Tongxiang Breaks Foreign Monopoly In Hydrogen Energy Industry

In a hydrogen energy enterprise located in Pinghu, the robot arms are waving in mid air to carry giant glass fiber IV pressure cylinders to the designated positions.

"Compared with traditional metal containers and steel cylinders, our fiberglass cylinders can reduce their deadweight by 70%, and their hydrogen storage capacity has also been greatly improved, which is 2 to 3 times that of traditional metal containers." The person in charge of the company introduced.

　　 The basic raw materials of the world's leading storage and transportation technology are all from Jushi Group in Tongxiang.

As a kind of zero carbon energy, hydrogen energy is known as the most promising secondary energy in the 21st century, and also an important driving engine for the transformation of global energy structure and the development of green economy. Any industry segment upstream and downstream of its industrial chain will be at the level of 100 billion.

In recent years, Jiaxing has vigorously deployed the hydrogen energy industry. As the leading enterprise of glass fiber in China, Jushi has already been working on this new track.

"This is the product that we have independently developed and produced for many years, which provides a new solution for the extensive application of hydrogen energy in the future global market." Dr. Xu Shengjie, deputy director of the R&D Center of Jushi Group, pointed to a white cylinder in the exhibition hall and said.

When the reporter came closer, he saw that the surface of the cylinder was full of lines according to some rules, and the whole cylinder looked like a "wool ball" that had been elongated and magnified.

Each line above is actually glass fiber, which plays a role in protecting the gas cylinder.

"A hydrogen storage bottle with a length of about 11 meters will use nearly 700 kilograms of glass fiber products. 100 tons of glass fiber can be made into about 150 large hydrogen storage bottles." Xu Shengjie introduced.

This set of data is really surprising.

"In fact, we have started the research and development of hydrogen storage bottle materials since 2017," Xu Shengjie continued.

Reporter, shocked again.

At that time, the development of hydrogen energy abroad was in full swing. "Can you do it?" At an exhibition, a foreign customer asked Jushi for products.

In a word, Jushi has keenly captured the new market.

But it's easier said than done.

Let the thin "flexible" material finally transform into a hydrogen storage container whose strength is far more than "Bailian Steel", and the performance of the storage and transportation materials must be stable enough.

After several selections, the high modulus and high strength glass fiber series has become the first choice of Jushi.

However, Xu Shengjie and his team felt a lot of pressure. "The application of hydrogen energy belongs to the high-end field, and it still needs to be optimized and debugged to a higher standard." He gave reporters an example. The tensile strength of glass fiber required by the hydrogen storage bottle material is more than 50% higher than that of ordinary products, and its service life should also reach 20 years.

Tensile strength, creep performance, fatigue performance... each indicator is broken by team members one by one.

"Our goal is not only to reach the standard, but to create the standard."

The team also quietly did a big thing - "We successfully broke the foreign monopoly and realized 100% localization of raw materials for sizing agent."

What is a sizing agent? The outer protective layer of the hydrogen storage bottle is composed of glass fiber and epoxy resin. In a simple understanding, the sizing agent is the adhesive of two materials.

"In the field of winding, the traditional glass fiber entering the epoxy resin will produce bubbles, which will affect the product performance. In addition to achieving interface bonding, the most important function of the new sizing agent is to effectively avoid the generation of a large number of bubbles." Xu Shengjie explained to reporters.

But for a long time, this technology has been monopolized by foreign countries, which is also known as the "neck jam" problem.

"No, we will do our own research." Although it is just a small reagent, it involves tens of thousands of molecular structures. I stayed in the laboratory all day long, thirsty for cold water, hungry for bread, and verified, analyzed, and fine tuned hundreds of parameters over and over again... This young team, whose average age is less than 40 years old, is very competitive.

Xu Shengjie said frankly that the team may "struggle" for several weeks for a certain parameter. "For example, in the past, as long as a certain raw material sizing agent is added, it will precipitate and fail. After a long time of searching for the reason, it has not been found, and once wanted to give up. Later, the team tried to change the molecular structure and modify the raw materials, and the problem was solved."

After nine months of trying more than 300 formulas, the team finally ushered in the successful moment of product molding. "It's very exciting to see the technology developed step by step from laboratory to industrial application. It's really not easy to adhere to original innovation."

The independent research and development of Jushi sizing agent raw materials has also broken the situation that related products in the domestic market rely on imports for a long time, and realized domestic independent supply.

The R&D and mass production of "Tongxiang Cans" also enabled Tongxiang to win some initiative and voice in the hydrogen energy industry, which is a "battleground".

"With the continuous development of the hydrogen energy industry, the hydrogen energy vehicles running on the streets may have the brand of Jushi products in the future." Xu Shengjie is full of confidence.

(Source: Tongxiang)