MechChem Africa November-December 2022

Cummins’ innovations in hydrogen production and energy storage

Boasting some of the world’s best renewable resources, the Africa and Middle East (AME) region is well positioned to host gigawatt size hydrogen production sites, predicts Alan Zhao, who heads up the New Power business for global power

internal combustion engine. In terms of tra ditional products, however, there is limited innovation in the AME region at the product platform level. “The region has been playing a late-adopter role for Cummins’ engine-based products,” notes Zhao. “At Cummins, innovation at the global product platform and fundamental com ponent level impacts both developed and developing economies. Beyond this, we have innovation that impacts regional and market segment levels in any stage of an economy, which we refer to as fit-for-market innova tion,” explains Zhao. The full ecosystem of zero emission tech nology includes upstream, midstream and downstream. Cummins continues to invest in other advanced technology tominimise emis sions, including fuel-agnostic engines such as hydrogen and natural gas engines. On the upstream side, Cummins has

world-best electrolyser hydrogen genera tion products. It deployed the world’s largest 20 MW Proton Exchange Membrane (PEM) electrolyser three years ago while most of the players in this sector were still at concept stage. On the midstream side, Cummins has extensive energy and hydrogen storage solu tions, while downstream it has fuel cells for stationary power and mobility applications. For example, Cummins’ fuel cell technol ogy is behind Alstom’s hydrogen-powered zero emission train in Germany. Major customers such as Werner Enterprise have specified hydrogen combustion engines for its delivery trucks. “As you can see, we are innovating and deploying our Destination Zero technologies into economical critical applications,” says Zhao. Cummins added the New Power business unit as part of its PLANET 2050 environmen tal sustainability strategy, which sets eight

“W e anticipate that our regionwill driveproduct platform and founda tional core technology innovation in the area of hydrogen produc tion and energy storage,” begins Alan Zhao of Cummins AME. Zhao expects New Power technologies requiring largescale infrastructure to fol low a path similar to that of the traditional

Cummins continues to invest in advanced technologies to minimise emissions, including hydrogen and natural gas engines; largescale PEM electrolysers for hydrogen generation; as well as energy and hydrogen storage solutions and fuel cells for stationary power and mobility applications.

32 ¦ MechChem Africa • November-December 2022