Bridging the Gap between New Materials , Fuel Cell Devices and Products: An Alliance of Virginia Universities, Battelle , VA Center for Innovative Tech, Industry Partners and LANL

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0332648McGrathThis award is to Virginia Polytechnic Institute & State University to support the activity described below for 36 months. The proposal was submitted in response to the Partnerships for Innovation Program Solicitation (NSF-03521).PartnersThe partners include Virginia Polytechnic Institute & State University (Lead Institution), Virginia Commonwealth University, Los Alamos National Laboratory, Battelle, Virginia Center for Innovative Technology, General Motors, Motorola, Hydrosize Technologies, and TeleEnergy Systems, .In addition, student recruitment and faculty exchanges with Grambling State University, Hampton University, Morgan State University, and University of South Carolina Spartanburg will broaden the participation of underrepresented minorities.The primary objective of this award is to integrate recently demonstrated proton exchange membrane fuel cells, processes and related technologies in a partnership with key universities, key industrial organizations, and national laboratories. New membrane materials are being developed. The industrial partners are performing the fuel cell system engineering analysis. The national laboratory partner is Characterization of the molecular structure of the new materials and relating that to the fuel cell performance. The universities and the industrial partners are developing new processing and manufacturing methods. The Virginia Center for Innovative Technology is promoting the outcomes of the work and recruiting/developing new start-up companies. Students involved in the project will become a significant part of the workforce necessary to support the emerging fuel cell business. Long-term sustainability is a key component of the program.Potential Economic ImpactThee fuel cell business is predicted to be in excess of $11 billion by 2011. Fuel cells provide clean, reliable energy in stationary, portable, and automotive applications.The intellectual merit of the activity lies in providing an integrated effort from fundamental research on new materials, development of novel materials processing, fuel cell system performance analysis, and fuel cell manufacturing scale-up. The broader impacts of the activity concentrate on creating a new student generation for the fuel cell industry with an emphasis on recruitment and involvement of underrepresented minorities.