Molten carbonate fuel cell power generation system

Research and development of molten carbonate fuel cells (MCFC) have been conducted by Hitachi, Ltd since 1981 under contracts with the Agency of New Energy and Industrial Science (NEDO). Hitachi has already completed a 100 kW MCFC test plant and in 1994 moved on to construct a 1000 kW pilot plant. Features of MCFC power generation systems are the high plant efficiency and environment friendly characteristics. The efficiency is expected to be about 55% with LNG and 50% with coal. In order to accelerate commercialization of MCFC plants, Hitachi has both studied systems suitable for distributed and large scale power plants and also experimented with fuel cell life tests. Stacks with full-size cells have demonstrated lifetimes above 5000 h at 5 atmospheres and single cells have shown Lifetimes of 30,000 h at atmospheric pressure. The 1000 kW pilot plant will be constructed and tested by 1997 and a 10 MW class demonstration plant will be constructed by 2003. (C) 1997 Elsevier Science Ltd.