Providing a Cleaner and More Secure Energy Future through Hydrogen Fuel Technology: The President announced that the Department of Energy has selected partners through a competitive process to fund new hydrogen research projects totaling $350 million ($575 million with private cost share) to overcome obstacles to a hydrogen economy. This represents nearly one-third of the President's $1.2 billion commitment in research funding to bring hydrogen and fuel cell technology from the laboratory to the showroom. The projects will include 28 awards to academia, industry, and national laboratories. The new hydrogen projects address four key areas:
Creating effective hydrogen storage: Current hydrogen storage systems are inadequate for use in the wide range of vehicles that consumers demand. Exploratory research and development is needed to overcome the grand challenge for hydrogen storage: to store the amount of hydrogen required for a conventional driving range (more than 300 miles), within the vehicular constraints of weight, volume, efficiency, safety, and cost. The Department of Energy is working to develop three primary options (chemical hydrides, metal hydrides, and carbon materials) in addition to 15 individual projects to explore new materials for hydrogen storage. Over 45 organizations will be involved, including DOE national laboratories, universities, research institutes, and industry.
Conducting limited hydrogen vehicle and infrastructure "learning demonstrations": To complement laboratory research, automakers and energy companies need to work together to develop integrated technology solutions for a national infrastructure. Eight automakers and six energy companies (under five major awards) will work together with their teams under this project to demonstrate integrated and complete system solutions operating in real world environments. Government and industry are providing matching funds. Teams also include utilities, universities, and small businesses. These demonstrations will provide important data on fuel cell vehicle and hydrogen-refueling infrastructure performance, cost, and durability and allow refocusing of research priorities as progress is made.
Developing affordable and durable hydrogen fuel cells: Currently, fuel cells and associated systems are as much as ten times more expensive than internal combustion engines. New cost-shared projects will be formed with five businesses to develop fuel cells for consumer electronic devices, and auxiliary power and off-road applications.
Developing a hydrogen education campaign: In direct response to the National Energy Policy, a hydrogen education effort will aim to build the next generation workforce, engage students in science and technology, and overcome the public education and acceptance barriers to achieving the hydrogen economy. Middle school and high school curricula and teacher training will be developed. These projects will complement current education efforts for public and safety officials at all levels.
For too long, environmental policy in America has been dominated by a sterile debate between those who believe that pollution is the price of progress, and those who believe that we must limit and scale back our progress. The President believes that progress, innovation, and technology can help America leapfrog beyond these false choices - and meet the energy needs of a growing economy in environmentally responsible ways.
President Bush's Hydrogen Fuel Initiative
In his 2003 State of the Union address, the President committed $1.2 billion over five years to accelerate research and development of hydrogen fuel cell and infrastructure technologies, including $720 million in new funding. The Hydrogen Fuel Initiative aims to help reverse America's growing dependence on foreign oil by developing the technology for commercially viable hydrogen-powered fuel cells that power cars, trucks, homes, and businesses that emit no pollution or greenhouse gases.
Through partnerships with the private sector, the Hydrogen Fuel Initiative will make it practical and cost-effective for large numbers of Americans to choose to use clean, hydrogen fuel cell vehicles by 2020 - so the first car driven by a child born today could be powered by fuel cells. This will dramatically improve America's energy security by significantly reducing the need for imported oil, and help clean our air and reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The President's proposal has received broad, bipartisan support in Congress.
The Hydrogen Fuel Initiative complements the President's existing FreedomCAR partnership, which is developing technologies needed for mass production of safe and affordable hydrogen-powered fuel cell vehicles, along with other advanced vehicle technologies. In total, President Bush has proposed $1.7 billion over five years for the Hydrogen Fuel and FreedomCAR initiatives.
Budget
The President's FY 2005 budget proposes $228 million for the Hydrogen Fuel Initiative, a $69 million increase (43%) over the FY 2004 budget.
The FY 05 request includes $29 million for basic science within the DOE's Office of Science and $18 million for safety, codes, and standards activities - consistent with the program's needs and the recently released peer review report by the National Research Council.
The FY 05 budget request also includes an increasing emphasis on exploratory research for hydrogen production, storage, and fuel cell technologies and continued technology validation.
A mix of diverse energy feedstocks to produce hydrogen is needed to gradually make the transition to a secure, affordable, and environmentally safe hydrogen energy system; these include renewables, nuclear, and natural gas and coal with carbon management strategies.
Fuel Cell Technology
Fuel cells are a proven technology: America's astronauts have used fuel cells to generate electricity since the 1960s, but more work is needed to make them cost-effective for use in cars, trucks, homes, or businesses. Additional research and development is needed to spur rapid commercialization of these technologies so they can provide clean, domestically produced energy for transportation and other uses.
The President's initiatives seek to help the private sector overcome key technical and cost barriers for fuel cells:
Lowering the cost of hydrogen: Hydrogen is four times as expensive to produce as gasoline (when produced from its most affordable source, natural gas). The hydrogen fuel initiative seeks to lower that cost enough to make fuel cell cars cost-competitive with conventional gasoline-powered vehicles by 2015; and to advance the methods of producing hydrogen from renewable resources, nuclear energy, and even coal.
Creating effective hydrogen storage: Current hydrogen storage systems are inadequate for use in the wide range of vehicles that consumers demand. New technology is needed.
Creating affordable hydrogen fuel cells: Fuel cell-based propulsion is now as much as ten times more expensive than internal combustion engines. The FreedomCAR initiative is working to reduce that cost to affordable levels.
America's dependence on foreign oil is increasing:
America imports more than 55 percent of the oil it consumes; that is expected to grow to 70 percent by 2025.
Nearly all of our cars and trucks run on gasoline, and they are the main reason America imports so much oil. Two-thirds of the 20 million barrels of oil Americans use each day is used for transportation. Fuel cell vehicles offer the best hope of dramatically reducing our dependence on foreign oil.
Hydrogen fuel will help reduce America's dependence on energy imports:
Through the Hydrogen Fuel and FreedomCAR initiatives, the Federal Government, automakers and energy companies will work together to overcome the technological and financial barriers to the successful development of commercially viable, emissions-free fuel cell vehicles that require no foreign oil.
Hydrogen is domestically available in abundant quantities as a component of natural gas, coal, biomass, and even water.
The Department of Energy estimates that the Hydrogen Fuel and FreedomCAR initiatives may help reduce our demand for petroleum by over 11 million barrels per day by 2040 - approximately the amount of oil America imports today.
Fuel cells will improve air quality and dramatically reduce greenhouse gas emissions:
Vehicles are a significant source of air pollution in America. Hydrogen fuel cells create electricity to power cars without any tailpipe pollution. The hydrogen fuel and FreedomCAR initiatives may reduce America's greenhouse gas emissions from transportation alone by more than 500 million metric tons of carbon equivalent each year by 2040. Additional emissions reductions could be achieved by using fuel cells in applications such as generating electricity for residential or commercial uses.
Hydrogen is the key to a cleaner energy future:
It has the highest energy content per unit of weight of any known fuel. When burned in an engine, hydrogen can produce effectively zero emissions; when powering a fuel cell, its only waste is water. Hydrogen can be produced from abundant domestic resources including natural gas, coal, biomass, and even water. Combined with other technologies such as carbon capture and storage, renewable energy, and fusion energy, fuel cells could help make an emissions-free energy future possible.
This is from the Presiden't webpage...I guess the democrats have a DIFFERENT slant on factual evidence!
