“The emission-free reaction of hydrogen and oxygen into electricity and water is another argument for the fuel cell. NOW GmbH, the national organization for hydrogen and fuel cells, hopes that with the support of this project, a pioneering step has been taken in the further development of the German fuel cell market.”

Environmental Issues

As with the BOSNet example, an increasing level of focus is being paid by corporations and nations to the environmental impacts of the products we depend upon. In the US, states such as California have set limits to the number of hours a generator can be run in non-emergency situations in order to address the emissions issue. Federal guidelines limit the amount of emissions allowed by generators. In Europe, countries including Germany have created Emissions Control Acts, which work to limit pollutants and make technologies such as generators subject to official approval. The general opinion is that this scrutiny will only increase.

Hydrogen fuel cells, as mentioned earlier, emit no pollutants. Since they very often replace diesel generators at communication customer sites, a comparison of the environmental impacts of the two can be helpful. Diesel generators are notorious for their pollutants. For example, a 50kW diesel generator falls under US Tier 2 standards and is allowed five grams of carbon monoxide per kilowatt-hour, 7.5 grams of NOx per kilowatt-hour and 0.4 grams of particulate matter per kilowatt-hour. When one extrapolates to 1000 generators providing 150 hours of runtime per year each for five years, the environmental impact becomes very clear.

A fuel cell operating on reformed methanol has significantly lower emissions than the diesel generator, but still higher than a hydrogen fuel cell, with 0.007 g/kWh of NOx, 0.17 g/kWh of CO and 0 g/kWh of particulate matter. 

Conclusions 

The issue of reliability is critical for TETRA networks. As the bar is raised in the expectation that communication be able to take place no matter what, the issue of backup power becomes paramount. When a high level of reliability can be provided by a product that also meets sustainability goals, a win-win scenario develops. Fuel cells meet both those goals and offer a compelling solution for site hardening at critical locations. 

• Sandra Saathoff is director of marketing communication at ReliOn. Visit www.relion-inc.com