Remarks by James A. Slutz
Deputy Assistant Secretary for Natural Gas and Petroleum Technology
U.S. Department of Energy
Hopedale, Ohio
October 22, 2003

The Hopedale Methane Fuel Cell Demonstration:
Showing that Technology is America's Best Tool

Thank you Steve Eschbach and thank you ladies and gentlemen.

The innovation we are dedicating today is an outstanding example of what used to be called American ingenuity. By that I mean it combines necessary acts with the available material to deal efficiently and elegantly with more than one objective.

Capturing this kind of ingenuity and boldness of spirit is at the heart of President Bush's initiatives in both energy and climate - capturing it and translating it into the concrete terms of new technology.

This innovation gives us the world's first-of-a-kind methane fuel cell. It adapts humankind's newest method of generating electric power to transform a common hazard of coal-mining, dangerously explosive methane, into a useful energy. It doing so, it also transforms a liability into an asset.

When we can solve two problems with one action we commonly call it a two-fer - we get two returns for one investment.

This concept offers more than two returns. Join me in thinking about some others.

When proved and widely deployed this kind of technology potentially can deliver:

• Added emphasis on mine safety;

• Dramatic worldwide curtailment a greenhouse gas that has 20 times the climate-altering potential of carbon dioxide;

• And, transformation of that once-vented methane into electric power with no emissions of any kind;

Success here with fuel cells could well lead forward to elimination of most atmospheric release of coal-mining methane in the U.S. - 300 million cubic feet a day of it at present.

Project estimates say this would be like eliminating the carbon dioxide emissions of 12 coal-based power plants, each of 500 megawatts capacity. This is how greenhouse-gas intensity falls. Yet we'd be gaining electric power.

We've reached three substantial returns already. But there is even more long-term potential.

The electric-power this fuel cell delivers will be used to produce more coal for other power plants. Thus, wide use this kind of technology can contribute to lower mining costs in a way that sustains coal in its role as the low-cost source of affordable, reliable electric power in America.

America will need more coal in the future. Our Nation will have to rely on coal for up to 40 percent of its new electric power through 2025.

By somewhat moderating the demand for power at mines, wide deployment would also deliver additional returns:

It can free standing generation capacity to serve other users who need electricity to grow economically;

In doing this, it would either:

• Serve to moderate demand and price in natural gas for power generation as one factor contributing to the balance and flexibility recommended last month by the National Petroleum Council;

• Or contribute to extending the life of the coal resource;

And, finally, it can add a significant reserve of previously unusable and unused British thermal units to our Nation's inventory of energy resources.

Cross-cutting gains like these are why President Bush so strongly and steadfastly moves our nation toward the use of technology to solve our problems whether the concern is pollution, climate, energy or the economy.

To quote Mr. Bush: "The greatest environmental progress will come about not through endless...regulations...but through technology and innovation."

These tools will give us the energy, environmental and economic security we need to create a robust 21st Century economy that delivers jobs and prosperity and national security.

This first-of-a-kind project demonstrates just 200 kilowatts of capacity. But it is an acorn to deliver in due time whole groves of oaks.

Congratulations are due all involved here today - to FuelCell Energy, to AEP Ohio Coal, to Northwest Fuel, and to the State of Ohio.

Yet, as an officer of the U.S. Department of Energy, I am especially proud of the role taken by our National Energy Technology Laboratory bringing forward this and other important technological initiatives.

NETL is truly deserving of its rapidly growing reputation as the world's finest and most creative fossil energy research establishment. It is doing things others can only talk about doing.

Even if only coincidental, I find it most appropriate that this project is located here in Ohio at this locality.

There may be no place more fitting for it in the United States than a one named Hopedale. On this day in particular the emphasis has to be on the first syllable - on Hope.

And the project itself is in the spirit of the new Ohio quarter-dollar. This coin commemorates that special kind of American ingenuity that took America from Kitty Hawk to the moon in less than the span of the last century; and it memorializes the boldness of the Buckeyes who led the way: The Wrights and Neil Armstrong.

We have our wit and technology at our disposal, our new century is young and all good Buckeyes know that small steps for men and women lead to giant leaps for humankind.

Thank you for your attention.