Fuel cells and their effects on utilities

Fuel cells will become practical initially in watt sizes, then in kilowatt and in megawatt sizes. As their development advances into the kilowatt range, they will stimulate brisk competition among the oil industry and electric and gas utilities for the opportunities of being the “single energy” source. When the megawatt size is reached, they will favor electric utilities over other energy suppliers Although the basic concept of fuel cells is not new, only in the past decade or two have scientists and engineers returned to it with renewed interest. This interest has resulted in part from the enormous rate at which we are depleting our fossil fuels and in part from the tantalizingly high operating efficiency promised by fuel cells.