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Fuel Cells Are Coming

Kathleen Snodgrass, Project Leader
and Longchaw Lee, Project Assistant

Is There a Fuel Cell in Your Future?

Fuel cells hold promise for Forest Service use, especially in areas where commercial electric power is not available. Although solar, microhydro, and wind power are also environmentally attractive energy sources, their use is not practical everywhere. Fuel cells could provide a clean, quiet alternative supply of power where it is impractical to use renewable energy sources. Possible future applications of fuel cells in the Forest Service include providing power for lights, showers, cooking, and computers at remote fire camps, providing battery-type power for portable field equipment, powering water pumps at recreation sites, and even providing electric power for remote ranger stations. The Forest Service Technology and Development Program, along with other agencies and private industry groups, has begun a fuel cell demonstration installation at the remote Big Goose Ranger Station near Sheridan, WY. This Tech Tip is the first of several that will explain how the Forest Service can use fuel cells.

In 1839, Sir William Grove successfully combined hydrogen and oxygen to produce electricity, inventing the first fuel cell. However, with abundant fossil fuel and the invention of the steam engine, fuel cell technology languished until the 1960s, when the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) began using the technology. In space, fuel cells were a desirable alternative to dangerous nuclear power, bulky solar collectors, and heavy batteries—and they produced drinking water. Use of fuel cells by the space program caused industry and government to recognize the potential of fuel cells as a clean energy source.

Fuel cells can power a laptop computer or a clock battery, and large units can be combined to produce many megawatts, potentially serving entire cities. A midsize unit (figure 1) could provide electric power and hot water for your home in the not-too-distant future.

Figure 1—Moderate-size fuel cells can provide
continuous or emergency power for homes or businesses.

Fuel Cell Basics

Fuel cells are similar to large batteries with constant fuel input. They are energy conversion devices that transform energy stored by hydrogen into electricity, heat, and water. Unless fuel cells use pure hydrogen for fuel, they also produce small amounts of carbon dioxide. The fuel cells have no moving parts. Because they do not burn their fuel, fuel cells produce virtually no pollution. Fuel cells convert 30 percent of the energy in their fuel to electricity, compared to just 20 percent for a typical power plant. The heat produced by fuel cells can be used to provide domestic hot water and to heat or cool buildings, raising the total potential efficiency of fuel cells above 80 percent.

A fuel cell is two electrodes sandwiched around an electrolyte (figure 2). Hydrogen fuel is fed to the anode (positive electrode) of the fuel cell. Encouraged by a catalyst, each hydrogen atom splits into a proton and an electron, which take different paths to the cathode (negative electrode). The proton passes through the electrolyte. The electrons create an electric current (generate electric power) as they return to the cathode. Oxygen enters the fuel cell through the cathode, where the electrons are reunited with the protons and combine with oxygen to form water. Most fuel cells use a reformer to extract hydrogen from propane, natural gas, methane, or other fossil fuels.

Figure 2—This schematic drawing shows how fuel cells produce electricity.

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since August 9, 2002