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Pitch

Fuel cells produce electricity & heat without combustion in a clean chemical reaction. Hydrogen can be made from renewable resources.


Description

Summary

The advantages provided by energy storage via the production of Hydrogen for use in a Fuel Cell energy system  are quite profound with regard to clean energy adoption.

Benefits of fuel cell systems include:

  • Low-to-Zero Emissions
  • High Efficiency
  • Reliability
  • Fuel Flexibility
  • Energy Security
  • Ruggedness and Durability
  • Scalability
  • Quiet Operation
  • Technology Compatibility
  • Lightweight and Long-Lasting

 

Hydrogen Fuel Cell energy production which generates 24/7 power at or near the point of use is considered a “distributed” power system. This means the expensive and wasteful transmission losses of energy sent over long distances from “centralized” and too often fossil fuel based power plants is eliminated.

-- Alas, we're already captured in a CO2 trap ...

  •  The big grid energy corporations only add clean energy assets to their portfolios when required to do so under state government mandates.
  • The production of Fuel Cell Electric Vehicles (FCEV's) and Battery Electric Vehicles (BEV's) by automobile manufacturers continues to languish at less than a snail's pace.
  • Wall Street and Big Banks are de-valuing efforts of pioneering companies whom are actually implementing clean energy alternatives. Financial resources are unavailable to such companies while the long established fossil fuel industry is treated as "darlings".              
     

It's abundantly clear that addressing climate change issues will not be happening if a status quo fossil fuel energy industry is allowed an inordinate amount of influence through it's political and financial dominance of our energy markets.

Fuel cell adoption and a distributed energy infrastructure represents an alternative to the dictates of big energy monopolies and an expensive, inefficient, crumbling electrical grid.

-- It's time to end an over-emphasis upon the profit motivated, over-centralized, dirty energy ideologies which have clearly evolved at odds with the nature of life on earth.


What actions do you propose?

Actually there are many ways this technology is already being adopted..

Millions of metric tons of hydrogen are produced annually in the United States, which is enough to fuel tens of millions of Fuel Cell Electric Vehicles.  The current primary uses for hydrogen, however, are for the petroleum, ammonia for fertilizer, chemical, and food industries.

Today, 95% of the hydrogen produced in the United States is made by industrial-scale natural gas reformation. This process is called fossil fuel reforming or steam methane reformation (SMR) and uses natural gas and steam to generate carbon dioxide and hydrogen.

Greenhouse gas emissions can be avoided completely if the CO2 produced in SMR is captured and stored, in a process known as carbon capture and storage (CCS), or when the hydrogen is generated from renewable sources such as electrolyzing water with solar or wind power.

As sustainable renewable energy generation advances in the United States, it is anticipated low to zero carbon hydrogen production will also become more commonplace.

  • Fuel cells perform at an average efficiency of 50% to 60% compared to the typical 30% efficiency of the U.S. electrical grid. When fuel cells are configured into a combined heat and power (CHP) system - where waste heat is captured and utilized for heating or cooling buildings, or liquids such as water - fuel cells can achieve efficiencies of up to 90%, making a CHP fuel cell one of the most efficient and environmentally friendly energy technologies available.

 

Applications of fuel cells as both distributed and micro grid-scale generation have demonstrated that the technology is effective, efficient, and reliable. They're used successfully today for Materials Handling, Public Transportation, Automotive and Stationary Power. No other technology can claim both the resiliency and efficiency of fuel cells, while still achieving significant emission reductions.

-- Northeastern states have already recognized the reliability issues associated with traditional grid generation, and many of those states are taking steps to address these problems by encouraging clean and reliable energy technologies...

-- MIT alumni should provide support for Massachusetts DOER Community Clean Energy Resiliency Initiative to include fuel cell and clean energy storage incentives statewide.

http://www.mass.gov/eea/energy-utilities-clean-tech/renewable-energy/resiliency/resiliency-initiative.html 

-- MIT alumni should support adoption of "Fuel Cell Tax Extenders Act of 2015" (HR 3571) the bill in US Congress which temporarily extends incentives for fuel cell property placed in service until 2021 - currently referred to House ways & means committee.

Most importantly MIT alumni must be open to creating an avenue through which fuel cell development and de-centralized energy infrastructure will put political and financial pressure on current, environmentally destructive energy production and distribution systems.

The risk/reward pendulum of our current energy system is out of balance. The key to advancing a new paradigm is energy storage.

A Hydrogen storage/Fuel Cell production energy partnership is indeed a more efficient, less risky medium for use during a transition away from the GHG producing infrastructure of the past. It retains the use of current resources while also enabling the development of cleaner, healthier, more resilient options.

Fuel Cells are exceedingly good at establishing a clean energy choice and it's in our interest, our planet's interest to create new ways to opt-out of dirty fossil fuel energy production.

The Choices of the future are our responsibility today.

-- MIT alumni are perhaps one of the most influential groups which is certainly capable of bringing great focus onto the challenge of a continued energy transition.

Let's Do This!

 

 

Thank you.