Ballard Power Systems today unveiled its 9th generation high-performance fuel cell engine, the FCmove-XD, at the Advanced Clean Transportation (ACT) Expo at the Las Vegas Convention Center. Ballard will be exhibiting at booth 1821 from May 20–23, 2024.
Ballard to Showcase 9th Generation of High-Performance Fuel Cell Engines for Heavy-Duty Vehicles at ACT Expo 2024
“We are fully focused on increasing the economic value for our customers in the field of heavy-duty mobility,” said Mircea Gradu, Technical Director of Ballard. “With the launch of our 9th generation of fuel cell engines – the FCmove-XD – we continue to push the boundaries and once again raise the bar and redefine the industry standard for PEM fuel cell engines. Our innovative FCmove-XD offers significant improvements in reliability, durability, efficiency, power density, scalability, ease of maintenance and total cost of ownership.”
With a volumetric power density of 0.36 kW/L and a gravimetric power density of 0.48 kW/kg, the FCmove-XD offers the highest volumetric power density in the heavy-duty industry. The scalable 120 kW fuel cell engine has a regulated DC/DC output, allowing up to three modules to operate as one system with a single interface, which together produce an emission-free output of 360 kW.
With a lifespan of more than 30,000 hours of operation – or more than a million miles in truck operation at typical duty cycles – the FCmove-XD engine is designed to offer class-leading durability and a low total cost of ownership.
Powered by an innovative “open architecture” design and other new design advancements, the powerful and compact FCmove-XD offers several key performance improvements (compared to our previous generation engine), including:
- 120 kW of power from our latest high-performance single-stack;
- Reduce the total number of parts by 33%, significantly improving reliability and reducing costs;
- Ultra-high peak efficiency of the system of >60%, which enables improved fuel consumption (lower total cost of ownership) and efficient heat dissipation;
- Wide operating temperature range up to 95°C;
- The integrated power controller includes a DC/DC converter, an air compressor inverter and a power distribution unit, and together with the proprietary software control, enables improved motor operation and efficiency;
- Fast start-up and shut-down times with an innovative hot standby mode that allows for a quick increase in performance;
- Improved manufacturability with a >50% reduction in assembly time;
- Easier access to spare parts for faster and more cost-effective on-site maintenance;
- Compliance with applicable safety regulations and standards;
“The energy and power requirements of the highly segmented truck market are particularly demanding due to various use cases, including high vehicle utilization and payload requirements,” said Silvano Pozzi, Vice President, Product Line Management. “One of the most convincing features of our new FCmove-XD is the scalability based on modularity. We can provide our customers with efficient integration of 120kW, 240kW and 360kW solutions, depending on the vehicle class, use case and duty cycle. For example, two engines with a total output of 240 kW can be easily installed in the engine compartment of a typical Class 8 heavy-duty truck, improving standardization and redundancy.”
Mr. Gradu said, “In addition to our internal innovations and design improvements to the FCmove-XD over the past three years, we have enjoyed strong collaboration with our maturing supply chain in the development of new plant components and the unique engineering associated with them. We have also made important investments in certain production tools. These integrated and parallel workflows have resulted in a leader in this category, with higher performance on all key metrics with significantly lower capital and operating costs for customers and end users. The first customer discussions before the market launch were very exciting.”
Ballard plans to initially manufacture the FCmove-XD at its Oregon plant to ensure “Buy America” compliance from 2025. Future large-scale production is expected to take place at Ballard Rockwall Giga 1, Ballard’s recently announced 3 Gigafactory to be built in Rockwall, Texas.