More widely available, methanol fuel cells provided by Oorja are being used to power lift trucks at six commercial partners.

By Allison Manning, Associate Editor -- Modern Materials Handling, 11/10/2008

Methanol fuel cell technology developer Oorja Protonics received CE safety certification for its flagship product, OorjaPac, and is working to promote the more widely available fuel.

CE product marking for safety is recognized worldwide and required for sale in the European Union. Oorja CEO Sanjiv Malhotra said the company, which he started about two-and-a-half years ago, now has about a half dozen commercial customers, in automotive, manufacturing, distribution and other fields. The company first announced its presence in the fuel cell market in March of this year.

The charging is powered by liquid alcohol fuel, which is widely available and used in windshield washer fluid, antifreeze and other common products. Malhotra said it’s easily stored and inexpensive, about $1.50 a gallon, running an entire forklift for about $10 a day around the clock.

Oorja conducted pilot programs with Toyota, Nissan, Honda, Costco, Best Buy and others and has started converting these field trials into commercial customers.

CE compliance involves numerous tests, including safety, durability and emissions to ensure the product will fare well on the floor of a manufacturing or distribution facility.

“CE certification is very well respected standard,” Malhotra said, noting the company will seek other worldwide certifications.

Malhotra said widespread use of methanol fuel cells would have a key impact on the lift truck market, most importantly increasing the battery life of lift trucks. Keeping the battery at a constant voltage with a methanol fuel cell product also will increase the life of the battery, he said, providing a 40% increase in its life. Customers will have to maintain fewer batteries at any given time, not have a need for a specific battery room and save labor by eliminating the need for personnel to switch the batteries.

“Overall the ROI is a very attractive 12 months,” Malhotra said.

While much attention has been given to hydrogen fuel cells, Malhotra said hydrogen fuel cells suffer from the challenges of hydrogen infrastructure.

“Hydrogen is good project, but far from commercialization,” he said, nothing that the company he had founded prior to Oorja was a hydrogen fuel cell developer.

Malhotra said there is no infrastructure for distributing hydrogen, a necessity when commercializing the fuel.

With methanol “you don’t need to be at the mercy of a hydrogen supplier that will probably take days to deliver a compressed [hydrogen] gas cylinder,” he said.

He also noted the safety issues with hydrogen. In a distribution center with hundreds of employees, equipment and machinery, having hydrogen tanks rolling around on forklifts could be an issue. Hydrogen also costs about eight to 10 times as much as methanol, according to Malhotra.

“Unless we solve problem of storage and cost, hydrogen is just going to remain in field trial and pilot programs,” he said.