Engineering team working on fuel-cell equipped Segway
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Carolina engineering professor John Weidner hopes to make the battery-powered scooter even more versatile while remaining environmentally friendly by adding a hydrogen fuel cell to prolong the Segway’s running time.
“We have a grant from the Columbia Fuel Cell Challenge to add a fuel cell to a Segway,” said Weidner, who concentrates his electrochemistry research on batteries, fuel cells, hydrogen production, and new materials associated with each. “By August, we hope to have it up and running.”
“Segway says you can run their product for about an hour at top speed (12 mph), but most users run them sporadically, not continuously, and probably get two or three hours from a single charge,” Weidner said. “With a fuel cell-equipped Segway, you’ll be able to go even longer because every time you stop, the battery will get a little more charging from the fuel cell.”
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More about the Segway personal transporter:
Introduced in 2001, the world’s first self-balancing personal transportation device, the Segway® Personal Transporter (PT), has represented the next generation in personal mobility. You can visit the Segway company web site at http://www.segway.com.
More about Future Feul Cells at the University of South Carolina, visit one of the following web sites:
Center for Fuel Cells, a National Science Foundation Industry/University Cooperative Research Center for Fuel Cells
Future Fuels™ Initiative, a web site sponsored by the office of the VIce President for Research and Health Sciences at USC
For more about Dr. Weidner, click the link in his name above.
