Fuel cells have been the next best clean-energy thing
for, well, a long time.
A technology with roots in the 1800s and modern-day use in
every NASA-manned space flight from Apollo through the end of the space shuttle
program, fuel cells just kind of look like a big box. Inside, they
electrochemically combine hydrogen and the oxygen from ambient air to create
electricity.
The by-products of that reaction are heat and water. The
heat can be recycled into the fuel cell itself and/or used for external heating
and cooling – generally referred to as combined heat and power. That makes
stationary fuel cells – the kind used for electricity, as opposed to ones used
in vehicles – extremely efficient and as clean an energy source as solar and
wind.
But because the hydrogen source for most fuel cells comes
from natural gas, they are generally not considered renewable, leaving them in
an environmental limbo.
Read the Yale Climate
Connections story - “Fuel Cells: Promising, but struggling to catch on.”
No comments:
Post a Comment