The Bay Area's newest regional agency. the Water Transit Authority (WTA), has received a $100,000 federal grant to design the world's first fuel cell ferry. This project is expected to require about three years.
The WTA, established in 1999 by the California Legislature, is charged with developing and implementing plans for a ferry system for San Francisco Bay, including the infrastructure and facilities to operate the system. The Implementation and Operations Plan to be developed by WTA must include specifications to ensure that ferry design minimizes air polluting emissions and that air and water pollution are monitored.
At present, although most of the ferries operating on the bay are powered by two- stroke diesel engines, less polluting four-stroke diesel marine engines are available. Also, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has set emission standards for commercial marine diesel engines that will become effective in 2006. Marine engines, it should be noted, are very durable and have a long service life.
Besides designing a fuel cell vessel, WTA also plans to test other clean alternative fuels, and is already participating in a program to run a ferry on biodiesel made from vegetable oils. The prospect of a clean-operating ferry fleet eventually serving the Bay Area may allay some of the public concern about air and water pollution, although debate continues over the comparative contributions of land and water travel to the region's pollution and the extent of the relief ferries may provide to traffic congestion on roads.
Electricity is the least polluting power source, and fuel cells are currently deemed the most feasible source of electric power for widespread transportation use. In the future, urban transit buses and passenger cars, as well as ferries, may be powered by fuel cells. In 1995, the California Air Resources Board (ARB) adopted the California Low-Emission and Zero-Emission Vehicle (LEV/ZEV) Program that requires that ten percent of the vehicles offered for sale in 2003 in California be ZEVs. In 2000, the ARB adopted its Public Transit Bus Fleet Rule that set timetables for transit agencies to acquire cleaner operating buses (see March/April 2000 issue) . Agencies that purchase diesel buses rather than alternative fuel buses are required to conduct a zero emissions bus (ZEB) demonstration project. By 2015, 15 percent of purchases must be ZEBs.
Three of the Bay Area's transit agencies will be purchasing and testing fuel cell buses with funds awarded from the Transportation Fund for Clean Air (TFCA). TFCA funds come from a surcharge on California license fees on motor vehicles registered in the Bay Area and are administered by the Bay Area Air Quality Management District. Alameda-Contra Costa Transit District (AC Transit), the Santa Clara Valley Transit Authority (VTA), and the Golden Gate Bridge, Highway and Transportation District (GGBHTD) each received funding toward the purchase of 3 fuel cell buses as soon as they are available.
Developing the technology to adapt fuel cells to power motor vehicles and to design facilities for fuel manufacture and refueling has taken longer than was originally anticipated. The Board of Directors of AC Transit approved a contract on March 19 with a San Diego manufacturer for delivery of 4 buses in July 2004, with the possibility for 6 additional buses. This is the world's first contract for the purchase of fuel cell buses. Three of the buses will be operated by AC Transit, and one is for SunLine Transit Agency of the Palm Springs area. AC Transit is the lead agency of a testing program that includes SunLine and may also include GGBHTD. AC Transit plans to eventually purchase 12 fuel cell buses, and GGBHTD plans on 6. VTA is developing a program to acquire and test buses and will operate them together with the San Mateo County Transit District (SamTrans).
AC Transit, SunLine, and VTA are associate members of the California Fuel Cell Partnership, a coalition of auto makers, petroleum companies, fuel cell technology companies, and federal, state and regional agencies formally convened in 1999. Associate partners with specific areas of expertise are hydrogen gas suppliers, hydrogen fueling stations, a methanol supplier, and bus transit agencies.
The goals of the Partnership include a two-year period of operating and testing a fleet that will eventually consist of 60 fuel cell passenger cars and urban transit buses to evaluate hydrogen and methanol refueling and manufacturing technology. The Partnership will also identify problems and find solutions relating to commercialization of the technology, and will institute a program informing the public about fuel cells.
Fuel cell vehicles run on electricity. Instead of getting electric power from a battery pack that runs down and must be recharged, a fuel cell converts hydrogen to electricity by an electrochemical process as power is needed. The process continues until the hydrogen fuel runs out and must be replenished. The fuel cell consists of a stack of electrolyte membranes through which protons, the nuclei of hydrogen atoms, can pass. Hydrogen, with an assist from a catalyst, is split into its constituent protons and electrons. The electrons go into a circuit to power the vehicle. The protons pass through the membranes and combine with oxygen from air coming into the fuel cell to form water vapor, the only emission.
Hydrogen is an abundant element, and many hydrogen-rich compounds exist that can be used as a source of the fuel. Commonly used examples are gasoline, natural gas, ethanol, and methanol. Hydrogen fueling stations would process the fuel stock to extract the hydrogen, which, since it is a gas, must be compressed or supercooled to a liquid or stored as a hydride solid to be used by vehicles. With the technology of the process in its present state, each station would cost about $470,000 to build. None have yet been constructed in the Bay Area. AC Transit plans to build a fueling facility for its fuel cell buses and a fueling station for fuel cell passenger cars in Richmond.
To get fuel cell cars on the road while the fueling infrastructure is being developed, some auto manufactures are testing on-board reformers to produce hydrogen from gasoline or methanol. This fuel, available from existing stations, is vaporized in the vehicle and passed through the reformer where it is partially burned and the hydrogen passed to the fuel cell. The process uses the fuel much more efficiently than an internal combustion engine, but it does emit some pollutants. Such vehicles are not, therefore, truly zero emission vehicles.
The high cost, the lack of refueling stations, and the fact that it has not been road-tested make the fuel cell car an unlikely candidate to fulfill the 2003 zero emission vehicle requirement. However, the promise that fuel cell technology holds and the support from auto manufacturers and the petroleum industry could make it the power source of the future. Meanwhile, transit agencies need to continue testing fuel cells as replacements for diesel engines to provide additional reductions in Bay Area air pollution.
Adelia Sabiston
For more information:
California Fuel Cell Partnership, http://www.drivingthefuture.org
Jim Gleich, AC Transit, 510-891-7185
Mary Currie, GGBHTD, 415-257-4548
Heidi Machen, WTA, 415-291-3377