Labs21 Phone Forum
September 26, 2003
Saving Your Retrofit Dollars:
How to modify your facility for safe hydrogen fuel cell vehicle
testing
Featured Speaker: Carl Paulina, Office of Transportation
and Air Quality, U.S. EPA
In November 2002, the U.S. EPA's National Vehicle and Fuel Emissions
Laboratory performed the first official tests of fuel cell vehicles,
conducting new vehicle fuel economy test procedures. Prior to testing,
however, EPA needed to modify its laboratory in order to comply
with strict federal and local safety regulations governing the safe
handling of the hydrogen that fuels the vehicle. This process, which
took approximately eight months, sheds light on the challenges facing
these specialty laboratories. With safety as the primary concern,
for example, EPA developed new protocols to limit the maximum amount
of hydrogen in the building at any one time and to comply with all
safety requirements.
This presentation focused on the facility modifications necessary
to safely test hydrogen fuel cell vehicles. With examples from the
automotive industry, the presentation addressed the following questions:
- How will existing test cell facilities be modified to reduce
the cost of testing hydrogen vehicles?
- What unique codes and standards apply to hydrogen test cells?
- What are the typical costs for retrofitting these types of labs
and how does this compare to building a specialized test cell
for this purpose?
This phone forum was hosted by the Labs21 Automotive
Testing Laboratory Forum.
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