Hydrogen fuel cell reactor is the core part of the whole fuel cell industry chain, and its performance and cost directly determine the process of fuel cell industrialization. At present, the fuel cell reactor industry in China is developing rapidly, with new technological breakthroughs and products emerging.

On the one hand, the power reactor industry develops rapidly, and the technology level and capital investment are advancing simultaneously; On the other hand, this situation also leads to the urgent need for the industry to further improve the localization level of core technology of membrane electrode, bipolar plate and other parts.

Electric reactor: the trend of localization is obvious, and the power reactor enterprises are developing rapidly

Looking at the performance of the installed capacity of the vehicle power reactor in recent years, 2019 is a year of rapid development of domestic hydrogen fuel cell vehicles. The demand of the vehicle power reactor is growing rapidly. A series of subsidy policies issued by the state level for the development of new energy have boosted the development of the industry.

At present, many enterprises are committed to the research and breakthrough of bottleneck in fuel cell reactor industry. Some head enterprises have successively produced domestic products with high degree of domestic power reactor, and put them into the industry for verification.

At present, domestic power reactor enterprises are rising rapidly, and their output is also increasing greatly. After a brief fall in 2020, 2021 has made it more prominent.

According to trendbank, 66% of the total installed capacity in 2020 has been completed in the first half of the year only when the state subsidy policy and demonstration city cluster have not been implemented. It is also pointed out that the total installed capacity of the vehicle power reactor in the first half of 2021 reached 71.28mw, an increase of 32.4% year on year.

Source: potential silver chain

Source: potential silver chain

Catalyst: poor domestic stability, serious dependence on catalyst import

At present, the intellectual property rights of catalyst for fuel cell have been in the hands of a few foreign enterprises. The core materials of catalyst have long relied on import, which leads to a large part of the cost, which restricts the independent development of hydrogen industry in China. With the support of the government for the hydrogen fuel cell automotive industry and the breakthrough of key technologies, the fuel cell catalyst industry will usher in rapid growth in the next few years.

Currently, Tianzhong precious metals and Johnson Wanfeng catalyst Co., Ltd. occupy a large market share in China, and other foreign companies such as Umicore, Holly and BASF also have relevant actions in the domestic market.

However, many domestic enterprises are developing rapidly, such as China autocatalysis, China Science and technology innovation, Jiping new energy, prime technology, Guiyan platinum industry, Wuhan Himalaya photoelectric, Nanjing Dongyan hydrogen energy, Xi'an Kaili new materials, etc., which have initially formed a potential to break the foreign monopoly.

According to insiders, domestic single production capacity is over 1kg and annual capacity is over 300kg, which is considered to be mass production, but few enterprises can meet the standard at present. Therefore, it also shows that the domestic industry application with large-scale production, excellent performance and stable has not been realized.

Proton exchange membrane: most of them are in the demonstration application stage, and there is still a gap with foreign countries

At present, the PFSA proton exchange membrane sold in the market is mainly Gore select proton exchange membrane. China Shandong Dongyue Group has also been able to produce PFS resin independently.

PEM has many disadvantages in terms of battery requirements. But with the development of various manufacturers, the cost, durability and comprehensive performance of the manufacturers have been improved. At present, it is not a big problem, but there is still a great room for progress.

The market of PEM is decided by the fuel cell market. At present, PEMFC is in the stage of commercial demonstration and application abroad. It has involved in a wide range of fields such as vehicles, mobile power, ships and fixed power generation. The market for large-scale demand is gradually forming, so the PEM of fuel cell has great potential for growth.

From the domestic perspective, fuel cell has been used in the fields of vehicles, small cruise ships, mobile power supply and so on. Although there is still a distance from commercial application, the high conversion rate and wide use of fuel cell determine the healthy development of fuel cell market, and the market prospect of proton exchange membrane for fuel cell is expected.

Gas diffusion layer: domestic substrate is backward and industrialization level needs to be improved

At present, the global gas diffusion layer industry is monopolized by several international companies. The global material suppliers include Toray (Toray) Co., Ltd., avcarb of the United States, Ballard in Canada, SGL and kedebao in Germany. The domestic market is basically dominated by the above enterprises.

In a comprehensive way, only a few enterprises in China, such as Jiangsu tianbird, general hydrogen energy and Shanghai Hesen, have been involved in the research and development of gas diffusion layer, and most of them are in the state of small batch trial production. Among them, universal hydrogen energy can be used as carbon paper and MPL layer, and carbon paper and gas diffusion layer products can be provided according to the needs of customers.

However, the domestic technology exploration in the field of gas diffusion layer materials has been established. The laboratory technology of carbon paper materials can be used to standard the international advanced product level, but there is still a certain gap in the realization of large-scale production of products.

Generally speaking, the foundation of gas diffusion layer in China is relatively weak, and the gap is still large with that of foreign countries. Because of the small demand for gas diffusion layer in fuel cell industry, domestic enterprises are lack of research and development power at present.

Bipolar plate: moving towards composite and metal bipolar plates

At present, the research on PEMFC bipolar plate materials at home and abroad mainly focuses on graphite, metal and polymer composites. But the domestic graphite bipolar plate is mature, and some properties of the graphite bipolar plate produced by some manufacturers have reached the international advanced level. At present, China is moving towards metal plate and composite materials, and there is still a big room for technology improvement.

It is understood that domestic graphite double pole plate companies such as Shanghai Hongfeng, Shanghai Hongjun new energy, Jiangsu Shenzhou carbon products, Huarong technology and so on are mature enterprises.

Among them, Jiangsu Shenzhou carbon products began to research and develop and produce graphite bipolar plates for hydrogen fuel cells in 1998, and it is the first enterprise in China to start to engage in the research and development of graphite bipolar plates for hydrogen fuel cells. By the end of 2020, it has provided more than 50 million graphite bipolar plates for more than 100 schools, scientific research institutes, electric reactor manufacturers and car enterprises at home and abroad, and is the leading enterprise in China.

In the field of metal bipolar plate, the enterprises involved are also increasing slowly——

For example, Shanghai Zhizhen, the company is mainly engaged in the research, development, production and sales of metal bipolar plates for hydrogen fuel cell for automobiles, and is a leading enterprise in the domestic metal bipolar plate industry. Other reactor enterprises such as Guohong hydrogen energy, Jihe hydrogen energy, new source power, hydrogen generator, etc. are also developing bipolar plate products for their reactors.

Among them, Shanghai Zhizhen has developed 7 generations of metal bipolar plates with independent intellectual property rights, mastered the key independent core technology of "whole process chain integration", realized large-scale mass production and supply to domestic core host plants and electric reactor enterprises, and became the "responsibility" of domestic metal plate technology strength.