Switching lanes in EV race: Amid Lithium headwinds, India sets sight on H-fuel cells

The problem: demand for Li-ion batteries from India is projected to grow at CAGR of over 30 per cent by volume up to 2030, translating into over 50,000 tonnes of lithium requirement for the country to manufacture only EV batteries.

With over 90 per cent of global Li production concentrated in Chile, Argentina and Bolivia, alongside Australia and China, and other key inputs such as cobalt and nickel mined in the Congo and Indonesia, India would need to be almost entirely dependent on imports from a small pool of countries to cater to its demand. While other options to Li-ion are being explored, viability remains a key factor. A renewed focus on hydrogen as a mobility option comes against this backdrop.

Traditionally a slow mover in EV technologies, India has made an uncharacteristically early push in the race to tap the energy potential of the most abundant element in the universe: hydrogen. This includes a National Hydrogen Mission and a roadmap for using hydrogen as an energy source. And while proposed end-use sectors include steel and chemicals, the major industry that hydrogen has the potential of transforming is transportation — which contributes a third of all greenhouse gas emissions, and where hydrogen is being viewed as a direct replacement of fossil fuels, with specific advantages over traditional EVs. As a supporting regulatory framework, the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways had, in late 2020, issued a notification proposing amendments to the Central Motor Vehicles Rules, 1989, to include safety evaluation standards for HFC-based vehicles.

Hydrogen as a fuel source

While hydrogen’s potential as a clean fuel source has a history spanning nearly 150 years, it was only after the oil price shocks of the 1970s that the possibility of the element replacing fossil fuels came to be considered seriously. Three carmakers — Japan’s Honda and Toyota, and South Korea’s Hyundai — have since moved decisively in the direction of commercialising the technology, albeit on a limited scale. The most common element in nature, however, is not found freely. Hydrogen exists only when combined with other elements, and has to be extracted from naturally occurring compounds like water (which is a combination of two hydrogen atoms and one oxygen atom).

Although hydrogen is a clean molecule, the process of extracting it is energy intensive. The two most common methods for producing hydrogen are natural gas reforming and electrolysis.

The thermal processes for hydrogen production typically involve steam reforming, a process in which steam reacts with a hydrocarbon fuel to produce hydrogen and accounts for about 95 per cent of all hydrogen produced. In electrolysis, water is split into oxygen and hydrogen through a process called electrolysis. Electrolytic processes take place in an electrolyser, which functions more like a fuel cell in reverse — instead of using the energy of a hydrogen molecule as a fuel cell does, an electrolyser creates hydrogen by splitting water molecules.

How hydrogen fuel cells work

Hydrogen is an energy carrier, not a source of energy. Hydrogen fuel must therefore be transformed into electricity by a device called a fuel cell stack before it can be used to power a car or truck. A fuel cell converts chemical energy into electrical energy using oxidising agents through an oxidation-reduction reaction. Fuel cell-based vehicles most commonly combine hydrogen and oxygen to produce electricity to power the electric motor on board. Since fuel cell vehicles use electricity to run, they are considered EVs.

Inside each individual fuel cell, hydrogen is drawn from an onboard pressurised tank and made to react with a catalyst, usually made from platinum. As the hydrogen passes through the catalyst, it is stripped of its electrons, which are forced to move along an external circuit, producing an electrical current. This current is used by the electric motor to power the vehicle, with the only byproduct being water vapour. Hydrogen fuel cell cars have a near-zero carbon footprint. Hydrogen is about 2-3 times as efficient as burning petrol, because an electric chemical reaction is much more efficient than combustion.

The new HFC technology bus prototype unveiled in Pune is seen as a major breakthrough, with the indigenously developed fuel cell stack at the CSIR-National Chemical Laboratory, Pune. The fuel cell used here is what is called a “low temperature proton exchange membrane type fuel cell” that operates at 65-75°C, which is suitable for vehicular applications. The polymer electrolyte membrane fuel cells, also called proton exchange membrane fuel cells, use a proton-conducting polymer membrane as the electrolyte while hydrogen is used as the fuel. These cells operate at relatively low temperatures and are the best candidates for powering automobiles.

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The problem with hydrogen

Globally, there were under 25,000 HFC vehicles on the road at the end of 2020; by comparison, the number of electric cars was 8 million. A big hurdle to the adoption of HFC vehicles has been a lack of fuelling station infrastructure — even though fuel cell cars refuel in a similar way to conventional cars, they cannot use the same station. There were fewer than 500 operational hydrogen stations in the world in 2021, mostly in Europe, followed by Japan, South Korea, and some in North America.

Safety is flagged as a concern. Hydrogen is pressurised and stored in a cryogenic tank, from where it is fed to a lower-pressure cell and put through an electro-chemical reaction to generate electricity. Hyundai and Toyota say the safety and reliability of hydrogen fuel tanks is of a level similar to that of standard CNG engines. Scaling up the technology and achieving critical mass remains the big challenge. More vehicles on the road and more supporting infrastructure can reduce costs. India’s proposed mission is seen as a step in that direction.