The project Don Quichote (Demonstration of new qualitative innovative concept of hydrogen out of wind turbine electricity) co funded by the FCH JU program,  reached an important milestone on March 9, 2016  a the existing hydrogen refuelling station of WaterstofNet at the premises of the Colruyt Group in Halle (Brussels), has been expanded by a PEM electrolyser (30 Nm3/h), extra storage capacity (40 kg) and a fuel cell (120 kW), delivered and built by Hydrogenics. This system will extensively be tested for the next 2 year (until October 2017). During this testing period, the PEM electrolyser will be benchmarked against the existing alkaline electrolyser. For the first time, it will be able to perform additional tests on both electrolyser systems to find out which type is better to connect to renewable energy sources.

Up to now, the existing hydrogen refuelling stations has delivered more than 2200 kg of hydrogen to mostly forklift trucks and performed 2.500 refuelings. The technical availability of the fueling stations is more than 95%. These conditions have convinced Colruyt to  invest in further fuel clel powered material handling vehicles: in the coming year Colruyt’s FC forklift trucks fleet will expamd to 250 vehicles making it the largest fleet in Europe.