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Apr 18 - Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News - Elisa L.
Rineheart Grand Forks Herald, N.D.
More than 100 people, including city and state leaders, attended a ground-breaking ceremony Monday for the National Center for Hydrogen Technology at UND's Energy and Environmental Research Center. The hydrogen center will significantly enhance the research, development, testing and commercialization of hydrogen and fuel cell technologies, said Gerald Groenewold, EERC director. The facility will help North Dakota lead the way in the creation of a hydrogen economy that will help eliminate America's dependence on foreign sources of energy, state and city leaders said. "The ground-breaking research that will be done right here in North Dakota will allow our grandchildren to drive hydrogen-powered cars, live in hydrogen-powered homes and end our country's addiction to foreign sources of energy," Conrad said. Dorgan, a member of the Senate Appropriations Committee and Senate Energy Committee, inserted language in an appropriations bill directing the U.S. Department of Energy to designate the EERC as a National Center for Hydrogen Technology. Conrad introduced legislation two weeks ago to increase domestic energy production. He said the United States should take notes from the Brazilian government, which requires motorists to use fuel that contains 40 percent ethanol. New fuel Using a fuel-cell equipped toy car as a prop, Chad Wocken, research manager for EERC, demonstrated Monday how to convert water into hydrogen fuel. Electrical current turns water into hydrogen and oxygen gas. When pumped into the fuel cell, the hydrogen and oxygen gas are turned back into electricity that powers the car's electrical motor. A curious observer asked Wocken how much it would cost to buy a hydrogen car like that. The average consumer wouldn't be able to buy one, Wocken said. "Even if you had $1 million to buy a hydrogen-fueled car, you'd probably have a hard time finding someone to build you one," he said. It will be about 20 years before the cost of fuel cells goes down enough to mass-produce hydrogen cars. But research from the hydrogen center will help overcome some of the mass distribution and storage hurdles that hydrogen fuels now face, Wocken said. Dealing with hydrogen as gas is difficult because there's no infrastructure to supply hydrogen to the mass market, he said. Storage is one of the biggest challenges of hydrogen fuel, Wocken said. "It takes the storage volume of a pickup truck to get about 100 miles of driving capacity," Wocken said. The average car goes 300 to 400 miles per tank of gasoline. Military uses The military is very interested in hydrogen, not only for transportation but also for replacement batteries for equipment such as global positioning and navigation systems that would run on fuel cells consuming methanol, Wocken said. EERC is working on a variety of battlefield applications for the military, including a project to transform JP-8 fuel, which is readily available worldwide, into hydrogen at high pressure. Groenewold said EERC is focusing on off-road applications to first demonstrate technical feasibility and reliability and bring the cost of hydrogen technology down to a competitive level. "We want to show the American public in particular that this technology is safe," Groenewold said. "There are a lot of misplaced emotions about hydrogen. There's fear that it's very unsafe and highly explosive. Well, so is the gas tank in your car." Groenewold believes we'll see hydrogen cars on highways within the next 10 to 15 years. And if there was a major disruption of oil supply to the United States, they'll probably be on the road a lot sooner than that, Groenewold said. The cost of fuel cells is coming down at 50 percent per year, so commercial uses are becoming more promising, Groenewold said. Rineheart reports on business and military affairs. Reach her at (701) 780-1269, (800) 477-6572, ext. 269; or at erineheart@gfherald.com. |