Anglo Platinum opened a new fuel cell power plant on Monday (6th July) which makes use of a rhodium catalyst in processes designed to create cleaner energy, Mining Weekly reports.

The world's largest platinum producer unveiled the stationary plant at an exploration site near Lephalale in Limpopo province.

Capable of automatically switching from being grid-powered to operating independently, the 200kW unit functions by reforming Anglo Coal's coal-bed methane into hydrogen using a rhodium catalyst .

As the hydrogen meets oxygen in the air electricity and heat are both produced and efficiencies of up to 83 per cent can be attained.

According to the news provider, United Technologies' UTC Power installed the facility and has already set up another 270 similar units across the world.

Anglo has a number of pgm projects in South Africa which contributed to its total refined platinum output of 2.465 million ounces in 2008.

Source:

Angloplat pioneers ‘clean’ fuelcell power using Anglo Coal gas (06/07/09)

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