HRC and Voith Composites co-develop hydrogen high pressure vessels for fuel cell applications

Aug 22th, 2019, HRC, one of the leading composites solution provider, together with Voith Composites, the development and series production center of carbon fiber-reinforced composites in the Voith Group have signed the MOU to jointly work on next generation hydrogen high pressure vessels for FCEVs (fuel cell electric vehicles). In order to overcome today’s challenges and to meet the market´s requirements new vessel concepts, process routes and material systems are required. Mr. Yongtao Gu, president of HRC Group and Mr. Matthias Odrobina, CEO of Voith Composites have signed the agreement on behalf of each company.

According to China's Hydrogen Energy and Fuel Cell Industry White Book, breakthroughs have been made in key technologies and technical bottlenecks such as power density, life and cold start of fuel cell stacks. By the end of 2018, the installed capacity of hydrogen fuel cells in the world had exceeded 2.090,5 MW, and the total sales of passenger vehicles had reached 9.900 initially realizing commercial application. ”

Although the technology of FCEV is already commercially ready with leading OEMs offering selected models in serial production, a significant market penetration of fuel cells has not yet been achieved. There are several challenges which must be overcome for FCEVs to be competitive with conventional vehicles (ICE, HEV, PHEV, BEV), but their potential benefits are substantial. One of these challenges are the high-pressure vessels used as hydrogen tanks in FCEVs which are one of the main cost drivers. Cheaper solutions will open new competitive solutions in EV market, which could be achieved by reducing material and process costs for the vessel manufacturing. Whereas a reduction of process costs in combination with new vessel concepts have the most impact, which forms the basis of the partnership between HRC and Voith.” commented by Dr. Timo Huber, Vice President of the R&D unit of HRC Group.

The Voith Group is a global technology company. With its broad portfolio of systems, products, services and digital applications, Voith sets standards in the markets of energy, oil & gas, paper, raw materials and transport & automotive. Voith Composites is the R&D and production center of carbon fiber reinforced composites in the Voith Group. Voith Composites develops customized solutions for components and industrial production processes along the entire value chain. All development and construction processes are based on state-of-the-art methods to design lightweight composite components.

“HRC is a very outstanding company, especially in terms of R&D and production capability”. Said by Mr. Matthias Odrobina, CEO of Voith Composites.” Voith has a profound knowledge in composite winding area and already gained considerable experience in hydrogen vessel development. I believe the MOU we are signing now will definitely bring us to another level of cooperation where both companies will benefit from the broad potential market”.