NFPA 2 and NFPA 55 Hold Joint Meeting
by Karen Hall, FCHEA

The NFPA Hydrogen Technology Technical Committee (HTC), responsible for NFPA 2, and the NFPA Industrial and Medical Gases Technical Committee (IMC), met together during the week of July 14-18 at NREL's Golden, Colorado facility. 

The Technical Committees held a rare joint meeting as many public comments are applicable to both documents. Public Comments were received on NFPA 2 material, which was extracted from NFPA 55. This is the Second Draft Meeting for each Technical Committee to resolve public comments and create Second Revisions to the First Draft of NFPA 2 and NFPA 55. Following the joint meeting, each Technical Committee will be balloted separately.

Voting options were Accept, Reject but see a related second revision, Reject, or Reject and hold. All public comments were addressed. The Second Draft Report will be posted for ballot no later than December 12, 2014. The Second Draft will be posted to the public no later than January 16, 2015.

The documents are currently on a 3-year revision cycle. Both documents will be dated 2016 editions; however they will be released in 2015.

Marty Gresho, who has served as Chair of the NFPA Hydrogen Technology Committee since its inception, will be stepping down as Chair for the next revision cycle. FCHEA applauds Marty's hard work and persistence during these formative years, and is pleased that Marty will remain on the Technical Committee.

SAE Publishes Documents to Enable Commercial Hydrogen Fueling
by Karen Hall, FCHEA

SAE International (www.sae.org), the global engineering association that sets technical standards for the automotive, aerospace and commercial vehicle industry, has recently published key documents that will enable commercial fueling of fuel cell electric vehicles (FCEVs) worldwide.

(Photo Credit: Jesse Schneider) 

SAE International's Fuel Cell Standards Taskforce has completed two technical standards: 

  • SAE J2799, "Hydrogen Surface Vehicle to Station Hardware and Software", was published on April 9, 2014. This standard specifies the communications hardware and software requirements for fueling Hydrogen Surface Vehicles (HSV). This standard is intended to be used in conjunction with the hydrogen fueling protocol, SAE J2601, Compressed Hydrogen Light Duty Vehicle Fueling Protocol and SAE J2600, Compressed Hydrogen Surface Vehicle Fueling Connection Devices. Further information, including ordering information, is available from SAE athttp://standards.sae.org/j2799_201404/.

  • SAE J2601, "Fueling Protocols for Light Duty Gaseous Hydrogen Surface Vehicles", was published on July 15, 2014. SAE J2601 establishes the protocol and process limits for hydrogen fueling of light duty vehicles. SAE J2601 includes standard fueling tables for communications and non-communications fueling, as well as a non-standard, development fueling protocol. Further information, including ordering information, is available from SAE at http://standards.sae.org/j2601_201407/. It supersedes SAE TIR J2601.

"Hydrogen Fueling, standardized with SAE J2601 allows the customer a fueling experience -same as today - in both fueling time and range", stated Jesse Schneider, lead of the J2601 and J2799 SAE standards. "J2601 allows FCEVs to achieve a high State of Charge resulting in a range of over 300 miles (500 km). In electrical terms, it is the equivalent to fueling 100 to 200 kWh (5-10kg) within 3-5 minutes which is considerably more storage than battery electric vehicles in much less charging time. Hydrogen Fueling with SAE J2601 also meets the fueling and range criteria also in the California ZEV mandate." The highest possible credits for the ZEV mandate are therefore achieved with fuel cell electric vehicles using SAE J2601 hydrogen standard fueling.

SAE technical paper, 2014-01-1990 which contains data in support of SAE 2601, has been published and is available online athttp://papers.sae.org/2014-01-1990/.

These documents have been created to harmonize hydrogen fueling worldwide for both 35MPa and 70MPa gaseous hydrogen dispensing. The addition of the 70MPa option provides fast fueling and range to meet consumer fueling and range expectations safely. 

Input Sought on Hydrogen Fueling Station Requirements
by Karen Hall, FCHEA

A request for information has gone out to aid the international working group developing a technical report, followed by an International Standard, on Gaseous Hydrogen - Fueling Stations. In order to develop an understanding of the current requirements in the areas of safety distances and hydrogen fuel quality, the request for information has been sent out to ISO member countries in the form of two surveys. 

For survey #1, Hydrogen Quality Assurance, the Working Group requests completed surveys by August 29th. To avoid any conflict with confidentiality, respondents are asked to send completed survey #1 to Hidenori Tomioka at JARI (htomioka@jari.or.jp). All data will be compiled and made anonymous to WG 24 (so as not to be a comparison list).

For survey #2, Safety Distances, the Working Group requests completed surveys by July 31st. Please send completed survey #2 to Guy Dang-Nhu (guy.dang-nhu@airliquide.com)

New IEC Conformity Assessment System
by Karen Hall, FCHEA

The IEC Conformity Assessment Board recently approved the formation of a fourth Conformity Assessment System known as the IEC System for Certification to Standards Relating to Equipment for Use in Renewable Energy Applications (IECRE System). 

The United States National Committee for the International Electrotechnical Committee (USNC/IEC) has officially applied as a participating country in the IECRE. Now the USNC Conformity Assessment Policy Coordination Committee (CAPCC) is actively engaged in organizing the U S National Committee/IECRE which includes the assignment of a Secretariat to administer the group and members who will actively participate in the work. 

The USNC/IEC is hosting the 1st meeting of the IECRE Management Committee at the University of Colorado in Boulder, CO, on 15 - 17 September. 

For further information, pleases visit the official website athttp://www.iecre.org/committees/remc/.

Fill 'er Up: NIST Develops Prototype Meter Test for Hydrogen Refueling Stations
by Mark Esser, National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST)

http://www.nist.gov/pml/div685/hydrogen-meter-072114.cfm

To support the fair sale of gaseous hydrogen as a vehicle fuel, researchers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have developed a prototype field test standard to test the accuracy of hydrogen fuel dispensers.* Once the standard is field tested, it will serve as a model for constructing similar devices for state weights and measures inspectors to use.

(Photo Credit: Suplee/NIST)

Three automakers plan to begin selling hydrogen-fueled vehicles to consumers in 2015. The state of California has opened nine refueling stations and is funding the construction of an additional 28 hydrogen stations during the next few years to service the growing number of hydrogen fuel cell vehicles on their roads.

NIST Handbook 44, the bedrock reference text for weights and measures inspectors, includes specifications, tolerances and other requirements for commercial weighing and measuring equipment ranging from gasoline dispensers to grocery store scales. Handbook 44, which has been adopted by all states, stipulates that hydrogen will be sold by the kilogram, and according to Juana Williams, a NIST weights and measures expert, hydrogen-dispensing pumps must be accurate to within 2 percent, or 20 grams, per kilogram.

"It's much more difficult to measure hydrogen gas delivered at 5,000 to 10,000 psi than it is to measure a product that is a liquid at atmospheric temperatures and pressures," says Williams. "While a kilogram of hydrogen has approximately the same energy content as a gallon of gasoline, the allowable error is slightly less stringent than for gasoline."

Even with the larger allowance, some have suggested these tolerances are too tight and proposed alternatives as high as 10 or 20 percent. What isn't clear is whether these claims arise because the meters are unable to perform within the tolerance specified in Handbook 44 or if the equipment and methods used to conduct testing are contributing larger errors to the process. Regardless, consumers expect to receive the product they pay for and businesses expect to receive fair payment for the product they sell.

"We've shown that the master meter in our lab is capable of dispensing helium from a simulated hydrogen dispenser with errors of 1 percent or less," says NIST's Jodie Pope, who designed the field testing apparatus. "So we can extrapolate that it is possible to measure hydrogen with accuracy sufficient for a fair marketplace."

The next challenge is to determine what accuracy is achievable in field installations of hydrogen dispensing systems when using NIST traceable standards and well-defined test equipment and test procedures and to then translate this into guidance for use by weights and measures inspectors and industry.

*J. Pope and J. Wright. Performance of Coriolis Meters in Transient Gas Flows. Flow Measurement and Instrumentation. March 17, 2014.