A regenerative fuel cell uses oxygen and hydrogen for the production of water, electricity, and waste heat. In a regenerative fuel cell, the conversion of fuel cell reactants into products and reconversion of fuel cell products into reactants are the two stages involved in the process of producing electrical energy. This type of fuel cell can store extremely high specific energy as compared to the other fuel cells such as methanol fuel cell, polymer electrolyte membrane (PEM) cell, and others. According to the U.S. Department of Energy, the packed specific energy in RFC is up to 1,000 W-hr/Kg whereas that of nickel/cadmium (Ni/Cd) and Lithium ion (Li/ion) batteries is less than 100 W-hr/Kg.Insightful Information Of this Report: Click Here
Market Dynamics
Rising usage of regenerative fuel cells both commercial and non-commercially, owing to factors such as high reliability, environmentally friendly, and renewable energy conversion is one of the major factors that is expected to drive growth of regenerative fuel cell technologies market over the forecast period. RFCs have wide range of applications such as backup or emergency power generation, storage of energy for remote off-grid power sources, high-altitude, long-endurance solar rechargeable aircraft, and hybrid energy storage/propulsion systems for spacecraft.
However, high cost of operation and maintenance is restraining the growth of regenerative fuel cell technologies market. Furthermore, low availability of fuel and low durability of fuel cells, especially at elevated temperatures are factors negatively affecting the growth of RFC technologies market.
Key Trends
Key players are focused towards adopting various organic and inorganic growth strategies such as mergers and acquisitions, joint ventures, partnerships, product or technological innovations, and market expansion to retain position in the regenerative fuel cell technologies market. For instance, in April 2016, as part of the mass production design phase, ZincNyx Energy Solutions Inc., the subsidiary of MGX Minerals Inc., expanded its capacity of zinc-air fuel cell battery, which stores energy in the form of zinc particles and does not contain any high cost battery commodities such as vanadium, cobalt or lithium.
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Market players
Some of the leading players operating in the global regenerative fuel cell technologies market include Hitachi Group, Infinity Fuel Cell and Hydrogen, Inc., Toshiba Corporation, UltraCell LLC, Sharp Corporation, and ZincNyx Energy Solutions, Inc., among other.