Fuel Cell Industry Grows by Over 40% in 2009, says Fuel Cell Today

Jan. 18, 2010 - PRLog -- Despite recession and economic slowdown, the progress of the fuel cell industry towards commercialisation continued in 2009, according to Fuel Cell Today’s (FCT’s) 2010 Industry Review, Fuel Cells: Sustainability. The book will be launched at the World Future Energy Summit in Abu Dhabi on January 19th. The 2010 Review is the only report that benchmarks the state of the global fuel cell industry in terms of a number of key metrics including shipments, supply chain and manufacturing availability, as well as 5-year market forecasts.

Fuel Cell Today’s analysis reveals that shipments of fuel cell systems in 2009 were approximately 24,000 units, an increase of 41 per cent compared to 2008. Cumulative shipments of all types of fuel cells by the end of 2009 totalled around 75,000 units with three-quarters of this number produced in the last three years.

Most of the units shipped to date were manufactured in Asia, where production of stationary fuel cells has been stimulated by the Japanese government’s subsidised CHP programme. In Europe the leisure industry was affected by the economic crisis and shipments of transport APUs for recreational vehicles have fallen. This decline is counterbalanced in North America by an increase in shipments of stationary UPS units and fuel cells for forklift trucks, both applications supported by US federal funding.

The 2010 Review also, for the first time, quantifies the fuel cell supply chain in terms of MW of manufacturing capacity and also the numbers of companies operating in the space – an analysis that has implications for the production of stacks and systems. Fuel Cell Today has also for the first time rated the added value of current commercial, or near to commercial, stationary and transport fuel cell technologies for potential adopters using a range of criteria including supplier availability, operating cost, and available subsidies for adoption.  

As in previous editions of the Review, Fuel Cells: Sustainability also provides five year market projections broken down by region, technology and fuel, together with a detailed discussion of the forecast trends. Dr. Kerry-Ann Adamson, Principal Analyst at Fuel Cell Today commented: “We anticipate millions of portable fuel cell units being shipped by 2014, with a heavy dominance of portable fuel cells. In stationary applications, we anticipate over 1.5 GW of shipments by the end of the forecast period. All of this points to the vitality of the fuel cell industry over the next five years, with positive implications in the longer term for job creation and emissions reduction”.