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Business ShaEgy and the Environment, Vol. 5,1617'7 (less)

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SUSTAINABLE TECHNOLOGY DEVELOPMENT: THE MOBILE HYDROGEN FUEL CELL

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Philip Vergragt and Dione van Noort, Sustainable Technological Development Programme and Delft University of Technology, Delft, The Netherlands -

Sustainable technology development implies large changes in technological systems. The illustrative process 'hydrogen fuel cell in a boat' is used here as an example of a learning process concerning a transition towards a hydrogen economy. Theoretically the concepts of constructive technology assessment, back-casting and social niche management are combined in this approach.

ccc 09~-4733/96/030i68-10 0 1996 by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment.

INTRODUCTION

he central theme of this paper is how to influence technological development in the T direction of sustainability. This question will

be approached from theoretical and practical points of view. Theoretically, the concept of constructive technology assessment is introduced, which aims to manage technological development in directions that are optimal with respect to social acceptance @aey Ouwens et al., 1987; Rip et al., 1995). This concept is combined with that of back-casting, i.e. starting from a desirable or unavoidable picture of the future and looking backwards towards the present situation (Jansen and Vergragt, 1993; for back-casting in industry, see Wang and Guild, in press).

Practically, the example of the hydrogen economy will be taken as an illustration. Hydrogen is often considered as the energy carrier of the future: if it is generated by solar cells, wind energy or other non-fossil fuel sources, it can be burned without introducing toxic substances into the atmosphere (Quakernaat, in press). In this context one specific example has been taken: the polymer fuel cell. In this cell hydrogen is chemically combined with oxygen, providing water and an electric current at relatively low temperatures. This type of fuel cell seems to be an appropriate candidate for a power source for personal transportation, such as cars and buses (Prater, 1990; Mallant and Koene, 1993).

The polymer fuel cell has been taken as an example (an illustrative process) by the programme Sustainable Technological Development. In this Dutch interdepartmental research programme it is investigated how, starting from a sustainable futural vision, technologies could be developed and implemented that fulfil the necessary functions while at the same time being sustainable (Jansen and Vergragt, 1992; Vergragt and Jansen, 1993).

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BUSINESS STRATEGY AND THE ENVIRONMENT

P. VERGRAGT AND D. VAN NOORT

The point we want to make in this paper is that constructive technology assessment, together with back-casting, can be operationalized into an approach by which new sustainable technologies could be developed and possibly implemented and accepted in society. In this approach the concept of social networks plays a central part. Social networks are the key variables, both in the stabilization of present technologies and in creating alternatives (Vergragt et al., 1992).

This paper is organized as follows. First we will describe the long-term strategic challenge for technology development as it has been formulated by the interdepartmental research programme 'sustainable technological development'. We will explain how the concept of back-casting is combined with constructive technology assessment and social niche management (Verheul and Vergragt, 1995). We will illustrate this by showing how the sustainable technological development programme took up the challenge of the polymer fuel cell, and how it started to create a social network to support an illustrative process in which a boat powered with fuel cells will be created.

LONG-TERM CHALLENGES FOR TECHNOLOGY DEVELOPMENT

Since the Brundtland Report (WCED, 1987), the notion of 'sustainable development! has been accepted by many governments and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) as a basis for policy- making. In the Netherlands, the government took it as a basis for its National Environmental Policy plans (NEPP 1 and 2) (Dutch Ministry of the Environment, 1989, 1994). However, the focus of these plans was on the short and middle long term, and primarily on the Dutch situation. Also, the relevance and importance for (sometimes radical) technological innovations as a means for sustainable development was insufficiently noticed.

As a consequence, a small task force set about formulating a long-term strategy for technology development which could form the basis of a Dutch government programme. The essence of this strategy is the following. In the very long term, the growth of the world population, together with the increase in global production and consumption, especially in the developing world, will pose new challenges to technological development. Incremental technological innovations will prove to be insufficient to solve environmental problems in the long term.

The Dutch Council for Environmental and Nature Research was asked to research the dimensions of this problem. The Council focused on the

environmental capacity of the earth as a tool to reflect on the physical dimensions of the sustainability concept. In its approach, three dimensions can be distinguished: exhaustion of raw materials, emission of toxic substances and degra- dation of soil, water and ecosystems (Weterings and Opschoor, 1992).

This study led directly to the application of the notion of back-casting to the problem of sustainable development. The time horizon for the back-casting operation is taken as 40-50 years, i.e. the time in which present young people and our children and grandchildren will be alive. A robust picture of the future will include notions about the population, their needs, the production and consumption levels and the environmental efficiency of the technology.

Starting with the needs of the present generation, we may assume that the needs for feeding, drinking and using water, housing, clothing, transportation and recreation will remain. Presently these needs are fulfilled by means of technology, but technology with an insufficient environmental efficiency. In a robust picture of the future, the world population will still want to fulfil these needs. However, the world population is expected to increase by a factor of two to three in the next 50 years. Similarly, in a sustainable world the developing countries will aspire to raise their production and consumption levels to a level which is comparable with our own. This means that physical production and consumption will have risen by a factor of four to eight for most of the population.

Combining these data in the famous Ehrlich formula

E B = M x Pr x WP

where E B = environmental burden, M = metabolism (the environmental burden per unit of prodperity per capita), Pv = prosperity (the level of production and consumption) and WP = world population, and supposing that in 1990 each of the parameters is unity, we obtain for 2040

0.5 - 1 = 1/8 - 1/50 x 4-8 x 2-3

assuming that EB does not increase, but preferably should decrease by a factor of two. This means that M, the metabolism, i.e. the amount of environmental burden per unit of production and consumption, has to decrease by a factor of 8-50, i.e. roughly a factor of 20.

It will be clear that there are three possible options: either the environmental capacity of the earth will be transgressed by a factor of 20, or the environmental efficiency of all technology will have to increase by a factor of 20. The third option would mean that levels of production and consumption

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MOBILE HYDROGEN FUEL CELL

would' be lowered tremendously, which does not seem to be a viable option. The first option seems to be incompatible with a sustainable world, which means that presently only the second option is available.

To increase the environmental efficiency of technology within the next 50 years seems to be a tremendous challenge. However, it is not impos- sible a priori. In the first place, on the shorter time- scales of 10-15 years tremendous efficiency increases could be achieved by implementing existent technologies and increasing management efficiency. Integral life cycle management and industrial ecology could tremendously diminish the environmental burden. In 10-15 years we estimate that a reduction of 75% is achievable, which is a factor of four.

However, in the longer term more drastic innovations will be necessary. When the easy changes have been made and incremental innovations are exhausted, more drastic changes in trajectory and paradigm will be necessary. This 'leap-frogging' towards sustainable technologies will require a tremendous effort in technology development, and also in culture and structure. Summarizing thus far, the notion of back-casting implies looking back from a desirable or unavoidable future vision and generating a challenge for technology developers and policy-makers (the 'factor 20').

The sustainable technological development programme has been created to investigate how these challenges could be met. Its mission is not to change technological trajectories, but to create examples ('illustrations') of sustainable technologies and to develop a methodology (a 'guiding manual') of how to achieve this. Thus it is a research programme with the ambition of bringing about changes in innovative practices.

The result of the illustrative processes will be illustrations of sustainable technologies. They will take the form of 'communicable designs', i.e. designs of technological systems which will be credible for technology developers and which can be communicated towards a larger audience. Communicable designs are not yet realized technologies; they will be a combination of visualized designs of future situations together with research programmes aimed at the solution of technological problems by research and development.

The operation of creating a robust vision of the future, which is at the same time desirable and unavoidable, and which contains a few robust parameters (population, eco-capacity, production and consumption levels) is called back-casting (Jansen and Vergragt, 1993). Starting with this robust picture we look back and design a path for

meeting this challenge. This path implies, among other things, starting long-term research projects aimed at achieving factor 20 environmental efficiency in the long term.

However, at the same time, the social dimension of this endeavour will have to be investigated. In the terminology of the sustainable technological development programme this is called the cultural and structural dimension. The culture is decisive for people's needs; a changing culture might result in changing needs. Until now the dominant culture has been far from sustainable. The structural dimension contains elements of institutions, interests and the economic structure. For the development and implementation of sustainable technologies, cultural and structural changes will be necessary (for some comments on the cultural and structural aspects of sustainable technological development, see Vergragt and Van Grootveld, 1994).

The sustainable technological development programme is managed by a small bureau and supervised by an inter-ministerial committee. A sounding board group has been formed, which includes leading people from industry and NGOs. It will operate in the period 1993-1997, i.e. a five- year term. Its mission is 'to explore and to illustrate, together with policy-makers in government and industry, how technology development could be shaped by back-casting from a sustainable futural vision, and to develop instruments for this'.

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BACK-CASTING, CONSTRUCTIVE TECHNOLOGY ASSESSMENT AND SOCIAL NICHE MANAGEMENT

In the Sustainable Technological Development Programme, elements of constructive technology assessment, social niche management and back- casting are brought together and integrated into one approach. In this section we review these theoretical ideas and try to draw conclusions about their applicability in actual practice.

Constructive Technology Assessment

Constructive technology assessment has been developed as a reaction to the traditional technology assessment approaches (Vergragt, 1992). 'Tradi- tional technology assessment' is characterized by the ambition of forecasting technological developments and their impact on society. Its implicit paradigm is the autonomy of technological development, the separation of technology and its social impacts and the possibility of carrying out objective scientific studies of these impacts.

Under the influence of innovation and technology

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dynamics studies, especially the ’constructivist turn’ in the 1 9 8 0 ~ ~ and also because of the limited success of traditional technology assessment studies, technology assessment started to shift away from consequences and focused more on the design process of technologies (Smits and Leyten, 1991). From the perspective of technology assessment, feedback processes were organized to feed back consequences into the design process. From the perspective of social participation, the ambition of constructive technology assessment is to broaden the decision-making process of technology development and to increase the mutual adaptation of technological and societal developments. To achieve this, new instruments are being developed, such as consensus conferences and futural images for consumers (Fonk, 1994)

Generally, the problem with constructive technology assessment is two-fold. In the first place, the inclusion of more participants in decision-making processes is no guarantee that optimum decisions will be reached. Especially with respect to sustainability and long-term perspectives, it is question- able whether the newly included actors are more interested in these issues than the traditional technology developers. Constructive technology assessment is hard to combine with back-casting. Thus constructive technology assessment is often oriented to the short term social optimization of already existing technologies, thus increasing the entrench- ment of these technologies (Knot et al., 1995).

The second problem is, of course, how to include social actors in design processes in a meaningful way, while at the same time protecting the interests of private firms. In several cases it has become clear that private industries want to protect their informa- tion about options for strategic reasons and this often makes constructive technology assessment difficult.

Back-Casting

Back-casting implies the development and sharing of a robust vision of the future. It implies that actors are prepared to take a long-term view of societal developments and accept some postulates about, for instance, population growth, the limited ecocapacity of the earth and the expectation that in a sustainable society the population of the less developed countries should increase their production and consumption capacities.

Among other aspects of back-casting is the belief that technology can be socially directed, that it is suboptimum in its present manifestation and thus that it is possible to develop technological options that satisfy sustainability criteria better, for instance the factor 20 eco-efficiency increase in the technology.

The problem with back-casting is two-fold. In the

first place it requires long-term strategic thinking. Within most institutions, long-term thinking is not very well developed, which is related to the policy cycle (four years in the Netherlands) and to requested return on investment times (which are often fairly short). The other aspect, related to the first, is the question of creativity. To back-cast, we have to dissociate ourselves from the present situation and make visualizations of possible futures. Of course, these visualizations have to be informed; in other words, back-casters should dissociate themselves from their everyday practices and interests, but should retain their knowledge and skills.

As we mentioned earlier, there is a tension between back-casting and constructive technology assessment. Constructive technology assessment is almost by definition about incremental technological innovations, including the demand side into decision-making, and broadening decision-making processes. Only if this demand side includes future generations could there be an overlap between constructive technology assessment and back- casting. Most constructive technology assessment experiments are thus about short-term perspectives; however, the challenge is that participants in constructive technology assessment activities should include back-casting ideas in their participation process.

Social Niche Management

Social niche management is a concept derived from strategic niche management. Strategic niche management is an implementation strategy in which innovative actors test new technologies in practical situations (Rip, 1989; Schot, 1992). These innovators create a ‘niche’ or protected area, which is shielded from the pressure of the selection environment. In this niche the technology and the users are mutually adapted: the bugs are removed from the technology and the user starts to develop user’s concepts, i.e. ways in which the technology can be used.

The experiments in this niche are also called ’social experiments’. For instance, in the case of the electric car, the user has to start to ‘think electri- cally’, i.e. because of its specific requirements (lower speed, less radius) the user has to adapt its behaviour towards the new technology.

This notion of strategic niche management has been taken up by Verheul and Vergragt (1995) to develop the notion of social niche management. The concept of ’social niche’ refers to the situation in which a niche is supported and protected by a social network. To understand this we have to go back to introduce ’social network analysis’.

Social network analysis refers to the concept that the technology and the social network that supports

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it are'two sides of the same coin. It has been developed by Vergragt (1988) and Mulder (1992). Vergragt analysed processes of technological innovation and found that decisions about start, direction, branching and termination were taken in groups or networks that shared a certain common problem definition. These networks and these common problem definitions define each other. Mulder studied these networks in more detail and found that networks develop over time, responding to certain requirements relating to phases in the innovative processes. Networks grow, become more complex and eventually become latent struc- tures that support an existing technology.

Struggles between existing and newly emerging technologies can thus be conceptualized as compet- ing social networks with different problem definitions. The network related to existing technologies is often fairly strong and the interests of the actors often lie in the perpetuation of the technology and the network. However, due to shifting problem definitions, new technical possibilities and other internal or external changes, new technologies and new networks may arise which compete with the old ones.

The concept of 'social niche management' refers to these situations. It has been developed in relation to the emergence of the Greenfreeze, a refrigerator developed by a network consisting of Greenpeace, a couple of medical doctors and an East German refrigerator company. This fairly heterogeneous set of actors developed a common problem definition, which was how to replace HFCs as the cooling medium with something that was more environ- mentally friendly. Together they formed a heterogeneous network which operated in a protected niche which was only formed by their common belief and aim. The authors thus stipulate that the protection of a niche can be self-constructed by a heterogeneous set of actors, provided they can find a common problem definition.

The relations among constructive technology assessment, back-casting and social niche management are not straightforward. Constructive technology assessment implies the broadening of the decision-making process about technological innovation, whereas social niche management refers to the starting of a new technological trajectory by a new set of actors. What connects them is that in both instances the users of the technology are included in the network. Social niche management also relates to back-casting: the common motivations and aims of the heterogeneous actors may be derived from a common belief in the possibilities of increasing the environmental efficiency of technology. Back- casting makes this belief more explicit and thus could form the basis of social niche formation.

HYDROGEN POLYMER FUEL CELLS

The Sector Analysis 'Sustainable Mainport Rotterdam'

In the context of the sustainable technological development programme, and together with the Municipal Harbour Authority of Rotterdam, an analysis has been made of the possibilities of a 'Sustainable Harbour Rotterdam in 2040. In this analysis, a back-casting operation has been per- formed with two notions as a starting point: The harbour Rotterdam has to remain a Mainport, i.e. a major economic and logistic centre and, secondly, the harbour will have to become a sustainable harbour, which implies a factor of 20 of environmental efficiency increase over all its technological operations. This also includes transportation to and from the harbour, over sea and over land, and the industrial activities related to the harbour activities.

In the analysis, five subjects were investigated together with one "eta-project' which aimed at providing an integrating framework. The results are published elsewhere (Vergragt and Van Groot- veld, 1994; Programme Sustainable Technological Development, 1995). One of the subjects was the hydrogen economy. In a sustainable mainport in 2040, coal, oil and gas might be substituted by hydrogen as the major energy carriers. This hydrogen might be produced by sustainable sources such as solar and wind energy and might be transported to the Netherlands by pipes or by ships. Sustainably produced hydrogen does not produce the green- house gas carbon dioxide and it is possible to produce electricity without burning, avoiding the production of the acid-producing nitrogen oxides.

In a report in the context of this study, the possible options for illustrative processes in the context of Rotterdam harbour and the hydrogen economy were sketched (Lako and Kroon, 1994). Among these options were transportation vehicles fuelled by hydrogen, and fuel cells for stationary heat and power co-generation. In a workshop in which the results of this study were discussed, the participants were interested in studying the option of a polymer fuel cell to be built in a vehicle or on a boat. This was confirmed in a second workshop with more participants from industry.

Hydrogen

Hydrogen captures the imagination as a future clean power source. When it is burned it yields energy with only water as a reaction product; no toxic substance is formed that affects the global climate or the ozone layer. In a fuel cell an even more efficient reaction is possible as hydrogen is

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directly transformed into electricity. This is possible at lower temperatures and thus avoids the possible formation of nitric oxides, which are also harmful to the atmosphere.

Difficulties with hydrogen are: its extremely volatile behaviour; its reactivity, which makes it dangerous (although no more dangerous than, for instance, LNG); its low boiling point, which makes it difficult to liquefy; and, last but not least, its image, which was formed by the explosion of the Hindenburg Zeppelin in the 1920s and which remains in the collective memory as a symbol of extreme danger. On the other hand, hydrogen was part of the coal gas in our households before natural gas was exploited.

One final difficulty is the production of hydrogen. Presently hydrogen is produced as a by- product from the cracking of oil and this production is far from sustainable. The stock of oil is expected to be exhausted in the next few decades and the chemical reaction for the production of hydrogen yields carbon monoxide and carbon dioxide as by- products, which cause global climate change. To develop a sustainable energy system, hydrogen will have to be produced from solar, wind, hydro or other non-fossil sources. In that case no net carbon dioxide is brought into the atmosphere and thus it will become a sustainable energy carrier. In the medium term, hydrogen could be produced from the steam reforming of natural gas, which produces less carbon dioxide, which could be stored. Another option is the production of methanol or ethanol from crops and organic waste, which closes the carbon dioxide loop.

Fuel Cells

Fuel cells were first developed and applied in the 1960s as power sources in space projects. Polymer fuel cells were used in seven Gemini missions. Apart from providing energy from hydrogen, these cells also provided potable water for the astronauts. However, at that time the polymer membrane was short-lived only 500 hours. For this reason, in the Apollo project the alkaline fuel cell was chosen and the development of the polymer fuel cell stagnated. Later the Nafion membrane was developed by Du Pont with a life time of 60,000 hours (Prater, 1990). In 1984 the Canadian firm Ballard tookup the development of the polymer fuel cell. At the same time, Siemens also started a project.

In a fuel cell hydrogen and oxygen react to form water. This reaction yields energy in the form of electricity. It is the reverse reaction of electrolysis, in which water is split into hydrogen and oxygen by an electric current. The difference with a battery is that a continuous supply of hydrogen is possible; no

recharging is necessary. There are many dgferent possibilities for the electrolyte (the intermediary between the anode and the cathode).

The main (potential) applications for fuel cells are stationary - for the production of combined heat and power and for military applications where energy is needed with little noise and at low temperatures - and for transportation, for instance in cars, buses, lorries and boats. At present Ballard develops buses with polymer fuel cells. They expect a market pull from the USA and especially from California, because of its zero-emission legislation. In the USA itself there is a programme for the development of a solid polymer fuel cell for cars, fuelled by methanol. In the Eureka Fuel Cell Demonstration project there is a bus fuelled by an alkaline fuel cell. There are several projects in which stationary fuel cells are demonstrated.

There are various types of fuel cells in different stages of development and operating by different principles. Some fuel cells operate at high temperatures, which complicates their design. The most important of these are the molten carbonate fuel cell (MCFC) and the solid oxide fuel cell (SOFC). In the Netherlands a large development programme for MCFCs is in operation, designed to demonstrate its potential and lowering the price. This project was not successful and has been terminated, which negatively affected the image of fuel cells in general. The SOFC is still in its development stage, but seems to be less appropriate for transportation because of its fraghty. Both high temperature systems have potential for stationary applications, especially for combined heat and power (because of their high temperature).

Among the fuel cells at lower temperature the phosphoric acid fuel cell is the furthest forward in its development. It is, however, inappropriate for transportation use because of its high weight and volume and its slow starting time (15 minutes). The alkaline fuel cell is still a good candidate for transportation applications, but at the moment its weight and volume are far too large. Among the main bottlenecks are the extreme sensitivity to carbon dioxide, which makes purification of hydrogen important, and the corrosive nature of the alkali, which affects the materials. The polymer fuel cell is the focus of this paper. It is still in the early stages of development, but its prospects are good, especially for transportation.

The Solid Polymer Fuel Cell

The solid polymer fuel cell (SPFC) consists of two electrodes separated by a thin sheet of proton- conducting polymer. The best known is Nafion by Du Pont; Dow Chemical has also developed a



polymer. These polymers were first developed as membranes for the chlorine-alkali industry. The working temperature is 70430°C. The voltage is about 1 V. The electrodes are partly of platinum for catalysis; the amount of platinum is currently about 0.35 mg/cm2. The cells are combined into stacks; currently one cell is 1 cm thick; but the potential is three cells per centimetre by decreasing the width of the separator plates.

There are still many bottlenecks in application of the SPFC in transportation. These bottlenecks are technical, economic, infrastructural and social and cultural barriers. Technically, the power density of the fuel cell is an important parameter. Compared with conventional power sources, the SPFC currently requires a higher volume and weight. One of the research objectives is thus to diminish the volume and weight of the SPFC. One of the options is to minimize the width of the separator plates between the individual cells.

Another technical bottleneck is the membrane. This has to be fairly thin (less than 100 pm) to maximize the proton exchange and thus the capacity. Membrane technology now appears to have reached an optimum on which it is difficult to improve. The electrodes are made of graphite paper or woven paper, with platinum as a catalyst. One of the research objectives is to reduce the amount of platinum for cost reasons.

One of the other significant problems is how to store hydrogen in a vehicle. There are three possibilities: gas under pressure; liquid; and chemically bounded as a hydride. There is much research on how to develop systems that are applicable to transportation, i.e. that are safe, do not require too much space, are not too heavy, do not leak too much and are easily operable. Alternatives are formed by other fuels that could be converted into hydrogen - for instance methanol. However, this conversion process is rather slow. Other problems are the sensitivity of the fuel cell to contaminants such as carbon monoxide and carbon dioxide. Both of these are present in commercial hydrogen, which means that hydrogen gas has to be purified to be usable.

In summary, although the polymer fuel cell is a good candidate for a power source in transportation, many technical problems have to be solved to make it functional under the required conditions. One of the most important bottlenecks for introduction is the price. At this moment a 5 kW stack (a series of coupled cells) costs $100,000 because it is fabricated manually. It is expected that the price will have to go down to $50-200 per kW, i.e. a factor of 100400, to become competitive. When series production is possible, these prices can be reached and then the SPFC could be operating at a

comparable cost level to a combustion or electric motor. The potentials for cost reduction lie in mass production, a reduction in the amount of platinum and the cost of the membrane. The costs of the separator plates also have to decrease.

The fuel price is another aspect of the cost. It has been calculated that the price of the required hydrogen, obtained with current technologies (and current environmental pollution) is about two to three times as high as the comparable price of car gasoline (Shell, pers. comm., 1995). However, about 90% of the gasoline price currently consists of costs other than production costs (VAT, etc.) and thus it is possible to equate the hydrogen price with the gasoline price by appropriate government measures.

To operate in a vehicle, the polymer fuel cell has to function as part of a system. This system contains, among other things: an electrical circuit which is able to steer electricity production; a battery for the storage of electricity as a buffer when a high current is suddenly needed and also for storing braking energy; a storage system for hydrogen; a filling system; a monitoring system; and all kinds of safety systems. Outside the vehicle an infrastructure has to be built that makes filling possible. Thus either a hydrogen pipe system has to be constructed or hydrogen produced locally by decentralized units.

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Barriers to Implementation

As we have seen, the SPFC is still at an early stage of development. Even if the technical bottlenecks are solved and if the price decreases in the future, this is no guarantee of implementation. Firstly, there will be fierce competition with alternative systems such as the electric vehicle and vehicles using biofuels. Secondly, the present physical infrastructure does not facilitate a shift in transportation technology. Thus an alternative system will have to compete with the existing infrastructure. Thirdly, it is unknown how much the argument of sustainability will prevail among other arguments. Only if the requirements for sustainable transportation are translated into regulations and prices will the market be able to provide the required momentum for further development and implementation. Lastly, vested interests are at stake. The present networks around the existing transportation system do not favour a quick transition towards a new system. This also relates to culture, knowledge and institutions. The present car culture, combined with the internal combustion motor, does not facilitate a quick transition. The knowledge base has to be developed because there is a lot of knowledge about the present systems in garages, schools, etc., but

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knowledge about the alternative is restricted. The same applies to the existing institutions.

The Fuel Cell Boat

As has been sketched earlier, the SPFC is at an early stage of development, but has a high potential to become an important power source for transportation. Many technical and economic barriers have to be overcome. Internationally, several research projects are under way to improve the performance and lower the price. In a few places demonstration projects are developing - for instance, in Canada where Ballard has developed a bus to run on SPFCs.

For the second workshop, TNO proposed to proceed with a ship fuelled by SPFCs (Bade and Schmal, 1995). The motives for this choice were a mixture of technical and economic arguments. Technically, at the present stage of development it is difficult to fit the fuel cell system into a car or a bus. On a boat it is expected that there is more room available for the accommodation of the technical equipment. Another argument is that the Nether- lands have an important ship-building industry, which has declined in the past few decades, but now shows signs of recovery. Moreover, there is some innovative shipbuilding in the Netherlands. Another important argument is that ship motors are often very polluting and use contaminated oil. The potential for environmental gains are thus fairly high if a boat with a fuel cell is successful.

This idea was discussed in the second workshop at the beginning of 1995 with representatives from industry, government and research institutes. No final conclusion has been reached. The idea of developing a boat fuelled by an SPFC fuel cell was welcomed, but on the other hand it was pleaded that the automobile industry should not be excluded.

The sustainable technological development bureau decided that a pilot study should be conducted to investigate the possible options for an illustrative process. The preliminary decision was to investigate a boat, but to keep the options for a land vehicle open. A stakeholder analysis of actors from industry, technological research institutes and uni- versities, government departments and indepen- dent consultants has been conducted. The aims of this stakeholder analysis were: (i) to obtain more knowledge about the technical aspects of the SPFC and the potential environmental gains; (ii) to identlfy the interests of the actors and to investigate the willingness for co-operation in a joint project; (iii) to identify options for the organization of the project and the part the sustainable technological development programme could play in this; to investigate the demand side of the project - could

leading edge customers be identified?; and ‘(iv) to prepare a proposal for an illustrative project for the steering committee and the sounding board committee of the sustainable technological development programme.

In the first half of 1995 important actors from industry, government, research institutes and inde- pendent consultants were interviewed. From these interviews a stakeholder analysis was constructed. We summarize here the main conclusions from this study.

The idea of developing a boat fuelled by an SPFC is interesting for several industrial actors. The fuel cell itself should be bought abroad because the Netherlands do not have the expertise to produce it nationally. Firstly, the function of the boat has to be specified. The Technical University of Delft per- formed a first market study in which potential users of the boat have been identified. A leading edge customer should be interested in the exploitation of a SPFC boat and at the same time willing to co- operate in a field experiment of testing the SPFC in practice.

Secondly, a technical design will soon be produced by the Delft University of Technology. In this design, the system components will have to be integrated. This design process will be guided by a sounding board group from industry. The entire project is managed by a project manager who is responsible for the integration of the technical design on the one hand and the industrial interests on the other.

The result of the project will consist of the following elements: specification of the functions of the boat; a technical design of a boat including an SPFC and technical components around it; an indication of the current and potential environmental gains; a sketch of the implementation trajectory including the financing and the role of each of the actors in the process; and the specification of research questions which have to be solved to overcome technical bottlenecks.

The first result of the stakeholder analysis is that several actors are interested in participating in the programme. The Dutch Government is developing a programme for economy, ecology and technology which might accommodate the subsequent implementation trajectory. Several large technological institutes in the Netherlands are interested in participating; they have technological expertise on fuel cells and support systems. A few industrial corporations have indicated that they are willing to co-operate, probably in an advisory role. The role of the sustainable technological development programme could be in orchestration, with the help of a small amount of seed money. The main function of sustainable technological development



should be adding a communicative element to the whole project.

The role of the Dutch automobile and truck producers is that they follow these developments with attention and that they are willing to partici- pate in the sounding board group. They do not see spin-offs in the immediate future, but they see opportunities in the longer term. From the sustainable technological development perspective, the real environmental advantage should lie in the adoption of the SPFC in land transportation; however, a ship could act as a first niche to explore both a market segment and the technology.

It is important to stress that the illustrative process 'polymer fuel cell boat' is not an aim in itself. The illustrative process's first aim is to explore the possible transition to a sustainable hydrogen economy. For this transition, a major change in infrastructure is necessary. To explore some aspects of this transition, the SPFC boat could be used as a 'probe'.

CONCLUSIONS

The illustrative process 'polymer fuel cell boat' contains elements of constructive technology assessment, social niche management and back- casting. The central element in the illustrative process is the formation of a social network of actors that support the idea. The first step in the formation of this actor network is a careful stakeholder analysis in which interests and aims, as well as mutual connections, are analysed. This is combined with the back-casting operation in which images of a futural hydrogen society are discussed among the stakeholders. Once these images are accepted among the stakeholders, we could say that a social niche has been formed in which a heterogeneous network of actors share a common idea of creating a certain technological artefact, in this case a polymer fuel cell boat. Of course, this is not enough to keep this network together. At least two elements should be added a strong management to keep the actors with their different interests and aims in line and the creation of a technical design which is on the one hand credible for technology developers and on the other communicable to the other stakeholders.

Until now the constructive technology assessment element has hardly been present in this approach. Thus we should reflect how the users of the fuel cell boat could be involved in the process. One category of users could be the exploiters of the boat. Which motives could a boat exploiter have for exploiting a hydrogen boat? More research is needed here. A second category includes the

passengers on the boat. The interests of these passengers have been completely unknown until now. More research is needed on the question about how to increase the passenger's interests in the functioning of a hydrogen fuel cell boat. One of the suggestions here is to combine the operation of the fuel cell boat with an exhibition of the hydrogen economy and its sustainability aspects to interest citizens in the relation between the local artefact (the hydrogen boat) and the global challenge (a sustainable society and the role of hydrogen in it).

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BIOGRAPHY

Professor dr. Philip J. Vergragt and Ir. Dione van Noort are with the Sustainable Technological Development Programme, PO Box 6063, 2600 JA Delft, The Nether- lands. Tel.: +31 15 2697543. Fax.: +31 15 2697547. The first author is also at the Delft University of Technology: e- mail [email protected].

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