ACTA.L Regulatory News (ACTA)

26 Jan 2009 07:00



26 January 2009  

Acta S.p.A. ("Acta" or the "Company")

Grant Approval

Acta, the catalyst technology development company, is pleased to announce that its application for grant funding for the Hydrostore project has received Italian government approval.

The project is to be led by a subsidiary of Eni S.p.A., the major Italian energy company, in collaboration with Enel S.p.A., Italy's largest power company and the second largest utility company in Europe. Total grant funding of €12.0m has been approved over the three years' duration of the project, to be shared between the project partners. 

Acta is expected to be the equal second largest beneficiary of the grant. The other project partners include ENEA (the Italian National Agency for New Technologies, Energy and the Environment) and a number of leading Italian universities and research institutes.

Paolo Bert, Chief Executive, commented: 

"We are delighted to be entering this important project with prestigious partners such as Eni and Enel. Not only will the project provide funding to accelerate our development of the water electrolyser for hydrogen production, but the commercial and industrial support of the project partners will be invaluable in bringing these promising technologies to market."

The project aim is to develop improved methods of generating and storing hydrogen for stationary and transport applications. Within this, the commercial objective is to develop efficient, high capacity methodologies for generating hydrogen, including from renewable energy sources, and storing it on an industrial scale at a cost that is competitive with high pressure hydrogen cylinders. The systems developed under the project will be installed for evaluation at Enel's energy park in Livorno, close to Acta's premises, and at an Enel power plant near Venice, among other locations.

Through the Hydrostore project Acta will further the development of its innovative alkaline membrane water electrolyser. This electrolyser produces high pressure hydrogen, without the need for expensive noble metals, and is capable of running on an intermittent power source, such as that from solar panels or wind farms, without loss of efficiency. Since the hydrogen is produced already at pressure, it also allows the efficient storage of hydrogen without the energy loss incurred by compression.

Under the scope of the project, Acta will be working to optimise the electrolyser catalyst performance, the membrane electrode assembly design, and the system durability. All intellectual property developed by Acta under the project will remain the property of Acta.

The Board believes that there are widespread applications for its new water electrolyser system in industrial hydrogen production, and that it offers a solution to the renewable energy industry's key challenge of efficiently storing energy from intermittent power sources.

As announced on 22 January 2009, Acta will be demonstrating the first prototype of its water electrolyser at the Fuel Cell Expo in Tokyo from 25 to 27 February.

- Ends -

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Notes to Editors

About Acta 

Acta develops and manufactures unique patented catalysts which have been launched to the renewable energy, automotive, battery and industrial markets. Acta is also developing other commercial opportunities using its catalysts for industrial waste treatment.

Acta's catalysts and alkaline system know-how are at the heart of the Company's development of a new, high pressure water electrolyser technology which has demonstrated low cost, platinum free, high pressure hydrogen generation. Combined with a platinum free fuel cell, the system offers a solution to the problem of how to store surplus energy produced from large scale, intermittent renewable energy sources (eg wind farms).

Acta's catalysts are also undergoing customer tests in applications such as ammonia treatment (removal of ammonia from an industrial waste stream), and zinc-air batteries (a high performance and environmentally friendly battery technology), as well as fuel cell and other applications.