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Zoot campus operating on fuel cell energy

Zoot Enterprises’ multimillion-dollar campus near Four Corners is now operating entirely on fuel cell energy.

By KAYLEY MENDENHALL, Chronicle Staff Writer

At a ceremony to dedicate the two $3.8 million fuel cells Wednesday, Zoot http://zootweb.com founder Chris Nelson, Sen. Max Baucus, R-Mont., and others involved in the project flipped a giant switch illuminating a light bulb and symbolically firing up the alternative fuel source for the building.

"Fuel cell technology is an upcoming technology," Baucus said in his keynote address.

He explained that during the massive power blackout in the Midwest and Northeast earlier this month, millions of people were without power because they depend on the grid.

"This is one company that is going to be self sufficient if anything ever happens," Baucus said. "And not only that, but they are contributing to the grid."

Nelson expects the fuel cell will create more energy than the building needs to operate. Zoot will then sell the excess back to the NorthWest Energy power grid.

The fuel cells, paid for in part with $1.4 million from the U.S. Department of Energy, convert natural gas into hydrogen, said Herb Nock, senior vice president of marketing for FuelCell Energy, the Connecticut-based company that built Zoot’s fuel cells.

The fuel cell then converts the hydrogen and oxygen from the air into water, producing both electricity and heat.

"It is between one-and-a-half to two times more efficient than other forms of generation," Nock said. "They are low profile, quiet, clean and efficient."

The infrastructure to support widespread use of fuel cells, like hydrogen fueling stations, does not yet exist. Nock said his company has built 15 fuel cell units worldwide since it went commercial in 1999.

"It’s still a little on the expensive side," he said. "People don’t yet know they are around."

Zoot has come under public scrutiny lately for pumping water from its wells without state permits to do so. Company executives say they have applied for the necessary permits, but have been frustrated by the slow state review process.

Regardless, the company’s fuel cells use only about one-and-a-half gallons of water per minute and put out about three-quarters of a gallon per minute, said Bruce Nelson, development project manager.

The water that is not used goes out into the company’s drain field.

"Fuel cells themselves make water," he said. "But that water goes out the stack in the exhaust."

http://bozemandailychronicle.com/articles/2003/08/29/news/zootbzbigs.txt

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