Fuel cells and hydrogen

The best use of the sun's energy is to make hydrogen, according to a Duke University researcher.

Engineer Nico Hotz earlier this week detailed results from his research around a rooftop solar panel that generates hydrogen from the sun's heat. The hydrogen gas--which is made by breaking off hydrogen atoms from a water solution--can be stored and used to make electricity in a fuel cell.

In his experiment, Hotz determined that his system creates more usable energy than solar photovoltaic panels which convert sunlight directly into electricity. He calculated the cost could be lower, too.

There have been … Read more

One of the biggest hurdles for fuel cell technology to overcome is finding an energy-efficient and cost-effective way to create hydrogen fuel. But what if we could convert landfill gas to hydrogen?

BMW is working on a project to turn the methane gas generated by landfills into hydrogen. For the past eight years, the auto manufacturer has been collecting, cleaning, and compressing methane gas from a landfill near its Spartanburg, S.C., assembly plant, and using the clean fuel to power more than 50 percent of the facility's total energy needs.

That move has reduced the plant's carbon … Read more

NTT America soon will be able to claim a data center that runs on biogas.

The Japanese telecommunications company today said it will install five Bloom Energy fuel cells in its California data center that will use biogas as a fuel. It's a sign of the growing interest in cleaner fuel cell technology, which proponents say will increasingly be adapted for residential customers.

The fuel cells will be able to generate 500 kilowatts of power, which is enough for about 500 U.S. homes. At the data center, they will generate 4.2 million kilowatt-hours per year and reduce … Read more

Bloom Energy and telecom giant AT&T said today that the clean-tech start-up would install its fuel cell-powered Energy Servers--known colloquially as "Bloom boxes"--at 11 facilities in California.

The AT&T facilities include sites in Corona, Fontana, Hayward, Pasadena, Redwood City, Rialto, San Bernardino, San Diego, San Jose, and San Ramon.

The units are expected to provide 7.5 megawatts of energy for AT&T, reducing its carbon emissions footprint for the facilities involved by half, or about 250 million pounds of CO2 per year.

For AT&T, it's a chance to use a buzzworthy clean-tech company in its overall corporate sustainability initiative to use more renewable energy as part of its portfolio. (The company also has 19 solar deployments slated for 2011.)

For Bloom, it's the latest in a series of high-profile partners, including software maker Adobe.

The key to Bloom's success lies in its business model, in which it pays for installation and hardware upfront in exchange for profits from a fixed rate on power produced.

(If you're interested, our sister site SmartPlanet did a deeper dive last year into the tech that's inside the Bloom box; our corporate siblings at 60 Minutes also profiled the company in February 2010.)

For the AT&T deal, the Bloom boxes are expected to produce more than 62 million kilowatt-hours of electricity each year, enough to power some 5,600 homes.

Installation of the boxes is scheduled to begin later this year; the plan is to have them fully operational by mid-2012.

This story originally appeared on SmartPlanet.com… Read more

General Electric, NRG Energy, and ConocoPhillips, through their joint venture firm, have invested in a new kind of wastewater treatment technology.

They're backing Israel-based Emefcy, developer of the Megawatter System, which uses bacteria to turn a regular wastewater treatment plant into an electricity-producing bioreactor that produces both clean water and electricity.

The electrogenic bioreactor draws on organic matter in the wastewater to supply microbial fuel cells (MFCs). It uses the electrogenic bacteria Shewanella, Geobacter, and Rhodoferax as catalysts to decompose the glutens in the water.

The Megawatter System is not built as a standalone plant, but is actually a … Read more

BOSTON--One of the barriers to the long-hoped-for hydrogen economy is a non-polluting energy source for hydrogen. Nanoptek is one company that's tapping the sun's energy.

The Maynard, Mass., company this week said it is taking orders for a commercial solar hydrogen generator, which is now in pilot production. The company showed a smaller version of its product at the TechConnect conference here.

Nanoptek envisions creating a system for storing energy from solar at large scale, making hydrogen for vehicles, and even home fueling. In the nearer term, though, the company is seeking to sell solar generators to businesses … Read more

A Department of Energy project will test how refrigerator-size fuel cells fit a niche in the energy system of serving up heat and electricity to businesses and schools.

The Pacific Northwest National Laboratory will administer the $2.8 million program to install 38 fuel cells from ClearEdge Power at 10 businesses. The program provides up to 50 percent of the total cost of installation and will gather data remotely on the performance of the fuel cell-equipped systems, which will range between 5 and 100 kilowatts of power.

ClearEdge Power's fuel cells use natural gas as a fuel to generate … Read more

Toyota opened the first hydrogen refueling station in the U.S. that is connected directly to a hydrogen pipeline.

Unlike nearby Santa Monica and Irvine hydrogen refueling stations, this new facility, located in Torrance, Calif., on the Toyota campus, doesn't use trucks to bring hydrogen gas on-site. Instead, it receives a steady supply of hydrogen fuel from Air Products' hydrogen pipeline, which produces hydrogen at its plants in Wilmington and Carson, Calif.

Shell leases the land from Toyota, and manages the station for the manufacturer. The station will service Toyota's fleet of 100 fuel cell test vehicles that … Read more

The mantra for the California's Hydrogen Highway has been, "build it and they will come." That planned thoroughfare will soon see more zero-emission traffic now that the California Energy Commission (CEC) released funds for three new hydrogen refueling stations across the state.

Stations in Laguna Niguel, West Sacramento, and South San Francisco should come online in the next 18 months, and will eventually serve the fuel cell vehicles that manufacturers will produce starting in 2015. To ensure these stations aren't fly-by-night operations with all the curb appeal of a scrap yard, they are required to be … Read more