In April 2004, engineering and science students from U of T took third place at the American National Hydrogen Association’s first annual Student Design Contest for hydrogen refuelling stations in Los Angeles, California. This year they are gearing up for the 2005 competition.
Near the end of the 2003 school year Monica Samec, a U of T undergrad studying chemistry, physics and international development, found out about the contest and contacted Dr. Steven J. Thorpe, engineering professor and the faculty’s vice-dean for undergraduates. Thorpe, who has extensive experience in hydrogen engineering research in both the public and private sectors, agreed to act as their staff advisor providing guidance on technical, policy and marketing issues.
Samec organized a recruiting session for students during the last week of classes. By the end of the week, the U of T Hydrogen Design Team was registered in the competition and ready to go.
The 2004 contest required contestants to “design a fuelling station with off the shelf parts,” says Thorpe. The team took “a backyard approach,” says Samec. They designed a small station that would fuel cars, act as a research station, and serve as a demonstration centre for the public. Electricity, generated on-site by a wind turbine, would be used to obtain hydrogen from water through a molecule splitting process called “electrolysis.” The cars fuelled by the station would be powered by hydrogen fuel cells, which work by combining hydrogen fuel with oxygen from the air, and using the energy created by the chemical reaction to create electricity.
The contest was designed to encourage university students to tackle the issues of creating a “hydrogen economy,” replacing our dependence on oil and gas. This new economy is already gaining steam.
In California, hydrogen-fuelling stations are being built, with plans to have 200 stations and a network running to British Columbia by 2010. In Canada there are plans for a Hydrogen Highway in British Columbia for the 2010 Winter Olympics, and plans for a Hydrogen Village on Toronto’s waterfront.
The project called not only for technical expertise, but also work in graphic design, economic and environmental analysis and marketing. Samec noted that this year’s team is particularly interested in recruiting students to help with the economic side of things. Thorpe pointed out, “[You] can’t do it from an engineering perspective alone.” Students from across all disciplines are necessary to help the group meet the requirements of the contest. “[A] multi-disciplinary team…is what they need in the real world,” Thorpe said, to provide for not only the science and design of the project, but also to assess its economic & environmental viability, and to market it in the public sphere.
This year’s team will have to meet a new challenge: designing a fuelling station that will also have an on-site hydrogen mini-power plant. Nemanja Danilovic and Ivan Vinogradov, co-leaders of the 2005 contest team, are looking forward to the work. Danilovic, who has been working on research for the past two years with Dr. Thorpe, said he is excited now to be working on the “real world applications” of his research.
Thorpe is enthusiastic as well. He called the project “a great undergraduate activity,” and commented that he was “extremely proud” of last year’s team, and is looking forward to advising this year’s team. Hydrogen technology, says Thorpe, is “one of four areas the faculty [of engineering] will focus on in the future” in terms of both research and curriculum.
