Wild Pininfarina Fuel Cell Sports Sedan
By Bill Siuru
Several concept battery and hybrid electric vehicles have featured individual wheel motors at each corner. Pininfarina has taken this idea one step further with the Sintesi fuel cell vehicle concept that it unveiled at the 2008 Geneva Motor Show. In the Sintesi, Pininfarina locates a hybrid drive system at each wheel position. Each Nuvera Quadrivium unit includes an integrated fuel cell, battery pack, wheel motor/generator, and associated control electronics.
The fuel cells are 20 kilowatt Andromeda proton exchange membrane (PEM) fuel cells. A 100 kilowatt lithium-ion battery pack provides supplemental power in a parallel hybrid configuration for acceleration as well as receiving electrical energy recouped during regenerative braking. The wheel motors are air-cooled, brushless DC permanent magnet motors with integrated gearbox, hub, and brakes as well as regenerative braking. Together, the motors deliver 91.2 horsepower and 671 lbs-ft of torque to each wheel.
According to Pininfarina, locating individual Quadrivium power units around the car provides designers great flexibility in designing for generous passenger capacity in a four-seat, four-door sports sedan. Called “liquid packaging,” the design philosophy does not consider the car as a shape that covers the mechanicals, but rather focuses on passengers first and shapes the mechanicals around them. The result is a sleek, tapered and aerodynamically efficient design with optimum weight distribution and lower center of gravity for great handling. The Sintesi has a wind-cheating drag coefficient of only 0.27.
Another innovative feature of the Sintesi is its STAR (Substrate Transportation Autothermal Reformer) on-board reformer. Developed by Nuvera in conjunction with the Department of Energy, STAR can produce hydrogen for the fuel cells from a variety of liquid fuels – gasoline, ethanol, petrodiesel, and biodiesel. The fuel processor uses three main reactants: the liquid fuel, air from the vehicle intake, and recycled water from the fuel cell exhaust.
Though the Sintesi design is aimed at high performance, fuel economy is a rather impressive 47 mpg on the combined European drive cycle. It has a range of about 500 miles on liquid fuel held in a small 10.7 gallon fuel tank. At its optimum efficiency point, the Quadrivium Drive has CO2 emissions of 78 g/km.
As with most concept vehicles, the Sintesi may always remain just a concept and never make it to production. Some of technology may be used in future production vehicles, although the somewhat complex Quadrivium hybrid drive system and STAR fuel reformer may find their use limited to upscale luxury cars.
Want to know more about fuel cell cars? Be sure to check out these articles on GreenCar.com:
GM Debuts the Provoq, the Cadillac of Fuel Cell Vehicles
Honda FCX Clarity Zero Emissions Fuel Cell Car
VW Conjures Up a Hydrogen Powered Microbus
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