Fuel Cell

The Bush administration's budget for fiscal 2006 would provide more dollars to advance the production of domestic energy from coal, hydrogen and nuclear sources. The president's Hydrogen Fuel Initiative would receive an additional $35 million in funding in fiscal 2006, bringing total funding to $260 million. In 2003, Bush proposed $1.2 billion over five years to further the development of technologies to produce hydrogen and store hydrogen energy. The budget would also provide $3.6 billion in tax incentives through 2010 to spur renewable energy, as well as hybrid and fuel-cell vehicle purchases.

by Debra Fiakas CFA The New Year got off to a rocky start for Ballard Power Systems (BLDP:  Nasdaq), a developer of fuel cell technologies and systems.  The company ran into some trouble with its strategy to penetrate the China market through a partner.  No one should be surprised by Ballard’s difficulties.  Fuel cell technology has been under development for more than two decades.  Frankly, technology is not the problem  -  at least any more.  Early on developers were beset by numerous challenges, not the least of which was the problem of getting fuel cells to work properly...

Astris Energi Inc. (ASRNF) reports that construction of phase one of the pilot production plant designed to produce the new alkaline fuel cell POWERSTACK(TM) MC250 is on schedule. The pilot production plant is being built in the Czech Republic and should be complete within two weeks with production trials planned for September.

The following is an excerpt from a press release from the Department of Energy (DoE) that came out today: "DOE’s Hydrogen Program and Fuel Cells 2000 have released a new searchable database of fuel cell and hydrogen activities in the United States. The database allows better access to information on stationary fuel cell installations, vehicle demonstrations and fueling stations – as well as state policies, initiatives and legislation aimed at advancing these technologies." Try running some queries on the database of fuel cell and hydrogen activities. I didn't check out the website too extensively but from what...

Astris Energi Inc. (ASRNF) announced that it has commenced marketing of its new, silent-running, emission-free, Model E7 AFC Generator. The E7 is an advanced version of the Model E6 power unit that has successfully powered Astris' Freedom Golf Car for the past three years. The E7 is built with two 900W Astris' POWERSTACK(tm) MC250 alkaline fuel cell stacks giving the unit a 1.8kW nominal power rating with the ability for maximum power output to reach 2.15kW, a 20% overload factor. The Model E7 is designed as a direct replacement for existing traction batteries used in a wide variety...

The device, manufactured by Fujitsu Laboratories, generates power by combining methanol and hydrogen. DoCoMo claims that development of the cell could be completed by the end of 2005. "The micro fuel cell is aimed at meeting user demands for more convenient handsets with greater power capacity, as well as reduced environmental impact," DoCoMo said in a statement.

Quantum Fuel Systems Technologies Worldwide Inc (QTWW) fell as much as 10% after the company posted second-quarter results that fell below expectations. They posted a loss of 10 cents a share on sales of about $5 million vs. a loss of 9 cents a share on sales of $6.7 million a year ago. Analysts were expecting a loss of 6 cents a share on sales of $8.6 million. The company said the sales decline was due to lower product sales in its fuel cell systems segment. Shares are now trading off the lows and are currently only down 6%....

The Connecticut Clean Energy Fund has agreed to provide funding to Proton Energy Systems, Inc., a subsidiary of Distributed Energy Systems Corp (DESC) to design, build and conduct a 24-month demonstration of a 5kW Regenerative Fuel Cell (RFC) for a telecommunications site in southwestern Connecticut. The project proposal from Proton is consistent with the Connecticut Clean Energy Fund's mandate to support projects that promote the commercialization of fuel cells and illustrate their importance as a clean, reliable distributed energy source.

Medis Technologies Ltd. (MDTL) announced that during the first week of functional demonstrations, the fuel cell Power Pack products it made available to General Dynamics C4 Systems, a business unit of General Dynamics (GD), to provide power to General Dynamics' rugged PDA have achieved new levels of performance, to its knowledge never achieved before in micro fuel cells. The Power Packs have provided five watts and five volts, operating for a period of many hours with each refueling, operating in every orientation, all without generating any discernable heat. The fuel cell cartridge system has operated effectively to refuel...

IdaTech (IDA) announced the ElectraGen(TM)3 fuel cell system. The ElectraGen(TM)3 is a hydrogen-based proton exchange membrane (PEM) fuel cell solution capable of producing up to three kilowatts of clean, reliable backup power. This announcement marks a significant addition to the IdaTech backup power fuel cell product offering and highlights IdaTech's position in the industry as the only company offering this wide range of backup power solutions. Like its bigger brother, the ElectraGen(TM)5, the ElectraGen(TM)3 product is a CE certified fuel cell system designed for critical backup power needs ranging from 1.5 to 3 kilowatts. By offering improved system...

Ballard Power (BLDP) has announced that second-quarter losses narrowed year-over-year to post better-than-expected results, but revenue declined across many business segments on lower volumes and decreased demand. Revenue fell to $21.2 million from $29.1 million for the same period in 2003, primarily due to lower product revenue as a result of completing deliveries of heavy-duty bus engines to the European Fuel Cell Bus Project in 2003. The significant decline in engineering service revenue in the latest quarter was due to the development phase of the current generation light-duty fuel cell engine program nearing completion and the next generation...

Stuart Energy Systems Corp (SRNYF) announced that it has secured record year-to-date industrial orders valued in excess of $12 million from its global customers. "During the first 4 and a half months, we exceeded our expected order intake for industrial sales. The increased demand is a result of strong market growth, coupled with continued adoption of our product offering," commented Robert Campbell, Vice President, Sales and Marketing. "With the bulk of these orders scheduled to ship this fiscal year, we remain committed to our aggressive target for revenue growth. Our year-end order backlog - an important metric as...

Plug Power Inc (PLUG) and Ballard Power (BLDP) announced they have been awarded a $2M program by the U.S. Department of Defense to develop an advanced prototype PEM fuel cell system to support Defense Continuity of Operations (COOP). Under this program, Plug Power and Ballard will jointly develop a next-generation prototype PEM fuel cell power solution to be used in backup power applications. Plug Power will act as the systems integrator, using a Ballard® fuel cell stack for evaluation and potential use in COOP programs for the U.S. Department of Defense and Department of Homeland Security....

Distributed Energy Systems Corp (DESC) is highlighted in the current issue of Power Engineering, a leading electric utility industry publication. The article, entitled, "On- Site Hydrogen Production Means More Than Convenience," gives background on the efficiencies and cost savings that are driving growing power plant industry acceptance of Proton's HOGEN® Proton Exchange Membrane system for on-site hydrogen generation.

Charles Morand The DOE made public earlier today the amount of money that will awarded to clean power projects in lieu of the usual tax breaks: $3 billion. This will allow project proponents to receive a direct cash grant now instead of a Production Tax Credit or an Investment Tax Credit later on. The guidance document notes the following: "Section 1603 of the Act’s tax title, the American Recovery and Reinvestment Tax Act, appropriates funds for payments to persons who place in service specified energy property during 2009 or 2010 or after 2010 if construction began...

Plug Power Inc (PLUG) announced today that the Company's GenSys(TM)5C fuel cell system has been certified by the California Air Resources Board as meeting the 2007 distributed generation emission standards requirement.