Release Date: April 17, 2000

Secretary of Energy Bill Richardson today announced that a revolutionary new type of fuel cell power plant has been built and will begin a cross-country trip to its test installation in Irvine, Calif.

	The Siemens Westinghouse 220-kilowatt power system is the first in the world to combine a solid oxide fuel cell and a microturbine in an innovative "hybrid" configuration.

It is the latest innovation in the Department of Energy's fuel cell research program. The new power plant, the first in the world to combine a state-of-the-art fuel cell with a gas turbine, is one of the cleanest and most efficient ways to produce electricity. Its success could help usher in a new option for the world's electric power industry - a source of power that would not require combustion."For a world that is becoming increasingly electrified," said Secretary Richardson, "this new power technology comes at the right time. The world needs cleaner, more efficient ways to generate electricity, and this technology will help meet that need."The Siemens Westinghouse Power Corporation developed and fabricated the advanced power plant. This month the company completed an all-important factory acceptance test of the system at its Science & Technology Center in Pittsburgh.Rep. Mike Doyle (D-Pa), who represents the district where the Siemens Westinghouse center is located, sent congratulations to both Siemens Westinghouse and the Department of Energy. "This first-of-a-kind fuel cell is the product of a government-industry partnership that began almost three decades ago. That partnership is now paying off with a new technology that is unsurpassed in its environmental and power efficiency potential."The successful test clears the way for the generating system to be transported to the National Fuel Cell Research Center at the University of California-Irvine where it will be operated by Southern California Edison during a year of testing in a commercial setting.When installed, the system is expected to generate electric power at 55 percent efficiency - meaning that 55 percent of the energy value of the natural gas fuel will be converted into electricity. A conventional coal plant, by contrast, converts only 35 percent of its fuel into electricity, while today's natural gas turbines average just over 50 percent.The advanced power plant technology relies on a solid oxide fuel cell, which is an assembly of ceramic tubes that each operate like a battery. The major difference is that, unlike a battery, fuel cells never run down as long as fuel and air are provided. In this case, the fuel is natural gas.The new power plant is made up of 1152 individual tubular ceramic cells which give it the capability to generate about 200 kilowatts of electricity. The unit is the world's first to operate the cells under high pressures and to use the hot, pressurized exhaust gases to drive a microturbine generator which will generate an additional 20 kilowatts of electricity at full power. The microturbine generator was manufactured by Northern Research and Engineering Corporation of Woburn, Mass.The power plant's combined maximum output of 220 kilowatts is enough electricity to power more than 200 homes.Since natural gas has very little sulfur in it when it reaches the fuel cell, there are no sulfur dioxide pollutants released into the air. Nitrogen oxide emissions, another air pollutant, are likely to be in the range of only 0.5 parts per million - nearly 50 times less than today's average gas turbines. The ultra-clean performance is the major reason why fuel cells can be sited in the most environmentally sensitive regions.In the power industry, efficiency gains of even a few percentage points can make a major economic difference over the life of a generating system. Siemens Westinghouse expects that electrical efficiencies of more than 70 percent can be achieved as its hybrid technology improves. Higher efficiencies also mean fewer greenhouse gas emissions, including carbon dioxide. When compared to a conventional coal-fired power plant, a 70-percent efficient natural gas fuel cell-turbine hybrid would cut the release of carbon dioxide by three-fourths. The reduction would be nearly one-third when compared to today's natural gas turbine plants.The 220-kilowatt system is the first of several solid oxide fuel cell systems that Siemens Westinghouse will develop and test over the next two years as part of the Energy Department's advanced fuel cell program. A 250-kilowatt unit without a gas turbine was recently announced for a combined heat and power cogeneration test in Canada, while a 320-kilowatt hybrid system is also in the planning stages. The culmination of the government-industry partnership program will be a 1-megawatt fuel cell-microturbine power plant in late 2002. The Energy Department and Siemens Westinghouse expect to announce the site of this unit in May.