Yesterday, as part of the fuel cell test program at TeliaSonera, a fuel cell was put to a difficult test. After 16 months of stand-still with no conditioning routines whatsoever during the stand-still the Cellkraft S-1000 fuel cell started up successfully and powered a telecom station. The ability to start up reliably after a long stand-still is of great importance for back-up applications.

The fuel cell is the first fuel cell installed in the Swedish telecom grid and was delivered and installed in September 2005. A unique feature for Cellkraft fuel cells is that they are able to start up after a long period of stand still without regular conditioning routines. Most other brands of back-up fuel cells require regular start/stop operation to ensure ability to start up reliably. The test yesterday is part of TeliaSonera’s test program for fuel cells where fuel cells are tested in different telecom stations mostly located in Småland, Sweden.

Telecom stations are normally powered from the normal electricity grid. Should a grid failure occur a back-up system will provide the power. Traditionally the back-up system is based on batteries or a diesel generator set. In some applications fuel cells can give advantages in form of longer back-up time to a lower cost. Fuel cells can only become a serious choice for back-up solutions when their reliability is a proven fact.

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For more information, contact:
Joakim Nordlund, Cellkraft AB
Telephone: +46 8 673 19 15
E-mail: joakim.nordlund@cellkraft.se
www.cellkraft.se

Cellkraft has chosen to divide its fuel cell and humidity/steam activities into two separate business areas in order to best cater for the different customer needs and meet the growing customer base. As part of this focusing, the business areas will have separate newsletters so specific customers can better relate to the news.

Highlights from Customer Trials

In two different customer trials, two different aspects of start-up reliability are examined.

In October, a period of 6 months of standby ended with a simulated grid loss in a test at TeliaSonera. This is the longest period of standby in the test so far. The fuel cell started up and powered the telecom station during the grid loss and then got back into standby mode. This may sound trivial, but fact is that many Cellkraft competitors recommend that their back-up fuel cells are run on a regular basis. Cellkraft has put a large effort to develop a start-up algorithm that ensures that start-up will succeed no matter for how long time the fuel cell has been standing still. This test at TeliaSonera shows that the Cellkraft’s choice of strategy is possible and that Cellkraft has come far in this development.

In the testing at STRI AB for Svenska Kraftnät, the Swedish power grid utility, fuel cells are started up every three or six hours with some exceptions when the fuel cells are run for twelve hours continuously. During the autumn this test series exceeded 1000 start/stop cycles, with no noticeable degradation of performance.

Photo: Svenska Kraftnät testsite.

Photo: Telia testsite.

New Control System Features

Cellkraft’s new, fourth generation, control system was finalised by the end of last year. Most changes compared to the third generation were made to simplify assembly of a fuel cell system and are thus not noticeable to a customer. The most important new feature for a customer is the possibility to upgrade the control software remotely. With this feature it is possible to upgrade the firmware of Cellkraft fuel cells via direct modem connection, GSM/GPRS, Internet or locally by the customer.

Intelec Fair ’07

For the first time Cellkraft exhibited their fuel cells at the International Conference on Telecommunication Power, Intelec in Rome 30th September – 4th October ’07. Cellkraft exhibited the most compact back-up power system on the fair comprised by a S-2000 fuel cell, a SAFT Intentium™ battery and an Eltek Flatpack rectifier.  Cellkraft also demonstrated start-up and running of an S-2000 fuel cell at the Cellkraft premises in Stockholm remotely over the internet.