We're still waiting on the official word, but late yesterday The New York Times reported that the Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory and Ceramatec, Inc. plan to reveal a breakthrough in hydrogen production research today.

According to sources in the article, the lab uses water heated to 1,800 degrees Fahrenheit and a ceramic sieve from Ceramatec along with electrical current, and yields the "highest-known production rate of hydrogen by high-temperature electrolysis."

That means the method uses less energy to produce hydrogen The most common means of producing hydrogen today is electrolysis, running electricity through water to split it into its components: hydrogen and oxygen. Using coal, the most common source of electricity in the US today, consumes around four times the more energy as the resulting hydrogen can produce.

The new method would have "about half the energy value of the energy put into the process," a vast improvement.

That's good news for the hydrogen economy proposed by the Energy Department, and for hydrogen powered fuel cells

At least if the system ever gets implemented. According to the New York Times, the new hydrogen production scheme would require the building of new types of nuclear reactors. Nuclear reactors haven't been built in the US for years.

Read the full New York Times article on Hydrogen production.