“Panasonic will commence sales of household fuel cells in April of 2014, in conjunction with the German boiler manufacturer Fiesman. This marks the first time for a Japanese fuel cell manufacturer to expand its operations into the overseas market. In addition, this will be the first general marketing of fuel cells for home use in Europe.

The company began a market survey in Europe around 2010. It reached conclusions such as, “Europe resembles Japan in terms of climate, and there is a demand for supplying hot water and heat” as well as, “There is a complete gas infrastructure there.” Based on these findings, it judged that the there was a very strong latent demand in Europe. Consequently, in July of 2011 it established a fuel cell development laboratory in Germany, began analyzing the elements making up city gas, and started to develop a fuel cell suitable to the German market. Amidst all of this, it also went ahead to develop fuel cells in conjunction with the German boiler manufacturer Fiesman, leading up to the current marketing of fuel cells.

The key points are remodeling of the reformer unit and connection to the chimney

The PEFC type fuel cells for home use to go on sale have specifications for the German market, one unique feature here being that they have a reformer for obtaining hydrogen in particular from city gas. German city gas is containing more nitrogen than Japanese city gas and is separated into an H gas which contains more nitrogen than Japanese city gas and has a high amount of heat and into an L gas with a low amount of heat. First of all, Panasonic developed a reformer for H gas which is thought to account for over half of the 40 million German households. For the company, “The second step will be, “To cope with the L gas areas,” noted a Makoto Wada, head of the Smart Energy Systems Department of the Sales Planning Group.

Also in Japan, water heaters are normally placed outside of the building, but in Germany these are installed mainly in the cellar, making for a greatly different market environment. Because of this, in Japan, while the vent comes into contact with the air, the unit specified for the German market is structured so as to vent though the chimney of the house in a highly hermetic way.”