Those interested in the fuel cell segment of the nation’s renewable energy portfolio may be interested in this announcement from the DOE. The webinar is co-sponsored by Clean Energy States Alliance, the Department of Energy, and the Technology Transition Corporation.
According to the announcement, DOE’s “Fuel Cell Technologies Program will co-host a webinar on Thursday, June 9, from noon to 1:00 p.m. Eastern with the Clean Energy States Alliance and the Technology Transition Corporation titled ‘Fuel Cells and Renewable Portfolio Standards.’
One of the topics of the webinar will be a discussion of states’ Renewable Portfolio Standards. In particular, DOE observes in regard to RPSs that “some states have included both fuel cells that use renewably generated fuels and fuel cells that use natural gas. The webinar will also provide detailed information that state policymakers need to take into account when considering whether to include fuel cells in an RPS. Additionally, the webinar will discuss the reasons why more states are giving increased attention to distributed generation systems – energy systems in which power is produced onsite instead of taken from the grid – including fuel cells.”
The fuel cell discussion is needed because it can be a problematic topic. Fuel cells discussions can get off base, particularly because many policy makers and a large segment of the science and tech-savvy public think of fuel cells as another type of renewable energy source, instead of seeing them as a much more efficient energy-conversion technology (that is blind to whether the fuels it uses are renewable or nonrenewable).