Page 145 - AWSAR 2.0

the greatest threat to our planet is the belief that someone else will save it,” I quoted Robert Swan, a British historian, best known for being the first person to walk to both, North and South poles.
“But what about other renewable power sources such as hydropower and solar cells? Many countries have invested significantly in hydro and solar power grids to provide an alternative to conventional energy sources. Aren’t they cleaner and environment friendly?” Pankaj seemed concerned at the other end of the line.
“Undoubtedly, but
hydropower sources have
complexities, such as safety
issues and harmful ecological footprints. And although utilization of solar cells is soaring globally, their efficiency to convert only 14-15% of available energy into useful power severely restricts its application,” I responded.
“Then what advantages do hydrogen fuel cells have?” he asked.
“Good question, Pankaj”, I chuckled as I had anticipated this question after the brief disclosure.
“Hydrogen fuel cells and particularly, polymer electrolyte membrane fuel cells, or PEMFCs in short, have an efficiency of approximately 80% and need hydrogen (H2) and oxygen (O2) as fuels. Moreover, the only emissions are the by-product of H2 and O2, that is pure water vapour as exhaust,” I set the ball rolling.
There was silence on the line for a while. I guessed Pankaj’s brain was processing the information like a computer as if some data had been just entered into it.
“You are kidding, right?” exclaimed Pankaj. “You mean instead of polluting the environment
Mr. Avinash Ingle || 121
with life-threatening emissions such as NOx, SOx and particulate matters, fuel cells emit pure water. That is killing two birds with one stone, water-shortage as well as the global climate
crisis,” he exclaimed.
“No, I am not kidding. This
power-generating device has no moving parts, so we get high efficiency. And unlike most of our electronic gadgets batteries, that require periodic charging, fuel cells continue to produce electricity as long as a fuel source (hydrogen and oxygen) is supplied,” I explained.
“Oh, is it?” wondered Pankaj. “Is that what you develop in your lab?” he asked in surprise.
“Well, partially. We develop and investigate the performance of one of the most critical components of these PEMFCs,” I
briefly described.
“Which component? Help me understand,”
he asked filled with curiosity.
“Okay, imagine a solid polymer electrolyte,
an electrolyte is an electrically conducting solution. This polymer electrolyte is sandwiched between two electrodes, an anode and a cathode. This is a single fuel cell, known as a unit cell. A unit cell of 1 cm x 1 cm dimension can generateonly1wattpower,justaboutsufficient to light a mini LED. Did you get the idea, should I continue?” I assumed Pankaj would have got this image correctly.
Hydrogen fuel cells and particularly, polymer electrolyte membrane fuel cells, or PEMFCs in short, have an efficiency of approximately 80% and need hydrogen (H2) and oxygen (O2) as fuels. Moreover, the only emissions are the by-product of H2 and O2, that is pure water vapour as exhaust