FCEL vor Gewinnschwelle 2013
Pushing Ahead with Fuel Cell Project Using Boil-off Gas
17 SEPTEMBER 2013
POSCO Energy announced on September 16 that it will move forward with the world's first fuel cell project by using boil-off gas (BOG) that comes from LNG production facilities.
The energy affiliate of POSCO signed a contract for a 300-kW fuel cell power plant with Korea Gas Corporation (KOGAS). The company will provide a 300 kW molten carbonate fuel cell (MCFC) to KOGAS’ Samcheok LNG terminal.
The fuel cells will be fueled by BOG. BOG occurs in any place where contact with heat is made, such as LNG storage tanks in the Samcheok terminal and LNG carriers.
A spokesman for POSCO Energy said, “After this project, fuel cell power projects using BOG, generated from other LNG production plants including terminals in Pyeongtaek, Incheon, Tongyeong, and Samcheok, are expected to be increased,” adding, “If fuel cells of POSCO Energy are directly fueled by BOG, KOGAS can reduce the costs of running LNG reliquefaction facilities.”
KOGAS will be able to secure steady sales, since fuel cells consistently utilize BOG throughout the year.
Kim Joong-gon, managing director of POSCO Energy, commented, “Korea is estimated to have BOG to such an extent that 600MW fuel cell power plants can be operated. Thus, our company is planning to actively participate in other BOG projects from local and overseas gas companies, after successfully completing this project.”
gute NAchrichten, aber warum wird der Kurs immer noch gedrückt ?
Sind denn die Shorties immer noch so hoch vertreten ??
Short Ratio (as of Aug 30, 2013)3: 14.40
Short % of Float (as of Aug 30, 2013)3: 11.00%
There are 3,200 utilities that make up the U.S. electrical grid, the largest machine in the world. These power companies sell $400 billion worth of electricity a year, mostly derived from burning fossil fuels in centralized stations and distributed over 2.7 million miles of power lines. Regulators set rates; utilities get guaranteed returns; investors get sure-thing dividends. It’s a model that hasn’t changed much since Thomas Edison invented the light bulb. And it’s doomed to obsolescence.That’s the opinion of David Crane, chief executive officer of NRG Energy, a wholesale power company based in Princeton, N.J. What’s afoot is a confluence of green energy and computer technology, deregulation, cheap natural gas, and political pressure that, as Crane starkly frames it, poses “a mortal threat to the existing utility system.” He says that in about the time it has taken cell phones to supplant land lines in most U.S. homes, the grid will become increasingly irrelevant as customers move toward decentralized homegrown green energy. Rooftop solar, in particular, is turning tens of thousands of businesses and households into power producers. Such distributed generation, to use the industry’s term for power produced outside the grid, is certain to grow.Crane, 54, a Harvard-educated father of five, drives himself to work every day in his electric Tesla Model S. He gave his college-age son an electric Nissan Leaf. He worries about the impact of warming on the earth his grandchildren will inherit. And he seems to relish his role as utility industry gadfly, framing its future in Cassandra-like terms. As Crane sees it, some utilities will get trapped in an economic death spiral as distributed generation eats into their regulated revenue stream and forces them to raise rates, thereby driving more customers off the grid. Some customers, particularly in the sunny West and high-cost Northeast, already realize that “they don’t need the power industry at all,” Crane says. Less
The Wall Street JournalBy Rebecca Smith | The Wall Street Journal – 10 hours ago
1
On a hill overlooking the Susquehanna River, two big wind turbines crank out electricity for Kroger Co.'s Turkey Hill Dairy in rural Lancaster County, Pa., allowing it to save 25% on its power bill for the past two years.
Across the country, at a big food-distribution center Kroger also owns in Compton, Calif., a tank system installed this year uses bacteria to convert 150 tons a day of damaged produce, bread and other organic waste into a biogas that is burned on site to produce 20% of the electricity the facility uses.
These two projects, plus the electric output of solar panels at four Kroger grocery stores, and some energy-conservation efforts are saving the Cincinnati-based grocery chain $160 million a year on electricity, said Denis George, its energy manager. That is a lot of money that isn't going into the pockets of utilities.
From big-box retailers to high-tech manufacturers, more companies across the country are producing their own power. Since 2006, the number of electricity-generation units at commercial and industrial sites has more than quadrupled to roughly 40,000 from about 10,000, according to federal statistics.
Experts say the trend is gaining momentum, spurred by falling prices for solar panels and natural gas, as well as a fear that power outages caused by major storms will become more common.
Michal Czerwonka for The Wall Street Journal Organic waste
"The battle cry is Hurricane Sandy," said Rick Fioravanti, vice president of energy-storage technology at DNV Kema, a Netherlands-based consulting company.
The growing number of companies that are at least partly energy self-sufficient is sending a shudder through the utility industry, threatening its revenues and growth prospects, according to a report earlier this year by the Edison Electric Institute, a trade association for investor-owned electric companies.
State and federal regulators say they are worried that utilities could end up with fewer customers to pay for costly transmission lines and power plants.
Utility executives, meanwhile, are asking themselves a disquieting question: "Am I going to just sit here and take it and ultimately be a caretaker of a museum, or am I going to be part of that business" that's emerging, said Nick Akins, chief executive of American Electric Power Co., a big Ohio-based utility. AEP is considering helping its customers install their own generating facilities.
On-site generation still accounts for less than 5% of U.S. electricity production. But it is peeling off some of the bulk sales that utilities find especially profitable. And some of the companies getting into the business think it is approaching a tipping point called "grid parity," at which point power would be as cheap to make as to buy from a utility.
Since 2007, when the first solar arrays went up on its store roofs in California, the installed costs of Wal-Mart Stores Inc.'s solar systems have dropped from $6 or $8 per watt of capacity to about $3.50 per watt, said David Ozment, the company's senior director of energy management. He said he expects the retailer to be paying as little for solar power as utility power "in less than three years," opening the floodgates to solar expansion.
Wal-Mart produces about 4% of the electricity it uses but intends to make 20% by 2020, taking advantage of idle acreage on thousands of store rooftops.
On-site generation isn't a new idea. It existed before the electric grid—the interconnected system of power plants, substations and transmission lines that ferry power thousands of miles—was stitched together beginning in the 1920s.
But for most of the past 50 years, the practice was associated mostly with remote locations like Alaska fish canneries or industrial facilities like oil refineries that generated lots of waste heat that could be harnessed for power production.
Almost overnight, that niche market has gone decidedly mainstream. Six years ago, Google Inc. attracted attention by installing big solar arrays atop its Silicon Valley complex in California. Other tech companies followed suit, worried about ensuring power supplies for energy-hungry server farms and achieving sustainability objectives.
Apple Inc. now gets 16% of its electricity from solar panels and fuel cells that run on biogas. Apple's data center in Maiden, N.C., makes all the power it consumes, a company spokeswoman said.
BMW AG's assembly plant in South Carolina, which made 300,000 vehicles last year, gets half its electricity from an on-site energy center that burns methane piped to it from a nearby garbage dump. Drugstore chain Walgreen Co., which has solar panels at 155 stores, plans to install them at 200 more.
Falling equipment prices make on-site generation increasingly attractive. From 2002 to 2012, the cost of installed solar systems fell by half, according to an August report from the Lawrence Berkeley National Lab. Companies also have the option of leasing big solar systems, rather than incurring the capital cost of buying them.
Many "clean energy" projects also qualify for federal and state subsidies. In the case of solar installations, there is a 30% federal tax credit, which is set to drop to 10% in 2017. Government officials say a shift to greener energy resources is good since it reduces the output from coal-fueled power plants, which produce about 40% of the nation's electricity and are the most polluting.
But analysts say the importance of subsidies has been waning, overshadowed by steep declines in the cost of power-generating equipment. For example, the cost of solar modules—the biggest single component in a rooftop solar system—has dropped about 80% in the past four years, to about 65 cents a watt from about $4 a watt, said Galen Barbose, a senior researcher at the lab.
Companies also are turning to wind turbines and technologies like fuel cells, batteries, small natural-gas turbines and reciprocating engines, which are natural-gas-fueled cousins of the auto's internal combustion engine.
Engineering and technology company SAIC Inc. is installing enough generating capacity at a data center outside New York to meet the center's core needs, with batteries for backup power. The system uses reciprocating engines burning natural gas, an option considered reliable in storms because gas pipelines are buried.
A report released by the White House in August estimated that power outages caused by bad weather cost the U.S. economy $18 billion to $52 billion a year in lost productivity from 2003 to 2012.
Demand for fuel cells in the U.S. is coming primarily from telecom companies, hotels and universities, said David Wright, CEO of ClearEdge Power Inc., a manufacturer in Hillsboro, Ore. Many buyers want reliable on-site generation as a hedge against storm-related outages.
By next year, Verizon Communications Inc. plans to install $100 million worth of fuel cells from ClearEdge and Bloom Energy, as well as solar panels, at 19 data centers and other facilities in seven states, including New York and New Jersey.
Some traditional utility companies are edging into the on-site generation business.
Edison International, which owns big utility Southern California Edison, recently bought a Chicago-based developer of rooftop solar projects, SoCore Energy LLC, and it is an investor in solar-finance company Clean Power Finance.
As power production becomes more decentralized, "I want to make sure the company is deeply involved," said Edison CEO Ted Craver.
Write to Rebecca Smith at rebecca.smith@wsj.com and Cassandra Sweet at cassandra.sweet@dowjones.com
Denke aber das hier erst gerade was anfängt.
After Hours
Time (ET) After Hours
Price After Hours
Share Volume
16:58 $ 1.3142 High 85,630
16:57 $ 1.31 2,757
16:30 $ 1.31 6,125
16:29 $ 1.31 502
16:28 $ 1.31 48,585
16:21 $ 1.304 Low 136,915
16:21 $ 1.304 Low 1,825
Schönes Wochenende