FuelCell Energy Inc. has secured funding from the U.S. Department of Energy for a carbon capture plant and three projects related to the commercialization of solid oxide fuel cell technology.
The four projects add approximately US$24 million to backlog in the fourth quarter of 2015, which excludes cost share obligations “One of our competitive advantages is robust research and development, which, in the case of carbon capture, utilizes our commercial fuel cell plant in an alternate configuration to pursue a potentially sizeable market,” said Chip Bottone, Chief Executive Officer, FuelCell Energy. “Advancing our solid oxide fuel cell commercialization is also exciting as we evaluate host sites and adapt the technology for storage applications.”
The carbon capture plant is a 2.3-megawatt fuel cell power plant configured for carbon capture adjacent to an operating coal-fired plant to capture a portion of the carbon emissions and destroy a portion of smog-causing nitrogen oxide, while also producing ultra-clean electricity. The fuel cell-based system installed will be the first of an expected two phase project at the selected site. The second phase, to follow this DOE project, would be to install eleven additional fuel cell power plants for a total project of 27.6MW to capture approximately 700 tons/day of CO2 in total, while simultaneously generating about 648,000 kilowatt-hours/day of ultra-clean power.
FuelCell Energy will also install and operate a 400 kilowatt solid oxide fuel cell system located at a host site and connected to the electric grid. The third project advances SOFC commercialization by implementing continuous flow manufacturing with consistent high quality and within market-competitive cost parameters.
In the fourth project, the SOFC stack will be adapted for hydrogen production using electrolysis through a solid oxide electrolyzer cell at very high efficiency and within established cost parameters.
