We'll explore the properties of gasoline, their impact on the environment, and options for improving the quality of the streams.

Fuel cells are often described as being continuously operating batteries, but this is an incomplete idea. Like batteries, fuel cells produce power without combustion or rotating machinery. They produce electricity by utilizing an electrochemical reaction to combine hydrogen ions with oxygen atoms. Hydrogen ions are obtained from hydrogen-containing fuels. Fuel cells, unlike batteries, use an external and continuous source of fuel and produce power continuously, as long as the fuel supply is maintained.

Alcohol has been used as a fuel for internal combustion engines since their invention.  Reports on the use of alcohol as a motor fuel were published in 1907 and detailed research was conducted in the 1920s and 1930s.  Historically, the level of interest in using alcohol as a motor fuel has followed cycles of fuel shortages and/or low feed-grain prices.

As the world continues to seek new energy sources that will lower or eliminate green house gas emissions, we also need to consider the feasibility of such transitions. Rather than speculating on this topic, I decided to visit the websites of three of the world's top "energy" corporations: Mobil, BP/Amoco, and Shell. The word 'energy' appears in quotations above because these companies have traditionally made their profits in one type of energy...petroleum. To focus the discussion further, we'll examine each company's views on the issue of transportation energy.

If you had to define the inner workings of "science" as briefly as possible, you may say: "Formulate theories, then prove your theories through careful, reproducible experimentation."  If you accept this short description of science then you will probably have serious doubts about the existence of the phenomenon known as Cold Fusion. 

Australia's first fuel cell, situated in the Australian Technology Park outside of Sydney, is the first commercial fuel cell installed in Australia. 

We seldom hear anything positive about the wind.  But what is the wind reduced your electricity bill by 50 to 90 percent?  That's the claim of the American Wind Energy Association.

According to the Energy Educators of Ontario, "In a four day period the planet's oceans absorb an amount of thermal energy from the sun and kinetic energy from the wind equivalent to all of the world's known oil reserves." (Stuart Baird, M. Eng, M. A.).

Fuel cells convert hydrogen or fuels containing hydrogen (like natural gas) to electricity, heat, and water. Their efficiency of 75% to 80% has made them the target of much research.

The most familiar transportation fuels in this country are gasoline and diesel fuel, but any number of energy sources are capable of powering motor vehicles. These include alcohols, electricity, natural gas, and propane. Some vehicle fuels, because of physical or chemical properties, create less pollution than do today's gasolines. These are called "clean fuels."