from previous article...
Kaloyeros said the center has already been working with several
area companies on fuel-cell and related projects. The companies are
fuel-cell maker Plug Power LLC, superconductivity and refrigeration
* company Intermagnetics General Corp. and environmental monitoring
equipment maker Rupprecht and Patashnick Inc.
The center will include researchers and facilities at U.S. Army
Benet Labs at Watervliet Arsenal and Brookhaven National Laboratory
and State University at Stony Brook, both in Suffolk County.
Several speakers at Wednesday's news conference said the
production of commercial-grade fuel cells and related technologies
has the potential to boost the area's economy.
Albany-Colonie Regional Chamber of Commerce President Wally
Altes attached several caveats to a projection he said he received
from the Center for Advanced Thin Films Technology staff.
"There has been a projection that 1,000 high-tech jobs may be a
distinct possibility," he said, adding later, "Potential is the
operative word."
Altes characterized the economic development potential of a
thriving area fuel-cell industry as enormous.
Fuel-cell development efforts already directly employ about 107
people in the region. Plug Power has 100 workers, and Dais Corp.,
based in Malta, employs seven.
* Intermagnetics, which develops technologies that can make power
transmission and storage, and Rupprecht and Patashnick, which |
