Michael Strizki heats and cools his house year-round and runs a full range of appliances including such power-guzzlers as a hot tub and a wide-screen TV without paying a penny in utility bills. His conventional-looking family home in the pinewoods of western New Jersey is the first in the United States to show that a combination of solar and hydrogen power can generate all the electricity needed for a home.
The Hopewell Project, named after a nearby town, has been developed at a time of increasing concern over US energy security and worries over the effects of burning fossil fuels on the climate.
The Hopewell Project does not advocate for or against any particular technology. Instead, we approach each application in terms of its specific requirements and operational considerations. As appropriate for a defined purpose, energy can be derived directly from the sun, wind, water, and the earth as well as being produced through chemical and mechanical processes. The Solar-Hydrogen Residence combines photovoltaic solar, electrolyzer, fuel cell, computer software, and other technologies that have been carefully selected for this installation. To meet the energy requirements of another project with different power demands or in a dissimilar environment, engineering could be more appropriately designed by employing alternative technologies.
"People understand that climate change is a big concern but they don't know what they can do about it," said Gian-Paolo Caminiti of Renewable Energy Associates, the commercial arm of the project. "There's a psychological dividend in doing the right thing," he said.
Strizki runs the 3,000-square-foot house with electricity generated by a 1,000-square-foot roof full of photovoltaic cells on a nearby building, an electrolyzer that uses the solar power to generate hydrogen from water, and a number of hydrogen tanks that store the gas until it is needed by the fuel cell.
In the summer, the solar panels generate 60 per cent more electricity than the super-insulated house needs. The excess is stored in the form of hydrogen which is used in the winter - when the solar panels can't meet all the domestic demand - to make electricity in the fuel cell. Strizki also uses the hydrogen to power his fuel-cell driven car, which, like the domestic power plant, is pollution-free.
Solar power currently contributes only 0.1 per cent of US energy needs but the number of photo voltaic installations grew by 20 per cent in 2006, and the cost of making solar panels is dropping by about seven per cent annually, according to the Solar Energy Industries Association.
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The Hopewell projectNew Jersey energy initiativeWhere Mike works, no wonder...
