New Industry Products

Oorja Protonics Unveils Onboard Methanol-Based Fuel Cell Charger For Material Handling Vehicles

March 31, 2008 by Jeff Shepard

Oorja Protonics has revealed its first commercial product offering – OorjaPac™ – an onboard charging system for forklifts, pallet loaders, and other material handling vehicles which charges their batteries both while they operate and under idling conditions.

The OorjaPac is said to address a number of critical problems faced by the material handling vehicle users. These include: low runtime with batteries on a single charge, resulting in the need to purchase and maintain multiple batteries per vehicle and conduct multiple battery swaps in order to get through one full day of operation; significant vehicle and labor downtime during non productive activities such as battery swapping, resulting in reduced operational productivity; reduced battery life due to inadequate charging and cooling processes; high operational costs associate with the incumbent approach, namely maintaining real estate for battery swapping/charging rooms and the labor associated with the battery swapping process.

Operating as an onboard battery charger, the OorjaPac is claimed to address all of these concerns and provides a compelling ROI. The OorjaPac is said to provide sufficient energy for a two-shift operation on a single four-gallon liquid methanol canister with refueling taking less than two minutes. The net result is said to be an operation with increased productivity and reduced capital and operational expenditure.

"OorjaPac represents a quantum leap forward in affordable fuel cell technology," said Sanjiv Malhotra, Founder and CEO of Oorja Protonics, "This patented direct methanol fuel cell is ideally suited for resource and time constrained environments where material handling equipment such as forklifts and pallet loaders are used. Our product is well positioned to displace compressed gas and plug-in battery systems as the technology of choice in a multi-billion dollar market."