We could simply say “what absolute nonsense’ and leave it at that. After all, it is an established fact that batteries comprise two electrodes, and an electrolyte packaged in a stout case. But hold on. Until Volta invented the battery in 1800, a ‘battery’ was just a fortified emplacement for heavy guns. However, in the broader sense, a battery is a device for storing surplus energy. This is exactly what hydrogen fuel cells do.
How Hydrogen Fuel Cells Stack Up Against Batteries
Fuel cells have been around since 1838. In fact, NASA uses them to power its satellites and space capsules. Hydrogen fuel cells are inefficient compared to batteries. However, they are infinitely renewable since they use the air we breathe as energy source. Thus, they could become the perfect companion for solar and wind.
Electricity on its way to temporary storage in a fuel cell, passes through an electrolyzer that separates air into hydrogen and oxygen. In this way, the surplus power becomes a different form of energy.
This energy remains in high-pressure storage until it completes the second phase of hydrogen fuel cell technology, that’s generating electricity. Hydrogen fuel cells are geologically stable. Moreover the fuel they use, oxygen, is not dependent on the whims of weather as are solar and wind.
Hydrogen Fuel Cells’ Role in Future Energy Storage
We can use hydrogen in many ways over and above electricity regeneration. In fact, the time may come when hydrogen becomes the world’s primary energy source.
Hydrogen is the simplest element. It is a low-polluting, highly efficient energy carrier that we use to propel space rockets, and make water for astronauts.
We are already using it to propel ships on the ocean, and vehicles on our roads. Hydrogen fuel cells are therefore batteries, because they are devices for storing surplus energy until we require it.
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1 Comment
I didn’t know that fuel cells have been around for that long. It’s pretty cool that it’s an energy source that uses the air we breathe as an energy source. I can see why there recently has been a bigger focus on using fuel cells.