Cogeneration: a Part of the Energy Solution

In the late 1970s, John Gofman, co-inventor of plutonium, had second thoughts about his work with nuclear power over the years. He authored a book entitled Irrevy, in which he argued that the use of nuclear power for electrical production amounted to a bad tradeoff of inefficient and expensive power generation for an insoluble toxic waste problem and generations upon generations of unknown cancers and genetic defects.

While the portion of domestic electricity currently produced by nuclear energy is marginal, at that time there were quite a few more nuclear power plants and nuclear energy production. A perfect storm of Three Mile Island and Chernobyl together with movies such as The China Syndrome gave impetus to an anti-nuclear movement, of which, Gofman was a pre-eminent spokesman, which changed all of that.

Now, as the nation faces an energy crisis, not just of gas lines, but of all energy production, the idea of re-introducing nuclear energy with a vengeance has emerged. During the 2008 Presidential campaign, Republican candidate John McCain proposed building 50 new nuclear plants. As the electorate starts to forget why the moratorium on nuclear plants in the US went into effect in the first place and embraces the simplistic argument that 80% of France’s electricity is produced by nuclear plants, it becomes more imperative that we not only examine Gofman’s objections to the ‘nuclear option,’ but take a look at some of the alternatives he proposed.


One alternative he proposed was cogeneration, an energy source that Gofman estimated could supply as much as 40% of domestic energy needs. While cogeneration is not a well known concept in the United States, whole cities in Europe were designed with cogeneration in mind.
Cogeneration is the process of using otherwise wasted energy (mostly heat energy) to produce electricity or for other useful purposes. Cogeneration is more of an energy conservation strategy than a source of renewable energy, since it is basically using energy that has already been created more efficiently. Currently cogeneration is estimated to be producing 10% of the nation’s electricity.


Cogeneration is sometimes called Combined Heat and Power (CHP) and is a proven technology that has been around a long time. The first cogeneration plant was also the nation’s first commercial power plant, built by Thomas Edison in New York in 1882.


In most heat engines between slightly more than half to two thirds of the total energy produced by the engine is wasted excess heat. Cogeneration.net estimates that the average efficiency of fossil fueled power plants in the US is between 30 and 33 percent. Using cogeneration the efficiency of conventional power plants can be dramatically increased, for example from between 40 and 50% to between 80-90%.


Conventional power plants emit the heat created as a byproduct of electrical generation through cooling towers or other means. Cogeneration captures the byproduct heat either close to the plant or, as in some European nations, distributed through pipes for home heating uses. According to Wikipedia, the steam system in the world, Con Edison, produces 30 billion pounds of steam each year at its seven cogeneration plants and pumps it to 100,000 buildings in Manhattan.


Because there is a substantial variety of industrial processes that create heat there is no one typical cogeneration facility. Examples of different cogeneration facilities are therefore, quite extensive.


For example a thermally enhanced oil recovery plant in Kern County, California produces enough excess electricity that it produces more than enough for local use and transmits the surplus to Los Angeles. Other cogeneration plants are fueled by biomass and/or municipal and industrial waste.


A number of universities have initiated cogeneration projects, most notably MIT. The MIT project is a 10-year $40 million project that MIT hopes will enable it to generate all of its own electricity and heat using the waste heat of a gas turbine. MIT estimates it will also reduce greenhouse emissions by 45% over the technology it replaces.


On a smaller scale “micro-congeneration” is gaining popularity. Consisting of a small cogeneration plant located in either a home or small business (or both for home businesses), the

technology can be adapted to almost any situation.


Basically instead of burning fuel solely for heating purposes, a portion of that energy is also used to generate electricity. Generators that can be used for micro-cogeneration can run the gamut from microturbines and internal combustion engines, to Stirling engines, closed cycle steam engines and fuel cells.

Distributed Clean Energy In a Brownfield Redevelopment

BRISTOL TOWNSHIP – Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection Secretary John Hanger today toured The Bridge Business Center in Bristol Township, Bucks County, where $1 million in federal recovery funds are being used to install a modern energy system in a former Rohm & Haas laboratory.

Secretary Hanger witnessed a milestone in the project’s development, as seven micro-turbines were lifted by crane and placed on the roof of a building at 360 George Patterson Blvd., where renovations are underway in the 50,000-square-foot, multi-tenant facility.
“This is how recovery funds are making a real difference in people’s lives,” said Hanger. “In a community that has suffered from an economic downturn, we see this developer making not only a $4.5 million investment in adaptive reuse of a building on a designated brownfield site, but also in providing a clean, affordable and reliable source of energy for its tenants.”

In March, Governor Edward G. Rendell announced the $1 million Pennsylvania Energy Development Authority grant to the Keystone Redevelopment Group to install an energy system that uses gas-fired micro-turbines. This project is one of the first in the state to receive funding through the federal American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.

Through the installation of this system, total savings on energy costs over a 10-year period are expected to equal approximately $2 million. A significant portion of that savings – as much as $150,000 a year – will come from the sale of energy back to PECO. This system will reduce CO2 emissions by roughly 3 million pounds per year, the equivalent of removing 318 average sized passenger cars off the road.

The retrofitting of 360 George Patterson Blvd., the design and installation of its sustainable energy system, and employment by its tenants are expected to result in the creation of 100 high-wage jobs.

“Chemical research and development is an energy-intensive business,” Hanger said. The incorporation of this energy system is expected to make The Bridge Business Center highly competitive in the life sciences real estate market, and to attract tenants that will create hundreds of additional high-wage jobs in the future.”

The Bridge Business Center is located in a Keystone Innovation Zone. KIZs are established in communities with institutions of higher education, and are designed to foster innovation and create entrepreneurial opportunities. More than 600 jobs have been lost in Bristol Township since 2005 as employers Rohm & Haas and Jones New York downsized.

To learn more about how the federal economic stimulus will benefit communities across Pennsylvania, visit http://www.ahs2.dep.state.pa.us/redirector?varURL=http://www.recovery.pa.gov.
###

COMMONWEALTH OF PENNSYLVANIADept. of Environmental ProtectionCommonwealth News BureauRoom 308, Main Capitol BuildingHarrisburg, PA 17120FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE6/25/2009CONTACT:John Repetz Phone: (717) 787-1323

The Rest @ Capstone

Sola Ventura

Anyone know anything about Sola Ventura? Not much on their website, but they seem to have a unique distributed cleantech business model.


Sola Ventura LLC brings technology and investment opportunity together to solve clients energy needs. Onsite Green Energy Production can reduce your energy usage, lock in a lower rate for an extended period of years, and cost you nothing for installation and maintenance of any solar, wind, geothermal, and fuel cells required.

Please Comment if you know more...

Feed In Tariffs - Cooperation Between Distributed Energy and Utlity Providers

This is a excerpt from the Fast Company series on Distributed Energy Generation. It reviews the emerging Distributed Energy Industry, ,and suggest feed in Tarrifs funded by a gneral utility tax.

Editor

In fact, wherever a little public funding has gotten the ball rolling, consumer appetite for micropower has been essentially bottomless. To see just how fast the microgrid can emerge, there's no better place to look than Germany, where the market has been blown open thanks to what's known as a feed-in tariff.

• If net metering is simply the right to sell your power back to the grid at retail price, a feed-in tariff adds a little sweetener on top, paid for by a surcharge on all customers' bills.


• In effect, feed-in tariffs offer the same financing deal to citizens at large that utilities get on any power plant they build.
  
• The tariffs have been successfully adopted in 47 countries -- but Germany is by far the global leader.


• The policy was introduced there back in 1999, and the incentive increased in 2004, guaranteeing the small rooftop-solar producer four times the market rate for 20 years for any electricity he sells back to the grid.

That year, installations of solar panels jumped from an average of less than 6 megawatts annually to 600 megawatts; the total 5.4 gigawatts of solar now operating in cloudy Deutschland make up a jaw-dropping third of the entire world's supply. That increased volume, meanwhile, has sent the price of solar panels plunging and created a world-leading industry with a quarter-million jobs.

• All this for just an extra euro on the average monthly bill, a charge that can be avoided by anyone who becomes a net-power producer.
  
• In March, Gainesville, Florida, became the first U.S. locality to adopt a feed-in tariff, targeted to add 4 megawatts of solar a year for the next 10 years.


• The city reached its 2009 cap in just three weeks and its 2010 cap days later. Entrepreneurs are moving in to finance, install, and maintain solar panels on homes and malls across the city.

The idea, here and elsewhere, is that eventually higher volume will bring down prices enough so that incentives can be phased out.

If there's so much potential in the microgrid, why hasn't it already hit gigawatt scale in the United States?

• One answer is that it pits local producers against the utilities themselves. If the distributed-generation scenario resembles cell phones, that casts the utilities in the role of Ma Bell -- as outdated, monopolistic incumbents. Ed Legge of the Edison Electric Institute, the lobbying organization for the utility industry (and leader of the national effort to oppose federal renewables targets), is surprisingly frank on this point: "We're probably not going to be in favor of anything that shrinks our business. All investor-owned utilities are built on the central-generation model that Thomas Edison came up with: You have a big power plant and you move it and then distribute it. Distributed generation is taking that out of the picture -- it's local."

This attitude is understandable. After all, if utilities don't own it, they can't bill for it. And with close relationships between power companies and state regulators, they can and do throw up a variety of roadblocks to see that rooftop-solar programs and the like remain tiny.

The nonprofit Network for New Energy Choices puts out an annual report called "Freeing the Grid," tracking the growth of microgrid-friendly policies. These are trending up -- 42 states now have rules allowing some form of net metering. But based on the fine print, 28 of those states earned Ds or Fs because their rules are too restrictive to allow the average person to participate.

James Rose, who wrote the report, singles out Texas as an egregious example: In June 2007, Governor Rick Perry signed into law House Bill 3693, a big efficiency and conservation bill. Though the new law called for net metering to be deployed "as rapidly as possible," the report explained, utilities took a "hard line" against it at the regulatory level, and ultimately state regulations allow no such thing. "There was the feeling that some of the people who were interested in not having net metering had a lot of say in how net metering was defined," says Rose, choosing his words quite carefully.

The tactics utilities deploy to protect their profits can make a reasonable person's head spin. "

In Arizona a couple of years ago, we got a renewables incentive passed," says Adam Browning, executive director of Vote Solar, a national advocacy group. "A local utility proposed that it collect money for all the electricity that you didn't buy from it. The argument was: We've got fixed costs associated with maintaining the transmission and distribution grid. So if you don't buy from us, we want to charge you for your 'fair share' anyway," which it reckoned as everything but the avoided fuel costs -- the oil that you don't burn by choosing renewables. So regular customers would pay 11 cents a kilowatt-hour, but customers with solar panels on their roofs -- not even using the utility -- would still have to pay 6.8 cents an hour. "We hired a lawyer contesting this, and eventually we won," says Browning. Today, Arizona has decent, though not finalized, net-metering rules.

The Rest @ Fast Company

IBM's Energy and Utilities Group

IBM's energy and utilities group Is developing Multi-Micro Grid management Software.




To make that possible, IBM is focusing on smart-grid software to manage the complexities of a system that might have 2,000 variable power inputs over 100 square miles, instead of two power plants. It's also developing cheaper photovoltaics (prices are already projected to fall by 20% to 30% this year), and Shepler has been working with the federal government to write recommendations for incentives and R&D investments.

Allan Schurr, the VP of strategy and development at IBM's energy and utilities group, says simply, "Distributed energy is happening."

The Rest @ Fast Company

Fast Co Explores Micro Grids

Why small-scale, local power -- the microgrid -- could be the answer to our energy crisis. And why the big utilities are fighting it with all they've got.

Infographic: The Microgrid Dream House

In April 2007, a helicopter landed in a backyard in Johnson Valley, California, a desert hamlet of 440 residents on the outskirts of Joshua Tree National Park. "One of the neighbors went out and asked them what they were doing just a few hundred feet from his house," Jim Harvey, a local landowner, recalls.

"They said, 'We're the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power, and congratulations! You're the lucky lottery winners of a brand new power line that's going to come right through the middle of your town.' "

That power line is called Green Path North -- an 85-mile-long high-voltage transmission wire from Los Angeles through public and private lands, connecting the city to potential geothermal and solar-thermal resources, with the whole shebang to be owned by the LADWP and paid for over the next decade by ratepayers. The cost: up to $1 billion just for the transmission line, plus untold billions for the not-yet-planned power plants themselves.

• Some 2,000 acres of desert would be sacrificed for a project that would, if it ever gets built, carry about 800 megawatts of renewable electricity -- enough for 600,000 homes.
  

Green Path North is pretty typical of the renewables push in the United States: big, expensive, slow, and spectacularly uncertain.

• Twenty-eight states have pledged to shift their energy mix to at least 10% renewables, and at press time, Congress was considering a national target of 15% by 2020. But if many of us see this moment as a defining one, a key opportunity to reassess how we create and use energy across the country, the federal government seems content to leave the owners of the old energy world in charge of designing the new one.
• Big utilities are pushing hard to do what they do best -- getting the government to subsidize construction of multi-billion-dollar, far-flung, supersize solar and wind farms covering millions of acres, all connected via outsize transmission lines. Nevada senator Harry Reid has introduced legislation to speed the way for a national "electric superhighway." (Former Vice President Al Gore is another champion.)

"We need to have an efficient way to take energy created in often remote areas and move it to where it is needed," Reid said this spring on the Senate floor. "A cleaner, greener national transmission system -- an electric superhighway -- must be a top national priority."

• But the men appear to be victims of a bad metaphor. There's nothing especially efficient or high tech about heavy-duty aluminum-steel cables; "line loss" -- the power lost during transmission -- runs as high as 10% on our overloaded grid.

The power lines take years to propose, approve, and complete; Green Path North alone has gone through seven potential routes since 2006. And the LADWP is taking a flyer that the remote, large geothermal and solar power plants it's supposed to connect with will even be built.

In all, the federal Bureau of Land Management has to date received almost 400 applications for large solar and wind plants covering 2.3 million rural acres. Only a few of those have undergone environmental assessments -- and that's only the first step in a multiyear planning, permitting, and building process.

Meanwhile, utilities are making plenty of money off their existing investments in fossil-fuel power. It often seems that according to utilities, renewables are the power resource of the next decade, and always will be.

Harvey says he has a better idea. The founder of the Alliance for Responsible Energy Policy, he's no NIMBY complainer. "We're just the opposite; we want it in our backyard," he says. "

• We want to put solar panels on our roofs and our neighbors' roofs." The nearby city of Palm Desert rolled out a program last August funding fixed-rate loans to private homeowners for rooftop solar, and within weeks, the money had been spent and panels were up on roofs. "The choice is clear," says Harvey. "If you want renewables, you want 'em clean and you want 'em fast, and the best way to do that is [rooftops]. But the utilities have been so adamant about thwarting these programs. They are the ones that are standing in our way."

[Finally, the bottom line Follows]

The evidence is growing that privately owned, consumer-driven, small-scale, geographically distributed renewables could deliver a 100% green-energy future faster and cheaper than big power projects alone.

• Companies like GE and IBM are talking in terms of up to half of American homes generating their own electricity, renewably, within a decade. But distributed power -- call it the "microgrid" -- poses an existential threat to the business model the utilities have happily depended on for more than a century.
• No wonder so many of them are fighting the microgrid every step of the way.

Why small-scale, local power -- the microgrid -- could be the answer to our energy crisis. And why the big utilities are fighting it with all they've got.

Companies like GE and IBM are talking about up to half of American homes generating their own electricity, renewably, within a decade.

Theoretically, the microgrid is simple.

• Imagine you could go to Home Depot and pick out a wind or solar appliance that's as easy to install as a washer/dryer. It makes all the electricity your home needs and pays for itself in just a few years. Your home still connects to the existing wires and power plants, but it is a two-way connection: You're just as likely to be uploading power to the grid as downloading from it.
• Your power supply communicates with the rest of the system via a two-way digital smart meter, and you can view your energy use and generation in real time on your iPhone. Maybe you also have an electric car in the garage; the battery serves as backup storage for your house as well. And the best part: Assuming you produce more than you draw, instead of a monthly bill, you get a check.

A half-block from City Hall in Cambridge, Massachusetts, sits an unofficial prototype of this microgrid model. In 1983, when Sue Butler first bought her home, it was a condemned burned-out shell where police sent vagrants to crash. Today, the historic Italianate house built in 1858 has a comfortable artsy grace that matches the owner's; a cello and violin wait for a duet among a jungle of plants by the bay window.

An elderly dog wheezes in the kitchen. On the roof, powering this cozy scene, sits a half-kilowatt microwind turbine and 5.5 kilowatts' worth of solar panels. The system was roughly half paid for by a $25,000 grant from the Massachusetts Technology Collaborative, which administers a fund collected from a surcharge on every electric bill in the state.

The solar installation can produce two to three times as much energy as Butler's home needs, meaning she can run her meter backward and sell a surplus back to the grid, a procedure called "net metering."

Sue Butler's house can generate juice for two others. Put one on every block and soon you have a renewable-power plant.

A neat addition to Butler's system is the standard commercial meter that she finagled from NSTAR, the local utility.

Unlike flat-rate residential electric meters, commercial meters show the price of power varying with usage over the course of the day. Butler can bank power in the batteries in her basement -- they hold enough to run her house for a week -- and sell it back to the grid at times of peak use.

"It's a low-tech smart grid," says Jonah DeCola, the soft-spoken self-taught engineer and union carpenter who put together her system as proof of concept. DeCola is building a career cobbling together systems like this and teaching community college kids, new immigrants, and ex-cons the trade as well.

He calculates the payback on Butler's $60,000 system at four-and-a-half years or less. "She's getting premium for her juice," he says.

Now think about this.

• Each Sue Butler can potentially power three homes.
• Put one of these on every block, and eventually you have a renewable-power plant right in the middle of an urban downtown.
• The developers of an office park or a mall can easily install 10 times as much solar power; and a town can do even more, like the town of Hull, on Boston Harbor, which currently has two community-owned wind turbines totaling more than 2 megawatts and is planning four more to power the entire town.

You may have heard a lot already about how companies such as Cisco, Google, GE, and IBM are investing billions in the so-called smart grid, the software and the digital appliances that will let consumers and power producers make intelligent, efficient decisions about their electric-power use.

Well, the killer app comes when you, the consumer, can actually profit by using power intelligently.

What we're talking about here is potentially a shift every bit as profound as the switch from mainframes to PCs, or from landlines to cellular -- a movement from behemoth centralized power plants to a network of privately owned, renewable, geographically distributed installations, managed using the same kind of packet-switching software that regulates the flow of information over the Internet.

The microgrid is all about consumer control -- aligning monetary incentives, with the help of information technology, to make renewables and efficiency pay off for the average homeowner, commercial developer, or even a town. The name of the game is to scale up renewables big enough, fast enough, to bring the cost down to parity with conventional resources.

The Rest @ Fast Company

Distributed Power Generation Has Come of Age

I found this five year old post that proclaims they time for cogeneration has come.

It is more true today than ever.

-Editor

The Future of Small Scale Distributed Generation

Feb 27, 2004 12:00 PM, By George Zirnhelt, P.E., Power Systems Research, Inc.

Even though the United States’ electric utility system delivers only 20% to 30% of potential energy to end-users, it’s still the most cost-effective means of generation available today.

Distributed generation (DG) has proven to be more efficient, but its cost has been prohibitive to this point. Its supporters have been pushing to capture more of the power market for years, but until it can compete on both levels, it will have trouble.

In certain situations, however, economics, reliability, and/or quality have created a circumstance where it actually makes sense for the electric power user to generate his own power.

• Large-scale industrial users—especially those who can also use the by-product heat—can justify the investment on economic terms.
• Many others have justified investment in power generation capability to provide better-than-grid reliability or quality in the form of uninterruptible power supply systems.
• Emergency standby systems remain connected to the grid but can operate autonomously at least for a time.
• Still others have found economies in peak shaving applications.

The result is that more than 550,000 small (less than 5MW) stationary power generation facilities are currently operating in the United States.

But many owners of these small power plants still look at their monthly electric bills and wonder if there might be a better way.

Renewed interest in DG has been driven by a combination of issues, including:

• total cost
• capital availability
• supply reliability
• power quality.

To the degree that these factors stack up favorably for self generation as opposed to grid supplied power, DG emerges as a compelling choice.

Over the past several years, the events and developments that many in the power generation industry had predicted would help the DG market take off have failed to materialize.

Concerns surrounding Y2K, projections of substantial increases in utility costs, deteriorating utility infrastructure, and continuing gas surpluses led many to project that the equation would move in a favorable direction for distributed power.

Some even believed it would move quickly and substantially. In fact, developers of micro turbine products thought that they could tip the balance with new technology. None of these has come true, but that’s not to say they never will.

The market potential. Of the 550,000 small stationary power generation plants in the United States, less than 25,000 are used for standalone, full-time power generation (See Table).

Many of these are powered by reciprocating natural gas fueled engines.

Though in use in some locations, diesel creates a costly emissions problem that contributes to its overall unfavorable economics. Small and micro turbines represent a small portion of the market, and a variety of situational sources, such as small hydro, solar, wind, hybrid, and fuel cells, make up the rest.

The distribution of output for these power plants—some include multiple generators with a combined total less than 5MW—indicates that these plants have made most sense for larger users.

Small-scale self generators have met with a wide range of economic successes, but very few of them can claim substantial economic gains.

Only in situations where fuel is essentially free, as in the cases of bio gas by-products, coal seam gas, or other such sources, have alternative generation technologies been able to demonstrate an economic advantage.

They may have achieved improved reliability or better quality, but economic improvements are usually marginal except in cases where the plant location is remote or isolated from the grid or is optimized for combined heat and power supply.

The economics are further complicated by the fact that for most users electric power and heat are relatively minor parts of their overall operating budget.

Over the years surveys have found that for most small power plant owners, electric power and heat account for less than 5% and 4% of annual operating budgets, respectively.

These figures vary seasonally and regionally as well as by sector.

Reliability has been less of a concern in certain regions, but the consensus seems to be that it has been declining and could be cause for serious concern in the future. Moreover, it’s believed by many that the infrastructure will continue to slip and will be too expensive to correct in the short term.

The outlook from here. It has become clear that most of the “easy” applications for small DG have been explored. In order for more opportunities to emerge, some of the factors in the viability equation must change.

The micro turbine promoters had the right idea by implementing changes in technology incrementally, but few of these changes resulted in a real benefit.

In addition, it takes a considerable amount of time to prove those benefits to a skeptical marketplace, something that many in the industry often forget.

On the other hand, the adoption time can be shortened if the benefit is significant. A disruptive technology that offers much higher efficiencies at considerably lower first cost will be necessary unless other factors move in favor of current technologies.

Those closest to the threshold are installations that can use both the heat and electric power.

These opportunities are everywhere, and they’re just over the horizon.

• The factors that could drive the variables in favor of small distributed power generation are those that force utilities to invest more heavily while leaving end-user choices unaffected.
• The prospects are real, and the large scale transmission system failures last summer only strengthen their chances.
• The utilities are also faced with continuing pressure on emissions reductions, and the proportion of electric power generated by low-cost coal could change the playing field.

It appears to be inevitable that the cost differential will improve for small distributed power. The rate of utility investments will increase over the next several years. The proportion of power generated by low-cost coal will decrease. Regulatory change will move in favor of better gas buying opportunities for small generators.

Change in product technology will be more important if it reduces cost of the equipment than if it improves efficiency, except in the case of the self generator who uses the power plant only for electricity.

However, in that case the economics make that option far from viable. The total package efficiency needs to be 80% or greater. A typical reciprocating gas engine today is never more than 40% efficient at converting the potential energy in the fuel to electricity. It’s possible to capture another 40% to 45% of that potential in waste heat. The typical micro turbine without heat recovery is less than 30% efficient, and therefore just isn’t practical without other circumstantial rationalization.

Change could come in the form of significantly increased power output of a given engine. Today’s gas engines produce only about 50% of the power of a similarly sized diesel. There are technologies currently under development that can nearly double the power output from the same piece of iron, thereby keeping the cost about the same.

The 550,000 installed power plants that aren’t in full-time use are also attracting interest. Utilities could very well decide that they’ll supply distributed power installations. This would eliminate the complexity factor. A case could be made that a gas company could move into the electric power business and level out the summer/winter demand imbalance. However, this would only be possible with regulatory changes and a different perspective on future gas supplies and cost. Neither of these will happen quickly.

The potential for DG is huge, even if single-family residential applications are excluded.

• More than 10 million commercial and institutional establishments and more than 15 million multi-family residential facilities are candidates.
• Obviously some of these prospects are better than others. The further this projection is extended, the higher the probability but the wider the error range in that estimate.
• Customers who are large enough to have a peak demand of more than 300kW but too small to gain advantageous electric rates are the best early adapter candidates.
• These are small and medium size industrial and commercial users.
• Hotels, factories, office buildings, and schools are good examples.
  

The timing for this change is uncertain. The number of DG installations will undoubtedly increase, but how much and how soon are difficult to predict. Given some reasonable assumptions for the energy outlook and the pace of regulatory change, it’s reasonable to expect that installations will have doubled within five years, and they’ll probably double again in the five years after that.

The key factors to watch for are increasing utility investments and higher interest rates, which both make life difficult for large-scale utility investments.

• New technologies that increase the specific output but not necessarily the efficiency of gas engines or small turbines, could reduce the initial cost per kW of capacity.
• Further deterioration of the delivery system reliability would also increase the premium that self generators might be willing to pay

Some combination of these factors will continue to drive the DG market. If the utilities decide to get on board, the demand could accelerate sharply. If they decide to discourage this direction, it could continue to be a slow painful struggle.

Zirnhelt is president and CEO of Power Systems Research in St. Paul, Minn.

The Rest @ EC & M

OREG or Microgrids Two Names for Distributed Energy Resources (DER)

For those of you interested in On site Reliable Energy Generation (OREG), moving to Renewable Energy, we have to know how grid providers see who you are and what you do.

In a nut shell, they see you as an energy resource. They call you Distributed Energy Resources (DER)

They call your On site energy generation a microgrid, and are fast working on ways to network all OREG resources together.

This white paper, written by the Deportment of Energy in 2002 lays out the concept fairly well.

- Lee Royal

AGNI Inc buys GenCell - or - Combined Heat and Power HP Buys a Fuel Cell Maker

Agni Inc has acquired Connecticut based GenCell Corporation, a Molten Carbonate Fuel Cell (MCFC) developer and manufacturer, to complement AGNI’s Proton Exchange Membrane Fuel Cells (PEMFC) and biomass / waste-to-energy technology, in its bid to expand into the North American market.

• GenCell’s high temperature molten carbonate fuel cell (MCFC) capabilities are well suited for integration in many AGNI renewable energy systems.
• AGNI’s technology converts a wide range of biomass, biogas, or fossil fuels to hydrogen, producing electricity through its PEMFC based Integrated Fuel Cell Engine power generation block.
• GenCell’s technology includes a cost-effective fuel cell design that will provide AGNI with more efficient, environmentally-friendly power generation.
• GenCell has a proprietary fuel cell stack architecture that is "designed for manufacture" to reduce fuel cell cost and improve reliability, which in turn helps make fuel cells more economical and environmentally attractive.

Additionally, AGNI will now leverage its new wholly-owned subsidiary company, "AGNI GenCell Inc.", to penetrate the large and growing North American market for distributed generation and renewable energy.

• AGNI's range of power generation technologies enable significantly more efficient electrical power production, along with the recovery of excess heat which may be converted into hot water, steam and chilled water for air-conditioning or to produce even more electrical power.
• Its technology can also be configured to produce potable water as a by-product and to recover CO2, therefore without emitting hazardous greenhouse gases.

Source: Fuel Cell Today

Connecticute Regualtion May hold up Fuel Cell Deployment

December 21, 2008

If fuel cells are going to be the energy technology of the future, the state may have to
jettison the regulatory mindset of the past. State energy regulators may stop the largest
residential construction project in the state from using a Connecticut-made fuel cell to
power the building.

The project in question is 360 State St., a 32-story, 500-unit apartment building under
construction across from the State Street train station in New Haven. The building will
contain retail space, including a fitness center and a grocery, and enclosed parking for
500 cars. At nearly 700,000 square feet, it may be the largest single residential building
ever built in the state. Developer Bruce Becker also planned to make it the greenest.
Becker has included 20 energy-saving technologies — a green roof, double-glazed
windows and other features — and hopes to power the building with a 400-kilowatt fuel
cell made by UTC Power of South Windsor. He said if it all comes together, the
skyscraper will be the first residential building in Connecticut to achieve Leadership in
Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) Gold Certification from the U.S. Green
Building Council.

The tricky part is the fuel cell. The project received a $900,000 grant from the
Connecticut Clean Energy Fund to help pay for the power-generating device. The grant
would cover slightly more than half the cost. To pay for the rest, and to maintain the fuel
cell, Becker proposed a plan he used for a similarly sized building called "The Octagon"
he built four years ago on Roosevelt Island in New York City.

Basically, he wants to generate electricity for the building from the fuel cell, and charge the tenants what they would pay if they weregetting the juice from United Illuminating, the local utility.

The building would still have a relationship with UI, to whom it would sell excess generation or buy power if it was needed for summer peak periods. Becker, as landlord, would have one "master meter" for UI. He would install "sub meters" for all the tenants.

This seemingly sensible idea needed approval from the state Department of Public Utility Control. It went before a hearing in September. On Dec.11, the DPUC issued a draft decision turning down the proposal. Master metering, as this arrangement is sometimes called,
has been historically unpopular with regulators. Traditionally, landlords have simply split
the cost of electricity in a building among the tenants. Thus, individual tenants were not
rewarded for conserving electricity, so tended to use and pay more for power.
But Becker said new technology allows each tenant to be accurately billed for only the
power that is used, and for a disinterested third party to monitor the billing. This, he said,
is what is done in New York.

But not in Connecticut. Here, master metering is allowed in marina slips and
campgrounds, and has been allowed in some residential contexts, such as subsidized
senior housing. But the department ruled that Becker's proposal didn't qualify "under

The department said it did not have the authority to create de facto utility companies,
which it does not have the capacity to regulate. The commission also said the proposal
would involve resale of electricity for profit, which is not allowed.

The decision says Becker can achieve the benefits of fuel cell technology by having the
utility buy back the excess power he generates, as a 2007 state law requires. Becker
said the rates of reimbursement under that arrangement are not high enough to cover the
cost of deploying the fuel cell.

This is a preliminary decision. The parties must return for oral arguments, after which it
could change. If the DPUC is interpreting present law correctly, and I have no reason to
think otherwise, then the law has not kept up with technology and needs to be changed,
muy pronto. Otherwise we will have the absurd situation of the legislature and some
state agencies encouraging developers to use fuel cell technology and another state
agency telling them they can't.

Becker hopes to have the DPUC change its mind. If the ruling stands, he said he may
appeal to the courts or ask for legislative relief. Failing that, he said he will be forced to
either abandon the fuel cell idea or use a much smaller cell.

That would be a shameful loss. The legislature has encouraged fuel cells and on-site or
"distributed" generation for many good reasons. Fuel cells are a highly efficient and
extremely clean form of power. Distributed generation lessens power line congestion, a
chronic problem here, and improves energy security.

On the other hand, the new technology has to be implemented without putting distribution
companies such as UI and their customers at risk of higher costs or service changes. So
it's complicated. But it must be worked out.

Whole Article @ Curant.com

Fuel Cell Manufacturers

• Acumentrics Corporation

They make a 5 kw SOFC Fuel cell: Acumentrics’ 5000 Electric Power Generator

• Efficient: Peak efficiencies between 40-50%; up to 90% with waste heat recovery.
• Silent: Whisper quiet electrochemical process generates continuous electricity.
• Internal scrubbing: Negligible NOx and SOx output; reduced CO2 output.
• Solid State: Ceramic fuel cell tubes.
• Fuel-flexible: Compatible with natural gas, propane, biofuels, LPG, H2 \
• Site flexible: Small scale package is easy to site.
• Grid-tie option: Allows connection to utility grid for peak shaving and net-metering.
• Easy operation: Rapid start and stop. Fuels can be stored onsite or delivered at residential line pressures.
• No external or internal pressure boosting required.
• Communications ready: Monitor and control using built-in Ethernet port.



• Altergy

Altergy Systems designs and manufactures proprietary proton exchange membrane (PEM) fuel cell systems, collectively known as Altergy Freedom Power™ products. These compact, rugged, high efficiency systems produce power at the point of use -- making reliable, distributed power generation a reality.

Freedom Power™ Systems provide an excellent alternative to batteries and generators. Their plug and play design allows system modules to stand alone or be combined to produce a wide range of power output (1-30kW).

• American Power Corp

InfraStruXure Fuel

• Cell 30 kw



• Analytic Power



• Ansaldo Fuel Cells Spa



• Apollo Energy Systems Inc.



• Astris Energi : Test Equipment



• Ballard Power Systems: Small PEMFC System
• 
  Mark 902 Transportation PEM 85 kW
  Mark 9 SSL
  Materials Handling / Light
  Mobility PEM 4.4 - 19.3 kW
  Mark 1030 Cogeneration PEM 1.3 kW
  Mark 1020 ACS
  Back-up power / Light
  Mobility PEM 300 - 5000 W
  HD6* Transportation / Bus PEM 65 or 130 kW net
  DFC 300MA Stationary MCFC 300 kW
  DFC 1500MA Stationary MCFC 1200 kW
  DFC 3000 Stationary MCFC 2400 kW
  
• Brennstoffzellentechnik GmbH (ZBT): Manufactures Hydrogen fuel Cell Stacks



• Cellkraft Small FC Up to 2 KW of PEM



• Ceramic Fuel Cells Ltd CFCL is an Australian based world leader in developing solid oxide fuel cell (SOFC) technology to provide reliable, energy efficient, high quality, and low-emission electricity from widely available natural gas and renewable fuels. CFCL is developing SOFC products for small-scale on-site micro combined heat and power (m-CHP) and distributed generation units that co-generate electricity and heat for domestic use.



• ClearEdge Power 5 kw natural gas not clear what type



• Dais Analytic Home level PEMFC



• DCH Technologies: DCH Enable



• De Nora - Italy



• Distributed Energy Systems (gone)
• (Proton Energy Sytems -A range of systems including hydrogen generators


• ECG



• EDC Ovonics



• ERDC



• European Fuel Cell GmbH



• Fuel Cell Technologies



• FuelCell Energy



• Fuji Electric



• GenCell



• General Electric



• Global Thermoelectric



• Global Thermoelectric



• GM



• H Power Corp.



• HELION



• Hoku Scientific and IdaTech



• Hydra Fuel Cell Corp



• HydroGen Corporation



• Hydrogenics Corp

Hydrogenics USA

27201 Tourney Road,

Suite 201

Valencia, CA

USA 91355

Phone: 661.253.2593Fax: 905.361.3626

• IdaTech



• Industrial Research Laboratory



• Intelligent Energy



• Ion America



• Ishikawajima Shibaura Machinery Co



• M-C Power Corp



• Matsushita Electrical Industrial Co



• Minaton (Russian Institute of Atomic Energy)



• Mitsubishi Electric Corp



• Mitsubishi Heavy Industries



• MOSAIC Energy



• MTU CFC Solutions GmbH



• NedStack Fuel Cell Technology BV



• Nuvera



• P21 GmbH



• Plug Power



• Sanyo Electric Co.



• Schatz Energy Research Center



• Schunk



• Siemens Power Generation, Inc



• neration, Inc.



• Smart Fuel Cell AG



• Sulzer Hexis



• Teledyne Energy Systems



• Teledyne Energy Systems



• 'Tokyo Gas



• Toshiba



• Tropical S.A.



• University of Queensland



• UTC Power



• Voller Energy Group



• Wärtsilä'



• ZTEK Corp. Specialize in High efficiency fuel reformers for fuel cells, etc..
• 
  Mark 902 Transportation PEM 85 kW 􀀹
  Mark 9 SSL
  Materials Handling / Light
  Mobility PEM 4.4 - 19.3 kW 􀀹
  Mark 1030 Cogeneration PEM 1.3 kW 􀀹
  Mark 1020 ACS
  Back-up power / Light
  Mobility PEM 300 - 5000 W 􀀹
  HD6* Transportation / Bus PEM 65 or 130 kW net 􀀹
  DFC 300MA Stationary MCFC 300 kW 􀀹
  DFC 1500MA Stationary MCFC 1200 kW 􀀹
  DFC 3000 Stationary MCFC 2400 kW 􀀹
  HyPM XR (DC)
  Backup Power
  Systems Stationary PEM 8 - 16 kW 􀀹
  HyPM XR Power
  Modules Stationary PEM 4 - 12 kW 􀀹
  HyPM HD Power
  Modules Mobility PEM 4 - 65 kW 􀀹
  HyPM Power Packs Mobility PEM / hybrid 12 kW continuous 􀀹
  HySTAT Hydrogen
  Station Hydrogen Refueling
  Alkaline
  Electrolysis 4 - 60 Nm3/hr 􀀹
  ElectraGen™ 3XTR Backup PEM - Liquid Fuel 3 kW 􀀹
  ElectraGen™ 5XTR Backup PEM - Liquid Fuel 5 kW 􀀹
  ElectraGen™ 3 XTi Backup PEM - Liquid Fuel 3 kW 􀀹
  ElectraGen™ 5 XTi Backup PEM - Liquid Fuel 5 kW 􀀹
  iGen™ Portable PEM 250 W 􀀹
  ElectraGen ™ 3 Backup PEM - Hydrogen 3 kW 􀀹
  ElectraGen ™ 5 Backup PEM - Hydrogen 5 kW 􀀹
  Medis Power Pack** Portable
  Direct
  Borohydride 1 W TBD
  www.medistechnologies.com
  Mobion 30M*** Micro / Portable DMFC 30 W 􀀹
  www.idatech.com
  www.ballard.com
  www.fuelcellenergy.com
  www.hydrogenics.com
  www mechtech com
  Page 1 of 3 Copyright US Fuel Cell Council 2008 For a detailed product listing, including product descriptions and efficiencies, visit www.

CFC Solutions GMBH now MTU Onsite Energy GmbH

MTU Onsite Energy GmbH is a subsidiary business unit of MTU Friedrichshafen, a subsidiary of Tognum AG, involved in manufacturing large diesel engines and complete propulsion systems.

(thanks for the Update Bryan-see comments below)

• CFC Solutions became MTU Onsite Energy GmbH (Fuel Cell Systems Division) in September 2008.
  
  The company manufactures diesel engines for propulsion systems in ships, distributed power plants, heavy vehicles and rail in the power range between 35 and 9,000 kW.
  
  
  Since 1990, MTU has shown interest in fuel cells which resulted in the foundation of MTU CFC Solutions, now CFC Solutions.
  
  The company has been involved in the development and manufacture for molten carbonate fuel cells ("HotModule", 250kW).
  
• Since the end of 2000, MTU is also involved in PEM technology in order to develop fuel cell drive systems for off-highway applications.
• The focus of this work has been on propulsion systems for ships and on-board power generation. The aim is to develop scalable fuel cell systems on a modular basis so that they can be modified to match the requirements of the various applications as closely as possible.
• In October 2003, CFC has presented a PEM fuel cell powered sailing vessel using Ballard Power fuel cell units.

Partners

• CFC and Fuel Cell Energy are partners to a cross-licensing and cross-selling agreement. MTU Friedrichshafen has been a shareholder in FCE since 1989.
• In July 2003, RWE Fuel Cells, a subsidiary of RWE (one of Europe's leading utilities) and responsible for RWE's fuel cell business has joined MTU CFC Solutions by bying a 25.1% stake in the company.

Fuel Cell Market Analysis

The following excellent article was originally published on 18 November, 2008. By the Institue fur Kraft Fahr Zuge in Aachen, Germany.
It is such an accurate and complete summary of my own research that I present it. The only difference I would have is an editors note I added near the bottom. I disagree that this technology is 4 years away from major market penetration. I believe it is imminent.

-Editor

The Rest Published in the Road2hy.com
.

The application of Fuel Cell and Hydrogen technologies to the industrial and commercial markets takes the form of co-generation or tri-generation systems.

• Systems available today have total powers in the range 100kW to 2-3MW (higher power, modular, systems are possible but have not been installed) and produce electricity, heating and, sometimes, cooling.
• Most quoted efficiencies are 70-80% overall and 45-50% electrical, suggesting that co-generation using Fuel Cells will yield significant reductions in GHG emissions.
• In developed countries the existing industrial and commercial power/heat sources are responsible for approximately 20-25% of the total GHG emissions, making these sectors prime targets for Fuel Cell system introduction [1].

The arguments for introducing Fuel Cell technology into these sectors are as follows:

• Many countries are investigating distributed generation strategies, influenced by renewable sources such as wind, solar, tidal and others. Fuel Cell co-generation systems suit this strategy well [2].
  
• The industrial and commercial sectors already use well-established fuel chain infrastructures for on-site generation and heating, plus the energy utility grids.
  

Some industries already produce large quantities of potential fuel, suitable for reforming, as a direct by-product of their manufacturing/production processes.

• An excellent example is the chlor-alkali industry that, globally, produces 200 tonnes of hydrogen per hour. If used in Fuel Cell co-generation plants this hydrogen could produce more than 3GW of electrical power and heating.
  

Co/tri-generation system efficiencies are much higher than those based on more conventional, established technologies.

• Fuel Cell systems will offer these sectors large potential fuel cost savings.
• Industries and commercial businesses will be increasingly keen to exploit GHG emissions reduction opportunities as legislation impacts their bottom line.
• Legislation in some countries is already forcing the adoption of increasing quantities of energy from renewable or greener sources.
• Combined with increasing conventional fossil fuel prices in the long term, a significant market already exists for Fuel Cell systems [3].

The choice or availability of fuel influences the type of Fuel Cell and reformer technology selected. Fuel Cell distributed or co-generation development is following a number of potential technology streams but with varying levels of development achieved so far. The systems that are already being produced commercially are:

• Molten Carbonate (MCFC) for applications of 200kW-2.5MW.
• Phosphoric Acid (PAFC) for applications of 100-500kW.
• Proton Exchange (PEM) for high power applications of 250kW-1MW
• Solid Oxide (SOFC): Considerable development is still required before true commercialisation is a reality for SOFC, in spite of the significant number of companies active in this particular technology stream. Systems that have been announced so far will be suitable for many applications and operate at powers between 100-250+ kW.

All these Fuel Cell systems incorporate fuel reformers where necessary so that the unit can operate on alternatives to hydrogen.

Fuel Cell co-generation systems, furthermore, must compete with long-established technologies and utility grids that are, at present, cheaper but are far less efficient. The primary goals must be as follows:

• Reduce co-generation system costs to more competitive levels.
• Reduce cell-stack operating temperatures to enable improved cell chemistry and the use of cheaper materials for the cell stacks.
• Improve fuel reformer technologies to reduce fuel impurities and hence reduce cell degradation.
• Extend cell-stack lifetime.

Main Players

An overview of companies known to be developing fuel cell systems for commercial and industrial applications is presented. The main players known to be active in industrial and commercial applications of H2&FC systems .

These companies can be divided into

1. manufacturers of fuel cell stacks
2. system integrators who develop the actual products
3. Those that do both.

(Editors Note: not in original article) Some companies are emerging which integrate multiple renewable energy generation (OREG) with energy provision though Power Purchase Agreements, In Deregulated environments. These engineering companies use multiple renewable technologies to provide entire energy solutions to a variety of energy users.)

Some of the key players in this sect a highlighted in the text below.

• CFC Solutions (Germany) manufacture high temperature fuel cell CHP systems. To date, CFC have installed more that 20 of their HotModule® fuel cell systems throughout Europe. These systems typically generate 245 kW of electricity and 180 kW of heat. CFC use Fuel Cell Energy’s Direct FuelCell® technology [4].
  
• Fuel Cell Energy (Danbury, Connecticut USA) is continuing to develop modular Molten Carbonate Fuel Cell (MCFC) systems with powers ranging from 300kW up to 2.4MW. They claim to be able to build systems of up to 50MW using their existing, smaller FC modules. Fuel Cell Energy owns and operates a manufacturing plant in Torrington, Connecticut, with a capacity of 50 MW of fuel cells per year at present, with plans underway to increase the production capacity [5]. Fuel Cell Energy has been working closely with its partner Enbridge to develop more efficient plants. Using the energy produced from micro-turbines, that reduce the very high natural gas transmission network operating pressure to acceptable levels, FCE is able to increase the overall efficiency of their Fuel Cell system.
  
• NedStack (Arnhem, the Netherlands) have developed low power PEM fuel cell stacks that they sell to integration companies. NedStack is also developing a much larger PEM system, for industrial / commercial power applications, with a power output as high as 1MW [6].

• Nuvera (Italy) is continuing the third phase of development of the Forza™ high power PEM Fuel Cell system specifically for chemical process industries. The hydrogen by-product of many chemical industries is an ideal fuel for this system. Nuvera expect Forza to produce up to 250kW at a net efficiency of 55-60%. Forza is being developed to allow many modules to be combined in systems with maximum powers of 2-3MW [7].
  
• Rolls Royce Fuel Cell Systems (UK) are developing industrial/commercial SOFC co-generation systems for commercialisation in 2010. Their first field trials should start in late 2008 or early 2009.

• UTC Power (South Windsor, Connecticut, USA) is a single source developer, integrator and supplier of on-site, stationary co-generation and tri-generation PAFC systems with powers ranging from 195-400kW electrical plus additional heating and cooling outputs [8].
  
• Wärtsilä (Finland) have developed a 20 kW SOFC CHP system for commercial applications. Their unit, called WFC20, is based on planar SOFC technology developed by Tospøe Fuel Cells A/S (Lyngby, Denmark). In July 2008, Wärtsilä’s SOFC CHP system was demonstrated at the Vaasa Housing Fair where it was used to supply electricity and heat, while being fuelled by landfill gas.
  

Recent Developments

• Since early 2007 Fuel Cell Energy’s largest customer, POSCO Power of Korea, has ordered nearly 40MW of systems, for delivery in 2008-2010.
  
• UTC Power, a United Technologies Corp. company, announced in July 2008 that four models of its PureComfort® combined cooling, heating and power systems had met the emissions limits of the California Air Resources Board. This will allow UTC systems to be sited in any suitable location in California. CARB has now ordered 4 systems from UTC as part of the California Distributed Generation certification program.
  
• On 11 June 2008, UTC Power announced that the New York Power Authority (NYPA) had selected the company to supply 12 fuel cells totalling 4.8 MW of power for the Freedom Tower and three other new towers under construction at the World Trade Centre site in lower Manhattan.
• Delivery of UTC’s PureCell systems will begin in January of 2009. This installation has already attracted considerable interest from the building and site system services communities [9]. An overview of some of the recent key milestones is presented below.
  

Key Milestones and Future Developments for applying H2&FC technology to the Industrial and Commercial Market Sectors

Drivers and Barriers

Fuel cell technology holds considerable promise for the industrial and commercial market sectors. The potential flexibility and efficiency of stationary systems, plus the many applications for which they would be ideal sources of power, are certain to be recognised.

• Fuel Cell systems are used predominantly in niche industries at present, but this is likely to change rapidly as the technology gains acceptance and recognition.
• This does depend on many elements of course, including costs, lifetimes and air quality/emissions/GHG offsetting legislation.

The findings of this study indicate that large co- and tri-generation systems available to the market now can offer significant advantages over existing technologies.

True commercialisation is limited, however, by the unproven nature of Fuel Cell-based systems and by suspected cell stack lifetimes. There is a strong, well-developed existing market for conventional products and limited Government subsidies available, in only a very few countries, to encourage Fuel Cell technologies. The high overall efficiencies of Fuel Cell systems do not yet adequately outweigh the inertia within these markets, though that situation is changing.

Only a small number of companies are successfully exploiting these markets and, until now, only to a very limited extent. Fuel Cell systems require considerable further development and have made only the smallest dent in the dominance of existing energy generation technologies. Recent shifts in Government energy strategies towards renewables, GHG emission reduction and distributed generation will improve the prospects for the future, but slowly.

More companies are carrying out research and development than are producing commercial systems. Competition should increase and help to drive the cost of the Fuel Cell systems down in time. This analysis suggests that is not likely before 2012-2015.

The current industrial and commercial uses for Fuel Cell systems are niche applications only that use existing fuel infrastructures and hence rely on the available fuel reformer technology.

Manufacturers must build on their successes so far and find new opportunities by:
Continuing development of reformers to improve efficiency and maximise cell stack lifetimes through fuel impurity reductions.

Use modular systems that can be adapted to specific requirements but benefit from economies of scale from common components, cell stacks and balance of plant machinery.

Improving overall system efficiencies to further distinguish between Fuel Cells and conventional generation technology.

In conclusion, the Industrial and Commercial market sectors have huge potential for growth - approximately 10 billion GWh per year is generated globally for these markets alone. Continued investment in R&D towards better products, plus increased take-up rate of Fuel Cell systems in the near future due to improved public acceptance of the technology, will ensure growth. There is no doubt that these market sectors will be critically important to the whole Fuel Cell industry.

The Rest Published in the Road2hy.com

DOE Report on a Hydrogen Economy

Analysis of "The Effects of a Transition to a Hyrdogen Economy on Employment in the United States" by the DOE

The Energy Policy Act of 2005 required a massive Study on the effect that the transition to the Hyrdogen Economy was going to have on our overall economy. This is becasue the technolgies were already commecrailly vaiable, and would change the way we do everything from how we use power in fixed sites to how we drive.

The study, The Effects of a Transition to a Hyrdogen Economy on Employment in the United States. was published in July 2008 and presented to Congress.

They Examined:

• Replacement effects of new goods and services
• International competition
• Workforce training requirements
• Multiple possible fuel cycles, including usage of raw materials
• Rates of market penetration of technologies
• Regional variations based on geography
• Specific recommendations of the study

Note: do not be daunted by the dates - T Boon Pickins Media Campaign and the Gas prices, coupled with the new Energy bill, the auto manufacturing crisis, and the need for an economic shift will sigificantly accelerate the transition.

• The study estimated the employment impacts of a transformation of the U.S. economy to the use of hydrogen between 2020 and 2050.


• They considered a rapid scenario and a slow scenario, but the conclusion is that the economy is already in transition, and will be transformed by 2050.

Onsite Hyrdrogen Power Generation or (Onsite Renewable Energy Generation or OREG

• fuel cells initially provide power, including back-up power, for remote locations not easily served by the electric power transmission and distribution grid.


• Following success in these markets, fuel cells begin to penetrate markets for
  portable power, then markets for all types of distributed power.


• For back-up and remote power markets, users are willing to pay a premium for secure, reliable electricity. Such markets include hospitals, hotels, data centers, and computer facilities, where uninterrupted
  power is critical.


• While these initial markets provide the sales volumes to launch the industry,
  the fuel cells themselves operate relatively few hours per year and displace little grid
  electricity.
  

Portable Power

• Portable power is a likely follow-on market for fuel cells.


• Fuel cells are being eyed for a wide array of portable applications ranging from consumer electronics to small-scale power production.


• Portable electronics (e.g., cell phones and notebook computers) utilizing
  premium lithium-ion and nickel metal-hydride batteries are particularly promising candidates for substitution by fuel cells.


• Premium batteries are popular because of their high energy
  density.


• As portable devices become more complex and their power requirements increase,
  fuel cells become an increasingly promising alternative.


• Since 2002, the number of devices containing premium batteries that the average American carries has grown 10% annually, to 0.5 devices per person.18 As the variety and functionality of portable consumer electronics grow, each person will carry increasingly multi-functional devices.


• While this will increase the demand for portable power, it may not increase the total
  number of devices beyond some natural limit of perhaps 1 device per person on average.


• Assuming the base-case population forecast of 420 million, some 400 million portable fuel
  cells could be in use in 2050.

Power Grid Displacement

• As fuel cells penetrate the portable power market and enter the broad residential and
  commercial power market, electricity displacement becomes substantial.


• Like fuel cells for mobile applications, stationary fuel cells are assumed to meet program cost and performance targets.


• In this study, stationary fuel cells are assumed to be natural gas fueled, where the fuel
  cell system includes an integrated reformer to produce the hydrogen


• Stationary Fuel Cells in the HFI Scenario
  In the HFI Scenario, stationary fuel cells are assumed to achieve 1% penetration of “new”
  electric demand in 2020, 5% in 2035, and 10% in 2050.19


• “New” demand is defined as the difference between electricity demand in 2015 and the analysis year (2020, 2035 or 2050), and is meant to include a variety of markets – back-up power, portable power and the broader market for residential and commercial power – which increasingly shift to fuel cells.
  

Penetration by fuel cells results in displacement of 0.01 quad of grid electricity in 2020, 0.3 quads in 2035, and slightly over 1 quad in 2050.

Here is an executive Summary:

• The Technology is "fairly mature" now



• Natural gas is NOT expected to be along term Feedstock for Fule cells.



• All Hyrdogen will be produced Locally, and will NOT be an international Commodity



• They expect a $370 Billion ( yes Billion) dollar PER YEAR drop in money going overseas by 2050.



• They anticipate fully fuel celled vehcilpes available by 2018 followed by a rapid replacement of the light-duty vehicle market



• All light duty vehciles are replaced by 2050

• They anticipate that fule infrastructure will be insltalled in "lock step" with vehicle demand growth.

Fuel Production

• Initially, most hydrogen is produced on-site, in relatively small, “distributed” facilities or
  delivered to fueling stations from existing, large industrial plants.



• Distributed facilities are more costly to build and maintain than gas stations.



• As demand for hydrogen rises, fuel production shifts to centralized facilities that can
  better capture economies of scale



• Regionalized resources will dictate Hyrdogen development methodology. Regions with nearby coal suppliesand CO2 sequestration sites opt for more coal gasification while those with ample wind or biomass favor hydrogen production technologies that rely more on those resources.

From centralized production facilities, hydrogen is delivered to local fuel stations where it is
dispensed along with conventional motor fuels.

As demand increases, delivery technologies shift from primarily tanker trucks carrying cryogenic liquid hydrogen to a mix of trucks carrying cold compressed hydrogen in insulated high-pressure tanks, and, beginning between 2020 and 2035, gas pipelines.

By 2050, when hydrogen has replaced nearly all motor gasoline, most local fuel stations no longer dispense gasoline.

Storage

• The development of an on-board hydrogen storage technology for hydrogen-powered
  vehicles has implications for the hydrogen delivery infrastructure.
• Currently, compressed hydrogen storage is the dominant approach for on-board hydrogen storage, with most systems using 5,000 psi composite tanks.
• Next generation systems, which have started to appear in demonstrations use higher pressure 10,000 psi tanks.

International Impacts

• With Falling OPEC Incomes, OPEC purchases inthe US will be reduced
• Their leanding to Industrialized Countries will be reduced.

Read the Whole Report from at fuelcells.org

New York City Establishes MicroTurbine Sntallation Standards

March 11th, 2008

Last week, RSP Systems installed the first microturbines in New York City pursuant to a new rule for their installation and use that Mayor Bloomberg signed into law last December.

RSP installed a set of Capstone C60 Microturbines at LEED Gold-certified Millenium Tower Residences in Battery Park City.

According to RSP President Cory Glick, microturbines are being specified with increasing frequency in local projects for new and existing buildings, and the company has created a New York-area dealership network of electrical and mechanical contractors who can design, install, and commission Capstone microturbines.

• The microturbine law was drafted by a Cogeneration Task Force led by Buildings Commissioner Patricia Lancaster and Fire Commissioner Nicholas Scoppetta.
• Microturbines capture the heat waste generated by their turbines in producing electricity and transform it into usable energy, making them between 70 and 80 percent efficient (compared with 30 to 35 percent efficiency for most types of power plants).
• Pursuant to the rule, approved microturbines can be installed in certain locations on both commercial and residential projects, including within weatherproofed enclosures, on roofs, or within rooms that have two-hour fire doors.

As Steven Spinola, President of the Real Estate Board of New York note, microturbines offer the dual benefit of clean energy and the addition of “needed electric generation capacity without further taxing [New York City’s] transmission and distribution systems.”

In order to install a microturbine system under the rule, owners must

1. receive permission from the utility company,
2. file an application with the Department of Buildings,
3. obtain a permit from the Fire Department in order to operate the system

Once DOB issues the first permit and the system is actually installed.

The rule is codified under Title 1 of the Rules of the City of New York under Chapter 50, Distributed Energy Resource Standards.

First Microturbines Commissioned Under NYC Standard (PR)
Rule 50 (DOB)

Bloomberg Announces New Rule (PR)

The Rest from Green Building Sync