Fuel Cells for Saving Natural Gas

August 7, 2005 – Vol.10 No.20

FUEL CELLS FOR SAVING NATURAL GAS?

In some ways a shortage of natural gas is more difficult to deal with than a shortage of oil. Pipelines can’t be built across oceans and transporting natural gas by ship in liquefied form is expensive and dangerous. In other words, relying on overseas imports to fill gaps in supply is not easy.

The threat of shortages of natural gas could be reduced by using it more efficiently. Efficient, combined heat and power fuel cells for our homes come to mind. If there is ever to be a large initial market for fuel cells it will most likely start with home power plants fueled by hydrogen extracted from piped-in natural gas.

The new energy bill in the United States offers a $1000 tax credit for each kilowatt of power produced from a fuel cell power plant. For systems such as PlugPower's 5-kilowatt GenCore, the subsequent $5000 reduction in price should help increase sales, a bit. To date the company has sold more than 550 fuel cell systems which can provide heat, hot water and electricity for homes and small businesses. Visit Plug Power at http://www.plugpower.com/ .

In the UK the first fuel cell micro combined heat and power unit will be installed in a housing estate in Eyemouth, Berwickshire. The system known as a Home Energy Center was built by heating specialist Baxi Group. Running on hydrogen extracted from natural gas, the system will provide 1.5 kilowatts of electricity (about 75 percent of the average home power needs in the UK) and 18 kilowatts (61,000 btu’s) of thermal output, 100 percent of a home’s heat and hot water needs.

The system, installed by SiGEN, will be tested for a year. Visit Baxi at http://www.baxi.com/ , SiGEN at http://www.sigen.co.uk/ .

Also in the U.K., energy group Centrica, a subsidiary of British Gas, will partner with fuel cell developer CeresPower to develop a mini-boiler that will work in conjunction with a fuel cell to provide heat and hot water for domestic use. Since it will operate on waste heat from the fuel cell, the boiler is expected to cut an average household’s energy bill by a third.

The companies expect the new boiler will be developed in about a year and could sell for as little as GPB 2500 ($4500) in about three years. Visit Centrica at http://www.centrica.co.uk/ and CeresPower at http://www.cerespower.com/