European deal for 1,000 fuel cell engines a sign of “market maturity,” underscores need for new plant to meet forecasted growth and production volumes

Ballard Power Systems’ April Fools’ Day news releases were anything but jokes.

On a day known for silly gags and fake pronouncements, the Vancouver hydrogen fuel developer made serious news with two major announcements — unveiling the largest engine order in company history, along with news of another US$54 million in U.S. government funding to support its plan to build a fuel cell gigafactory in Texas.

The engine deal, a long-term supply agreement with Solaris Bus & Coach, will see Ballard provide 1,000 hydrogen fuel cell engines through 2027 for the European transit bus market.

Delivery will start this year. These engines will deploy across Europe, where Ballard-powered Solaris buses already operate in over 22 cities on the continent.

Market maturity

“It really shows the market maturity. A few years ago, we were getting orders for one, two, and then five and 10 [engines],” Nicolas Pocard, Ballard’s vice-president of marketing, says in an interview with Electric Autonomy.

“And now… Solaris has the biggest market share for all zero-emission buses in Europe.”

The order consolidates an existing one for 300 engines, while adding another 700 to the total. Units will be made up of approximately 80 per cent FCmove-HD 70 kW and 20 per cent FCmove-HD+ 100 kW engines aimed at the 12 and 18-metre bus markets.

According to Pocard, Ballard has been working with Solaris since 2016 or 2017.

To date, Poland-based Solaris has delivered nearly 200 hydrogen-powered buses, with more than 500 units in its order book for the next two years.

“[We see] OEMs, committing on long-term supply for these engines and not just on a product or project basis,” Pocard says. “Because now the technology is accepted, it’s being deployed and proven and it works.”

Texas gigafactory

Meanwhile, the US$54 million Ballard announced for its planned gigafactory in Rockwall, Tex., comes in the form of tax credits awarded by the U.S. Internal Revenue Service as part of the Qualifying Advanced Energy Project Tax Credit (48C) funded through the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA).

This money adds to the initial gigafactory support funding Ballard received in March – when it announced the project: US$40 million in the form of two grants from the U.S. Department of Energy.

Ballard says it plans to make a final investment decision on the project later this year, “pending completion of customary conditions, including necessary approvals and definitive documentation.”

Assuming it goes ahead, the facility — to be dubbed Ballard Rockwall Giga 1 — will be located on a parcel of 22 acres of industrial land within the Rockwall Technology Park.

In the first phase, Ballard plans to invest approximately US$160 million from 2024 through the end of 2027 to build and commission a new manufacturing facility with annual production capacity of eight million membrane electrode assemblies, eight million bipolar plates, 20,000 fuel cell stacks and up to 20,000 fuel cell engines per year.

Ballard says it needs the new plant to meet “forecasted growth and production volumes” that will soon exceed the capacity of its current plant in B.C.

“Automatized” production

In the funding press release, company president and CEO Randy MacEwen added: “Customers are being very clear — they are counting on us to be there for them at volume and at the right costs. The ability for us to demonstrate a clear roadmap to high production volumes at significantly reduced costs is critical to customers transitioning from demonstrations to future scaled deployments.”

Pocard says the facility came about in a period where Ballard expected production growth and needed plans for a fully automatized facility.

“We’re going to be able to go from a pilot line or what we have now in Vancouver to really fully automatized production of key products for the mobility market,” he says.