Bioethanol fuel cell

Can't run an internal combustion engine with the ETOH?

Keith Cress
kcress -

There is no such thing as a direct ethanol fuel cell. No company on earth sells such a thing.

There is such a thing as a direct methanol fuel cell. Their efficiency and durability are both still terrible though.

It is possible to reform both methanol and ethanol to produce hydrogen to feed a conventional PEM fuel cell. Complete and total removal of both CO and CO2 is required though, to avoid either the death of the fuelcell catalyst or excessive anode tailgas venting to keep it from dying. It's not really practical either.

The problem with ICEs of that power is that its performance in general does not exceed 20%, and is not a value that serves us today. This is why, in part, we sought solutions of the style of fuel cells, since in general, running with hydrogen or even reforming natural gas yield better yields. (Of at least 40% running on natural gas).
We know that it is not a simple solution and we are aware of problems such as those named moltenmetal, but we have seen that some companies already offer some advanced prototype, which is based on the reform of ethanol in hydrogen, and feeding a cell with this hydrogen.

perhaps you should start with Google Scholar:
TTFN (ta ta for now)
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