Ballard Power Systems fuel cell company announces $160M US gigafactory
March 27, 2024The company will be building the massive facility in Rockwell, Texas, to produce components and systems.
Ballard Power Systems has announced that it will be building a new $160 million gigafactory in Rockwell, Texas, to produce hydrogen fuel cell components and systems.
The plant will be called the Ballard Rockwall Giga 1
In the new manufacturing gigafactory’s Phase 1 of construction, it will have an annual production capacity of 8 million bipolar plates, 8 million membrane electrode assemblies (MEAs), 20,000 hydrogen fuel cell stacks, and as many as 20,000 fuel cell engines. This is the equivalent to producing 3GW of fuel cells every year. Its intention is to broaden its capacity from that point onward during phased brownfield expansions.
Ballard has already been awarded a $40 million US Department of Energy (DoE) grant to build the factory. The facility is slated to begin operation in 2027.
The grant money is broken into two parts for the hydrogen fuel cell gigafactory
The total of $40 million in grant funds are broken into two parts. The first is $30 million to be invested into advancing and automatically stacking for assembly the proton exchange membrane (PEM) MEAs, and the remaining $10 million is to be invested in a manufacturing line of next-gen flexible graphite bipolar plates.
H2 vehicles operating around the world
According to Ballard’s data, the company has over 1,700 fuel cell buses operating around the globe. The grants that it received were not the only ones for which it applied.
Credit: Photo by depositphotos.com
When the company was awarded the grants, its president and CEO Randy MacEwen expressed Ballard’s gratitude for the DoE’s hydrogen policy support, preparing the United States for a leadership position in scaling hydrogen and fuel cells.
“This is particularly important,” said MacEwen, “as the US accelerates a path towards environmental sustainability and energy security, while continuing to boost domestic manufacturing and bolster critical supply chains.”
The company’s chief transformation officer Dr. Lee Sweetland added that Ballard has been striving to develop automated production processes for MEAs, bipolar plates, and stack assemblies, as they develop their next generation of designs and technology. Sweetland added that this strategy will place Ballard in a position in which it will meet predicted future market demand while simultaneously reducing fuel cell engine production costs.
Closing Thoughts
Grants from the DoE, such as this one, are helping companies to take the steps forward that they require to accelerate development and production. This has potential to position those companies as national, regional, and global leaders in this market and to bring the US with it as the world decarbonizes and seeks new cleaner energy sources.
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