General Motors said on Tuesday that it planned to develop and market hydrogen-based fuel cells to heat and power homes and businesses by mid-decade as a way of furthering a technology it one day expects to supplant the internal combustion engine.
But GM, like other automakers, does not plan on introducing fuel cell vehicles to the public until at least the end of the decade.
"Our commitment is to drive towards significant volume, hundreds of thousands, by the end of the decade," said Larry Burns, GM's vice president for research and development.
"It can change the world, it can change the industry," he added. "Automobiles can be reinvented around this technology."
A fuel cell generates electricity by separating the electrons from the protons of hydrogen atoms. The electrons generate a current, and then are recombined with their protons and with oxygen. Fuel cells are considered one of the cleanest ways of producing electricity because they emit water vapor and heat, though many fuel cells draw their hydrogen from methanol, gasoline or natural gas and emit some pollutants.
The first fuel cells were created in the 19th century. The technology was used on the lunar lander and GM created the first fuel cell powered concept vehicle in the late 1960s. Though all of the big car companies are working on vehicles powered by fuel cells in one form or another, making them viable in mass produced automobiles still faces many challenges. Fuel cells contain expensive precious metals like platinum and palladium, they have not been proven to work in extreme weather conditions and the nation's gas stations would need to be reconfigured.
On Tuesday, GM demonstrated a Chevrolet S-10 pickup truck powered by a gasoline fuel cell apparatus that took up less than half of the truck's bed, but the gasoline currently available has too high a sulfur content to be usable to power the cell.
GM said it plans to enter the home and business market through a partnership with one of the many companies developing fuel cells, but has not yet picked a partner. The automaker already has formed a partnership with General Hydrogen and Quantum Technologies, two companies making fuel cells or equipment for fuel cells, on automobile-related projects.
GM's entry should further crowd an already crowded field developing fuel cell technologies that also includes Plug Power of Latham, New York, International Fuel Cells, a subsidiary of United Technologies and Ballard Power Systems, a Canadian fuel cell company that has partnerships with Ford Motor Co and DaimlerChrysler.
"This validates the distributed power market, but GM should be viewed as a competitor," said Christine Farkas, a Merrill Lynch analyst.
Environmental groups, while praising progress on fuel cell research, said it was another modest incremental step and pointed out that GM's announcement came after its vigorous lobbying campaign that helped persuade the House of Representatives to exclude significantly tougher fuel economy standards in the new energy bill.
"They're trying to stave off using technologies they do have now," said Ann Mesnikoff, a lobbyist for the Sierra Club.
"Fuel cells are a technology on the horizon," she added. "But between now and fuel cells, there are dramatic improvements we can get."
Jason Mark, director of the clean vehicles program at the Union of Concerned Scientists, an environmental group based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, said that "gasoline could compromise the potential of fuel cells."
"There will be some emissions from the tailpipe and the fuel economy might not be much greater than the hybrids available today," he added. "So what's the point?"
Burns of GM said the eventual goal was not a gasoline powered fuel cell, but one that could power a zero-emission vehicle. But the gas-powered cell would be an intermediate step and would, he said, improve typical gas mileage by 50 percent. Toyota's Prius, a hybrid car that has an electric and a gasoline engine, is already in that ballpark. He also said that the gas-powered fuel cell would reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 50 percent.
NO-LIMITS PARTNERSHIP: ‘The bottom line’ is that if the US were to have a conflict with China or Russia it would likely open up a second front with the other, a US senator said Beijing and Moscow could cooperate in a conflict over Taiwan, the top US intelligence chief told the US Senate this week. “We see China and Russia, for the first time, exercising together in relation to Taiwan and recognizing that this is a place where China definitely wants Russia to be working with them, and we see no reason why they wouldn’t,” US Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines told a US Senate Committee on Armed Services hearing on Thursday. US Senator Mike Rounds asked Haines about such a potential scenario. He also asked US Defense Intelligence Agency Director Lieutenant General Jeffrey Kruse
NOVEL METHODS: The PLA has adopted new approaches and recently conducted three combat readiness drills at night which included aircraft and ships, an official said Taiwan is monitoring China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) exercises for changes in their size or pattern as the nation prepares for president-elect William Lai’s (賴清德) inauguration on May 20, National Security Bureau (NSB) Director-General Tsai Ming-yen (蔡明彥) said yesterday. Tsai made the comment at a meeting of the Legislative Yuan’s Foreign Affairs and National Defense Committee, in response to Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Wang Ting-yu’s (王定宇) questions. China continues to employ a carrot-and-stick approach, in which it applies pressure with “gray zone” tactics, while attempting to entice Taiwanese with perks, Tsai said. These actions aim to help Beijing look like it has
China’s intrusive and territorial claims in the Indo-Pacific region are “illegal, coercive, aggressive and deceptive,” new US Indo-Pacific Commander Admiral Samuel Paparo said on Friday, adding that he would continue working with allies and partners to keep the area free and open. Paparo made the remarks at a change-of-command ceremony at Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam in Hawaii, where he took over the command from Admiral John Aquilino. “Our world faces a complex problem set in the troubling actions of the People’s Republic of China [PRC] and its rapid buildup of forces. We must be ready to answer the PRC’s increasingly intrusive and
UNWAVERING: Paraguay remains steadfast in its support of Taiwan, but is facing growing pressure at home and abroad to switch recognition to Beijing, Pena said Paraguayan President Santiago Pena has pledged to continue enhancing cooperation with Taiwan, as he and Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida expressed opposition to any unilateral change to the “status quo” in the Taiwan Strait using force, Japanese media reported on Saturday. Kishida yesterday completed a trip to France, Brazil and Paraguay, his first visit to South America since taking office in 2021. After the Japanese leader and Pena spoke for more than an hour on Friday, exchanging views on the situation in East Asia in the face of China’s increasing military pressure on Taiwan, they affirmed that “unilateral attempts to change the