Renewable Fuel Cells for the Fuel Cell Economy Center of Economic Excellence

Inception:
2005

About the CoEE:

The Renewable Fuel Cells for the Fuel Cell Economy CoEE is a part of the larger Future Fuels™ Initiative, which is expanding USC’s expertise in fuel cells and alternative energy. The CoEE is developing catalysts that allow alternative fuels to be produced from renewable sources, which will be extremely important as the transportation sector moves away from dependence on imported oil and carbon-based fuel. The CoEE also coordinates state and local research projects to attract additional capital investment in fuel-cell-related industry to South Carolina.

To date, the CoEE has received more than $1.5 million in research funding. Work associated with this CoEE has led to the creation of a start-up company, Palmetto Fuel Cell Technologies.

Along with other components of the Future Fuels™ Initiative, the Renewable Fuel Cells for the Fuel Cell Economy CoEE will be housed in the Horizon Center, a $55 million public-private facility at USC Innovista. The chairs for these CoEEs will work with public and private sector alliances such as the S.C. Hydrogen and Fuel Cell Alliance and the Greater Columbia Fuel Cell Collaborative. USC presently has the nation’s only NSF Industry/University Cooperative Research Center (I/UCRC) for Fuel Cells, which was renewed in FY 2009 for five years. As a part of this renewal, the I/UCRC has become a multi-university endeavor with the addition of the University of Connecticut and five member companies: IBM, Fuel Cell Energy, Northeast Utilities Foundation, Siemens and D‐Star Engineering. These CoEEs have international collaborations with the Korea Institute of Energy Research and the Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy in Germany.

Funding level:
$3 million

CoEE endowed chair:

Horizon I is a five-story, 125,320 square-foot university research facility on the USC Innovista campus. This building is currently in Phase I of construction and is expected to open in April 2010. Horizon I will be primarily devoted to the developmental research for future fuels, hydrogen, fuel cells, and polymer nanocomposites.