July 13, 2007
Fuel cells moving in to Submarines

Fuel cells apparently make a good submarine hard to find.

Air Products of Pennsylvania this week announced it supplied a new fueling station to supply a state-of-the-art HDW 214 submarine of the Hellenic (Greek) Navy with hydrogen.

The first fueling of its kind in Greece took place this week in Skaramanga, near Athens.

Air Products supplied the integral components of the hydrogen fueling station to the submarine's designer, Howaldtswerke-Deutsche Werft GmbH (HDW), which has been experimenting with fuel cell technology for submarines since the late 1970s.

HDW's Class 212 and 214 non-nuclear submarines have been developed to use a silent operating fuel cell plant that runs on nine 34-kilowatt Siemens polymer electrolyte membrane (PEM) hydrogen fuel cells. Read