BACKGROUND

Sir William Gove developed the first fuel cell in 1839. Since this remarkable development, little was done to develop fuel cell technology until the last 10 years or so. However, recent developments in the global marketplace have catapulted alternative energy into the forefront of the American debate on the economy, politics and the environment. Recently, advances in fuel cell technology have been significant from materials research to application utilities and infrastructure. Fuel cells produce energy and are a close kin to the conventional battery. Fuel cells, however, are a renewable and sustainable energy source that is clean and has unlimited applications. The fuel cell operates by splitting hydrogen molecules from water and recombining them with oxygen creating an electrochemical reaction that produces electricity. The fuel cell system contains an anode and cathode that, at one time in the history of fuel cell development, was made of solid platinum. Through the 1950's and four decades later, fuel cell applications were restricted to NASA because of the high cost of producing the cells. Since then, materials research and development has eliminated solid platinum as a requirement and now utilizes powdered platinum membranes to transfer hydrogen protons to the cathode. In addition to using platinum in the membrane, the fuel cell also utilizes gold in the bipolar plates that enhances the chemical reaction.

Tanury Industries has been coating precious metals for over 60 years. Tanury provides a full range of coating services to diverse markets from decorative products to connectors for missile applications.

A world leader in heavy platinum and heavy gold plating, Tanury has also made significant contributions to sputter and cathodic arc coating technologies. As a result of our years of experience and accumulated technical assets, we find ourselves uniquely suited and poised to develop and engineer coatings that can enhance this vital future energy source.

While there has been much work done in the fuel cell development area in the last 10 years, most of the advancements have come in membrane development and bipolar plate materials research. Tanury Industries is in the forefront of the development of advanced coating technologies for fuel cells and has developed proprietary technologies that advance the utilization of coatings to enhance the efficiency of fuel cells.