Pathfinder: Sierra Energy Heads for a World beyond Garbage, Traditional Power, Fuel
by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest) …One of these days, someone might make a commercial in which the protagonists find a detour around some methane-reeking Mt. Garbage, crowning peak in a range of towering landfill mountains. In the foreground, impassable mountains of garbage. With the help of technologists, the landfill heap is reduced to a small, harmless residue — and our trapped tourists then go on their way, immoveable object having been eliminated.
You might find that Sierra Energy’s FastOx Pathfinder system is called upon to do the job.
The power equation
What is it, exactly, the Sierra Energy FastOx Pathfinder technology? Think “teensy blast furnace”. With some modifications.
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Sierra’s Pathfinder system appears to be making some waves with a skid-mounted, 10 ton-per-day system that it originally developed as a small demo unit to prove the viability of its technology.
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Potential customers for small-scale systems? US Navy aircraft carriers and destroyers; cruise ships, cargo ships, ferries; small, isolated communities; FEMA (for disaster relief).
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“The market I find the most interesting, especially here in California, is renewable hydrogen. I understand the hesitation around the vehicles, but part of the reason that hydrogen fuel-cell vehicles haven’t taken off is that hydrogen sells $6/kg in the best set of subsidized circumstances, and the reality for many people is $10-$12 per kilogram.”
Now, fuel-cell vehicles under development by Honda and Toyota can hold roughly 5 kilos of hydrogen and they get a range of around 300 miles. So, you can do the math at $10-$12 per kilo, and rapidly you get to a cost of $0.16 – $0.20 per mile. Compare that to a Toyota Camry (roughly same size) getting 300 miles on roughly 12 gallons of gasoline, costing $0.14 per mile even at $3.50 per gallon.
And you gotta pay $50,000 for what is, essentially, a $23,000 Camry. And you have to fill up at one of something like 100 stations around the country that cost $1 million each. (As opposed to an ethanol blender pump costing $50,000).
But renewable hydrogen, says Hart, offers radically different economics. READ MORE
