The First Element: Stuart Island

Stuart Island is in the San Juans, Washington, and is about 2 miles long.

An experimental program is going on in this island, for the Stuart Island Energy Initiative has built a complete system where solar panels generates the power to put working some electrolyzers, which produces hydrogen. This hydrogen is stored on a tank of 1900 litres, in a pression of 10 and 80 bar. This fuel is used finally in a fuel cell of 48 V, and it gives enough electric energy for all the living in the whole island.

This project started in 2004 Fuel Cell Conference in Denver, and it took 2 years to be ready. That's mainly because of the difficulty of arriving to this island, which hasn't got any ship or ferry service.

The idea of this program is to develop a clean and pollution-free energy system expecting to get to a world wide energy infrastructure. It is known that fuel cells only exhales water vapor, but still the main problem is in the way of getting the hydrogen, because the way we have today isn't carbon-neutral. A clean way isn't supposed to be achieved in few years.

Another advantage of using hydrogen is that it stores a lot of energy per kilogram, because of its small weight. However, the energy released in the combustion of hydrogen by the reaction is 242 kJ/mole, and it is less that the energy taken from natural gas (800 kJ/mole). We also must say that 242 kJ of hydrogen occupies the same volume as 800 kJ of natural gas. However, gasoline is the master of energy. Did you know that gasoline is more energy-dense than dynamite? This is thanks to its density - a mole of gasoline releases 5500 kJ, and in 22.4 liters (the volume of 242 kJ of hydrogen) there are 160 moles of gasoline, containing 900.000 kJ of energy.

The fact is that people choose fuel cells over batteries because they find it cheaper and more reliable for large-scale energy storage. And as this island shows, "a hydrogen system is practical and appropriate, here and now!

If you have any cuestions about this special island, I give you the e-mails of the three man who put working this proyect:

Stephen Friend at apathseeker@hotmail.com

Jason Lerner at wapalco@gmail.com

Charles Delahunt at cdelahunt@siei.org