Lift trucks: Fuel cells are a stimulus package
Fuel cell powered lift trucks are getting hot, despite economy's chill.
Tom Andel, Columnist -- Modern Materials Handling, 4/1/2009
Companies serving materials handling markets must not be reading the papers. Don’t they know the recession has slammed the brakes on putting a hybrid car in every garage and either a wind generator behind that garage or a solar panel array on top of it?
Nope. In fact, the dire economic news is driving materials handlers to seek out solutions like fuel cells in their lift trucks. You have to move stuff, even in a struggling economy. Enough two- and three-shift operations exist where the time and space wasted on battery changing is making alternative power sources like fuel cells and hybrid power systems viable solutions today.
If you’ve been avoiding the news, too, you might not be aware of another story with direct implications for materials handlers. Certainly you’ve heard President Obama talk about the stimulus package? Well, a number of tax incentives in it benefit the forklift market and its customers. They’re related to fuel cells.
First, there’s a new investment tax credit applicable to hydrogen refilling stations. According to the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, the alternative refueling property credit for hydrogen dispensers is 30%, capped at $200,000. Bill Mitchell, vice president of Nuvera (www.nuvera.com), makers of fuel cell systems for lift trucks, told me that depending on the size of the application and how the trucks are used, that could take a year or more off of the payback. On the fuel cell side, each fuel cell box has a 30% tax credit, capped at $3,000 per kilowatt.
Then, there’s the CO2 benefit to using fuel cell lift trucks, especially if the administration’s talk about “cap and trade” gains traction. The plan would limit greenhouse gases by capping the emissions a company could emit and allowing relatively pollution-free firms to trade “credits” with others exceeding the limits.
Data from Argonne Laboratories (www.transportation.anl.gov/pdfs/TA/537.pdf) show that the CO2 associated with a lift truck that’s running on a fuel cell using hydrogen made from natural gas has much less environmental impact than a lift truck whose battery was charged off the nation’s electrical grid.
As Warren Brower, product marketing manager for Plug Power (www.plugpower.com), told me, “Fuel cells are here today and are a viable, commercial alternative to incumbent power technologies.” That’s good news not only for materials handling, but for U.S. energy consumers in general. The environmental and productivity gains achieved in the short term by warehouses and distribution centers will pave the way for fuel cell applications in power generation and automotive applications further down the road.
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