10 March 2021
DRDO completes test milestone for fuel cell AIP system
by Richard Scott
India’s Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) has achieved a major milestone in the development of an indigenous fuel cell-based air-independent propulsion (AIP) system planned for retrofit to the Indian Navy’s Project 75 Kalvari-class submarines.
INS Khanderi , the second of six Project 75 Kalvari-class submarines, pictured just prior to its commissioning in September 2019. The Indian Navy plans to retrofit the DRDO’s phosphoric acid fuel cell AIP system to the class during refit. (Richard Scott/NAVYPIX) + (DRDO)
In a 9 March statement, India’s Ministry of Defence (MoD) said that a land-based AIP prototype had successfully demonstrated both endurance and maximum power performance. Introduction of an AIP system will enable the Project 75 boats – based on the Scorpene design developed by France’s Naval Group – to significantly extend submerged endurance at slow speed.
The DRDO’s Naval Materials Research Laboratory at Ambernath has been working in collaboration with Larsen & Toubro (as lead system integrator), Thermax, and the Centre for Development of Advanced Computing for several years to develop an indigenous AIP system based on phosphoric acid fuel cell (PAFC) technology. This includes the construction of a 270 kW land-based prototype that packages the AIP plant subsystems, reactant tanks and waste tanks inside a representative Project 75 hull section.
According to the MoD, the land-based prototype “was operated in endurance mode and [maximum] power mode as per the user requirements” in a test completed on 8 March. “The technology has been successfully developed with the support of industry partners L&T and Thermax [and] has now reached the stage of maturity for fitment into target vessel,” it added.
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India’s Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) has achieved a major milestone in the d...
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