy-duty ASTs. Efforts include identifying and examining various stressors controlling and representing the durability of components and cells during heavy-duty fuel cell operation.
This group will leverage the characterization tools and capabilities available to various International groups to advance understanding of PEMFC performance and durability. The efforts include characterization of materials undergoing various degradation mechanisms due to stressors as well as elucidating the structural changes occurring in components from beginning to the end of life.
This group will explore MEA testing at various scales to better understand the scaling of performance and durability from small differential cells to operating stacks. The MEAs will be exchanged between the various organizations and the testing results shared. The various teams will utilize this data to validate both performance and durability models.
These three groups will help manage the International collaborations in these areas and will meet as an I-DWG from time to time to disseminate information to the wider working group.
Resources
Access the I-DWG Resources.