Arguably the Holy Grail of fuel cell commercialization is the Hydrogen fuel cell car—it has led many on a quest, including Ohio, which hopes to become a leading state in the fuel cell industry.

Others see Ohio’s manufacturing strength as a leg-up in the race to bring fuel cells into industrial markets. It’s here that WIRE-Net and Cleveland company ThermaFabAlloy are hoping to make their entry. In November, 2006 they submitted a proposal to Ohio’s Third Frontier fund for a fuel cell project that marries two cutting-edge energy technologies: geothermal and fuel cells.

Geothermal typically involves the production of warm and cool air for climate control by capturing the Earth’s heat.

Geothermal is starting to spawn new applications, such as the co-generation system recently built at the Chena Hot Spring spa in Alaska. It uses the Earth’s heat to boil a refrigerant, which has a much lower boiling point than water. The refrigerant vapor passes through a micro-turbine, making its blades spin at around 13,500 rpm, which in turn drives a generator, producing electricity.

The geothermal process in WIRE-Net’s proposal would be another new application. It would take fuel cells made by Columbus, Ohio-based NexTech and wrap it in a high-alloy steel body produced by ThermaFabAlloy. The new ripple is the ability for the heat to be harnessed from the fuel cells to free up trapped oil and gas for extraction and sale, says WIRE-Net Vice President of Manufacturing Services Ty Haines. Plus, some of the gas is used to run the fuel cell, which also makes a saleable amount of electricity. Testing for the product could be done at Case’s Wright Fuel Cell Group.

"We're excited because the Cleveland area does steel, fabrication, parts, components, insulation, coatings and platings and WIRE-Net has the right ties with them all,” says Haines. “We're looking to do a proof of concept (with the Third Frontier grant). If this is a go, we might be employing around a thousand people.”