Periodic Reporting for period 1 - AMPS (Automated Mass Production of SOC Stacks)
Okres sprawozdawczy: 2023-06-01 do 2024-11-30
Production of clean energy using sources available within the European Union is more important than ever. Equally important is to strengthen EU’s ability to produce hydrogen without using fossil natural gas. The transition from fossil, imported energy sources to clean, domestic energy sources and hydrogen production needs to happen in a way that the citizens of the European Union can find acceptable without excessive economic burden. Solid Oxide Cell (SOC) technology answers these challenges by enabling:
1. Usage of domestic, underutilized energy sources such as biogas with Solid Oxide Fuel Cells (SOFC),
2. High-efficiency hydrogen production using Solid Oxide Electrolyser (SOE) and
3. Providing means to control electricity demand/production, and therefore the electricity cost, by modulating hydrogen production based on availability of wind & solar power.
AMPS will develop, demonstrate and validate in actual production lines mass-manufacturing and quality control methods to produce SOC components and stacks at low cost and at high volumes by bringing together the leading European companies. The project is motivated by partner's strong commitment to develop their products and services and commence real mass-manufacturing.
The high-level AMPS objectives are:
1. Automated high-speed cell production with integrated quality control
2. Automated high-speed interconnect plate production and coating with integrated quality control
3. Automated high-speed stack assembly with integrated quality control
4. Complete component tracking and optimized mass-manufacturing by using virtual twins
5. Assessment and demonstration of target stack manufacturing cost of <800 €/kWel at production volume of 100 MW/year
6. Establish European supply chain of SOC manufacturing equipment.
AMPS proceeds beyond the state-of-art by developing several automated solutions for manufacturing with significant reduction in cycle times thus allowing scale-up of stack production for higher than100 MW annual volumes.
1. Usage of domestic, underutilized energy sources such as biogas with Solid Oxide Fuel Cells (SOFC),
2. High-efficiency hydrogen production using Solid Oxide Electrolyser (SOE) and
3. Providing means to control electricity demand/production, and therefore the electricity cost, by modulating hydrogen production based on availability of wind & solar power.
AMPS will develop, demonstrate and validate in actual production lines mass-manufacturing and quality control methods to produce SOC components and stacks at low cost and at high volumes by bringing together the leading European companies. The project is motivated by partner's strong commitment to develop their products and services and commence real mass-manufacturing.
The high-level AMPS objectives are:
1. Automated high-speed cell production with integrated quality control
2. Automated high-speed interconnect plate production and coating with integrated quality control
3. Automated high-speed stack assembly with integrated quality control
4. Complete component tracking and optimized mass-manufacturing by using virtual twins
5. Assessment and demonstration of target stack manufacturing cost of <800 €/kWel at production volume of 100 MW/year
6. Establish European supply chain of SOC manufacturing equipment.
AMPS proceeds beyond the state-of-art by developing several automated solutions for manufacturing with significant reduction in cycle times thus allowing scale-up of stack production for higher than100 MW annual volumes.
In the first stage of the project "Project Quality Management Plan PQMP", "Ethics Plan", and "Project Data Management Plan PDMP" have been prepared to give solid base for the future technical and scientific work. Consortium has work very hard and efficiently and has created successfully following methods:
1. Method to recycle cell production waste (D2.1).
2. Design of automated raw material handling for nickel oxide (D2.2).
3. Design of automatic cell heat treatment process for mass production (D2.3).
4. Specification and requirements for the interconnect laser welding process (D3.1).
5. First draft of the Hydrogen safety planning (D6.1).
In addition, validation of reduction of cell production waste method has been done partly successfully (2.4). However, some additional test must be done to sure that 100 MW annual volume scale can really be reached. This work can be finalized in a few months.
Progress of the project has been well in the line of Grant Agreement and big deviations cannot be seen.
1. Method to recycle cell production waste (D2.1).
2. Design of automated raw material handling for nickel oxide (D2.2).
3. Design of automatic cell heat treatment process for mass production (D2.3).
4. Specification and requirements for the interconnect laser welding process (D3.1).
5. First draft of the Hydrogen safety planning (D6.1).
In addition, validation of reduction of cell production waste method has been done partly successfully (2.4). However, some additional test must be done to sure that 100 MW annual volume scale can really be reached. This work can be finalized in a few months.
Progress of the project has been well in the line of Grant Agreement and big deviations cannot be seen.
The AMPS project will develop and demonstrate in actual production lines cost-efficient mass manufacturing and quality control methods and manufacturing equipment. These methods, software and equipment can then be directly sold by participating companies as products and product lines and knowhow. Before the end, AMPS project will achieved following results beyond the state of the art:
1. Cell manufacturing will increased yield from current 70% to above 95% and reduction of production time and cost at least 75%. Automation of material handling will allow production upscaling to >100 MW/year.
2. Create concept for automated interconnect manufacturing for mass production.
3. Development of automated stack assembly process for mass production (>100 MW/year).
4. Clarification of the requirements and boundary conditions that need to be met to reach manufacturing cost of <800 €/kW at 100 MW annual production volume of SOFC stacks.
The cost-effective series production of the FC with a production of at least 100 MW/year can only be achieved through the automation, optimization and digitization of the critical and cost-intensive manufacturing processes and this is exactly what AMPS project aims to do.
1. Cell manufacturing will increased yield from current 70% to above 95% and reduction of production time and cost at least 75%. Automation of material handling will allow production upscaling to >100 MW/year.
2. Create concept for automated interconnect manufacturing for mass production.
3. Development of automated stack assembly process for mass production (>100 MW/year).
4. Clarification of the requirements and boundary conditions that need to be met to reach manufacturing cost of <800 €/kW at 100 MW annual production volume of SOFC stacks.
The cost-effective series production of the FC with a production of at least 100 MW/year can only be achieved through the automation, optimization and digitization of the critical and cost-intensive manufacturing processes and this is exactly what AMPS project aims to do.