The report aims at informing about the state of the fuel cell industry. It is targeting readers who want to learn more about the technology, but especially it is targeting global policy institutions. This is a large group of people, and can include those who are in contact with fuel cells for the first time as well as those who already have a profound expertise in this field. Therefore the report gives a short introduction of history and also explains the different types and working mechanisms of fuel cells but also shows threads and chances by linking the gathered knowledge with new topics like block chain. The underlying information for this report was gathered by a broad literature and internet research. Knowledge from previous Industry Reports as well as research papers, newspapers, press releases and governmental authorities were used to collect and show a broad spectrum of facts.
Fuel cells can be used as a substitute as well as a complementing technology. The applications can be divided into the three categories stationary, transport and portable. The area of stationary fuel cells includes systems like plants or one household systems. In this area it is possible to complement for example regenerative energies with fuel cells to store the energy during the time it is not needed and by doing so building a smart network. As it is a clean and very fast reacting technology it can be also used in cities, for example instead of gas plants. Portable systems in different scales can be used for example as a supplement for diesel generator to support of grid systems with energy. Micro systems compete with traditional batteries. The transport sector is probably the most competitive area as fuel cells are in direct competition with traditional fuel as well as electrical energy powered cars. Further discussion about the possible future discussion will be hold in PART 5.
The fuel cell market for customers is quite young and therefore still shaping itself rapidly. On the market there are several big players as well as niche producers. In general big stationary systems (e.g. plants) are built by bigger companies whereas the portable systems are mostly distributed by smaller companies. The fuel cell market is strongly varying according to regional factors, which was the reason to divide the analysis of the market in PART 3 in three main regions.