Toshiba drive development of the portable power station
Categories: Energy and sustainability Transport
The Toshiba Corporation has recently announced a new addition to its family of hydrogen-powered energy supply systems H2One, with the release of the H2One Truck Model.
First introduced and trialled in April 2015 in Kawasaki City, south of Tokyo, the eco-friendly electricity generator has gone on to be implemented into the construction of a hotel at a theme park in Nagasaki, and is even set to supply green energy to an East Japan Railway Company station opening in 2017.
H2One is a completely independent, off-grid energy generation unit, powered by sunlight and water alone. The system itself is made up of a water electrolysis system to produce hydrogen from water, a storage tank to capture the hydrogen, a raft of hydrogen powered fuel cells that can produce stable electricity, and an on-board storage battery to store any excess energy produced.
Electrical outputs of the system are free from carbon dioxide and completely environmentally friendly, while hot water is generated as a by-product, ready for use as and when it is needed by homes and hotels.The latest addition to the family, the H2One Truck Model, features a scaled down version of the original model first demonstrated in Kawasaki, and is housed in two four-tonne trucks. The new truck-mounted system offers improved mobility, allowing the generators to be rapidly transported to disaster sites, to provide a flexible energy supply for affected residents.
Once in place, the hydrogen fuel cells generate electricity with almost no noise, vibration or emissions of regular diesel generators, meaning they can be safely used as close to disaster areas as they are needed.In an improvement on the previous model, the H2One Truck Model’s hydrogen storage tank is fitted with a new hydrogen storage alloy, meaning a greater density of hydrogen can be packed into each tank. This in turn reduces and size and weight of tanks, and contributes to the system’s improved flexibility and mobility, while still retaining all of the power generation capabilities of the original H2One model.
The Toshiba Corporation is continuing to develop technologies for promoting hydrogen as a fuel in a bid to realise an environmentally friendly future based on clean, carbon-neutral energy. Visit their website to find out more.
