The immortal project aims to develop advanced fuel cell technology for heavy-duty trucks
The project will develop higher performance fuel cell components for heavy-duty trucks with a predicted lifetime of at least 30,000 hours lifespan.
A European consortium that includes Johnson Matthey and Bosch will work on a €3.8 million project called Immortal to develop advanced fuel cell technology for heavy-duty trucks to support decarbonision in freight transport.
The project will develop new materials for fuel cell components in heavy-duty truck applications to ensure tailored performance and long term durability. It is a three-year project supported by the European Fuel Cells and Hydrogen Joint Undertaking (FCH-JU). The consortium is coordinated by France’s CNRS and includes Johnson Matthey (JM), Bosch, FPT Industrial, AVL, Imtek and Pretexo. The roles of these partners will be as follows:
- Johnson Matthey will work on electrocatalyst and membrane components and integrate them in catalyst coated membranes with catalyst layers tailored for enhanced performance and heavy-duty operation lifetime.
- Bosch will develop cell and stack testing protocols to reflect realistic use in the field and accelerated stress test protocols and apply them to large-size MEAs and short stacks.
- FPT Industrial will provide the industry system requirements and analysis leading to estimation of the Immortal stack cost.
- AVL will provide a second stack platform.
- CNRS Montpellier will lead the project and work on developing novel membrane reinforcement and reinforced membranes and electrocatalysts.
- Imtek (a research group at the University of Freiburg) will focus on understanding degradation mechanisms using chemical and structural techniques.
- Pretexo will provide project management and communication support.
Jo Godden, MD of Johnson Matthey’s Fuel Cells business, said, “Developing a robust fuel cell powertrain solution to decarbonise freight transportation will be critical to achieving net-zero goals around the world.”
Bart Biebuyck, Executive Director of the FCH-JU, stated, “Projects like Immortal are absolutely essential in driving down the costs of components and enhancing the competitiveness of hydrogen fuel cells powered trucks.”
