Page 20: of Marine Technology Magazine (September 2022)

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GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research Kiel www.geomar.de

GEOMAR earlier this year tested fuel cell technology for use on a long-term sea? oor observatory, where it could also be required to power robotics. GEOMAR’s solution is a fuel cell, developed in partnership with the Centre for Solar En- ergy and Hydrogen Research, Ulm (ZSW), as part of the Ger- man Federal Ministry of Economics and Technology funded

ARIM-FUEL project (ARIM stands for “Autonomous Robot- ic Sea-Floor Infrastructure for Bentho-Pelagic Monitoring”). costs a modest $1250. The system can deliver 150 W to 1kW

It’s a proton exchange membrane (PEM) fuel cell, in which output, a signi? cant increase compared to previous solutions hydrogen and oxygen are fed to a polymer membrane elec- that draw their energy from primary cells or rechargeable bat- trolyte and platinum based electrodes, to generate power with teries, says GEOMAR. This will cover many requirements, heat and water as a by-product. GEOMAR’s system compris- which include for long-term deep sea monitoring, but also, in es of 11 gas bottles of hydrogen and ? ve bottles of oxygen future, recharging autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs) and the fuel cell, developed by ZSW, which gives “about 120 and a seabed crawler, using an inductive sea? oor recharging kW of power we can use for our monitoring efforts at the sea- unit, says Dr Flögel. The system is currently rated to 1200 m ? oor,” said Dr Sascha Flögel from GEOMAR. In addition, the depth, due to limitations of some of the pH sensors and buoy- system has a 4 kW rechargeable battery, which the fuel cell ancy foam that are part of the sensor suite GEOMAR wants to charges. To re? ll the fuel cell that GEOMAR has designed use with it. However, it’s targeting 3000 m by 2023-24.

Sir James S. Milne, Chairman and Managing Director of Balmoral Group www.balmoralo? shore.com

Earlier this year Jim Milne, chairman and managing director of Balmoral Group, of? cially became Sir James

S Milne CBE, DL, DHC, Hon DBA, Hon FRIAS, upon receiving the honor of Knight Bachelor in the Queen’s

Birthday 2022 Honors List for services to business and charity. “For as long as I can remember I have strived to be the best I can be and, I think, have encouraged others to do and think the same way,” said Milne. “I am very for- tunate in that I have been surrounded by a loving family all my life and they have given me the strength and free- dom to pursue my commercial, charitable and personal dreams. The good Lord has been watching and guiding me too, of course.

Sir James is often quoted as saying that he hasn’t come a long way in life as his company’s corporate headquar- entrepreneur; growing lettuce and mushrooms; buying, reno- ters are located less than a mile from where he was born and vating and selling cars while at school before acquiring an 84 brought up on the family farm, just outside Aberdeen city at x 21ft. ex-RAF hut from Kinloss to start up my ? rst glass? ber that time. He, like many, has experienced numerous highs and manufacturing operation on the family Home Farm of Tullos.” lows, both on a commercial and personal level and, somehow, Today Balmoral Group operates from a 45-acre site in Aber- has always bounced back.“You can dra w your own conclu- deen and has engineering and manufacturing facilities in New- sions from this”, he says. “You might think I’m either a genius, castle, South Yorkshire and South Wales.“85% of what we completely mad or, perhaps more realistically, somewhere in produce in the UK is exported worldwide. From our offshore the middle.”He is a ? rm believer that the way to get on in life energy products for the hydrocarbon and renewable sectors, to is to take calculated risks, make mistakes and learn from them our anaerobic digestion and water/wastewater products, you - and admits to making quite a few in his time. will ? nd Balmoral products on every continent in the world,”

Sir James continued: “I do believe, however, that I was a born said Milne. 20 September/October 2022

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