Washington Station Offers Gas, Snacks and Hydrogen
Article in the NY Times
nytimes.com
November 11, 2004
Washington Station Offers Gas, Snacks and Hydrogen
By MATTHEW L. WALD
ASHINGTON, Nov. 10 - At an ordinary filling station about a mile east of the Capitol that has the usual selection of regular, premium and diesel at the pumps and chewing gum and soda next to the cash register, Shell Oil and General Motors are offering hydrogen.
For $1.99 a kilogram, drivers can choose liquid hydrogen, chilled to nearly 300 degrees below zero, or gaseous hydrogen, at 500 pounds per square inch of pressure. That amount of hydrogen, when burned, produces about the same amount of energy as a gallon of regular unleaded gas, which was also selling for $1.99 on Wednesday.
In a fuel cell, which converts hydrogen to electric current without combustion, a kilo of hydrogen could take a car twice as far as a gallon of gasoline. But at the moment the car itself would cost more than $100,000.
That is one reason there will not be much of a wait at the new pump soon. For now there are only six hydrogen-powered vehicles likely to use the pump - a small fleet that General Motors is lending to a rotating set of people it hopes will be influential in helping a new technology flourish. While this is not the first hydrogen fuel pump in the country, it is the first integrated into a gas station.
At a cost of about $2 million to install, the new pump has no prospect of making money in the short term. But the two companies hope it is the first in a chain that will extend from here to New York, and eventually, all over the country.
Before that could happen, several major questions would have to be resolved. For one, the cost of the fuel cell would have to be cut by about 90 percent to make it economically competitive with a conventional gasoline engine.
The source of the hydrogen is another issue. For this pilot project, the hydrogen is produced at a chemical plant in Canada by exposing the methane in natural gas to high-temperature steam and extracting the hydrogen. Then the hydrogen is chilled into a liquid and brought here by a truck that resembles a thermos.
Hydrogen is produced in many places, including oil refineries and chemical plants, but it is normally used where it is produced because it is difficult to ship. It can be made in small batches in remote locations using electricity, but environmentalists say making the electricity may hurt the environment more than the fuel cell helps it. The cell itself produces electricity with no byproducts, except pure water and a bit of waste heat.
Another problem is the flammability of the gas. About two dozen protesters, who said they were fearful of a fire, carried signs on Wednesday accusing Shell and G.M. of environmental racism for having chosen a site in a black neighborhood. An organizer pointed out that the station was adjacent to an elementary school.
But the mayor of Washington, Anthony A. Williams, said at an opening ceremony at the pump: "This is a good thing, unless I'm missing something." And Spencer Abraham, the energy secretary, called the opening "a real step in the transition from the carbon-based economy of the past to the hydrogen economy of the future."
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