Technical options for abating road traffic impacts Comparative study of fuel cell vehicles and vehicles with internal combustion engines

The Federal Environmental Agency (UBA) believes that, in principle, fuel cells are an interesting option for efficient cogeneration of electricity and heat. Each individal application must be studied to decide whether it is ecologically and economically competitive with other options. A life cycle analysis must be performed for the various environmentally relevant scenarios. The calculations of emissions from motor vehicles running on various fuels (process chain method) in the present report are a pragmatic approach to an analysis aimed at evaluating fuel cell technology. This is particularly significant given that the state of the art still leaves room to decide whether or not to press ahead with fuel cell development. The UBA is involved in International Energy Agency (IEA) studies of automotive applications. There are major differences between stationary and mobile uses of fuel cells, both in terms of the technology and the option of using different sources of process energy, alkaline (80 C), phosphoric acid (200 C), molten carbonate (650 C) and solid oxide (1000 C) are currently used in fuel cells and rely on natural gas and other fuels at high temperatures. The process heat may be used to cool or heat buildings or else in manufacturing. Applications in motor vehicles seek to maximize electrical efficiency and minimize waste heat, which must be discarded. Alongside the alkaline fuel cell, the focus here is overwhelmingly on the proton-exchange-membrane fuel cell (80 C), which offers the advantages of lower weight and operating temperatures over the afore-mentioned technologies. (orig.)SIGLEAvailable from TIB Hannover: RN 8422(1999,93) / FIZ - Fachinformationszzentrum Karlsruhe / TIB - Technische InformationsbibliothekDEGerman