GLOCESTER -- Mike Higgins isn't old enough to have a license, but he had no problem driving yesterday what his biology teacher said could become the car of the future.
The fuel-cell car zipped along at full speed, stopping or turning around at Higgins' whim. But Higgins, 15, had to make sure the palm-sized plastic vehicle didn't hit the lab bench at the front of the classroom.
Fuel cells produce energy with no pollution, when hydrogen and oxygen yield water and energy, said Ross McCurdy, who teaches lessons on the environmentally clean chemical process to his biology and chemistry students at Ponaganset High School.
As the global supply of fossil fuels diminishes, McCurdy said, the world must looks to alternative sources of electricity. Fuel cells, he said, are efficient, clean and sustainable.
They're already being used to power buses in Chicago, and the first fuel-cell passenger cars will be shipped to California this year. Fuel-cell cars will become widespread in this country within about 10 years, McCurdy said.
"This has been one of my pet projects because the idea of having energy for cars, power plants and pretty much anything you need it for with zero pollution -- this is pretty good news," McCurdy said.
In January McCurdy used a $4,000 Perkins grant to buy about a dozen small kits and a 12-watt fuel cell to teach interactive lessons to his students. This month McCurdy won another $4,000 Perkins grant, which he plans to use toward a $6,000 computerized 50-watt fuel cell system. McCurdy said he'd like to eventually buy bigger fuel cells to power larger, more complicated things, such as robots and remote-control cars.
For now, McCurdy limits his fuel-cell lessons to the kits and a handful of small cars, including the one at Higgins' lab bench yesterday.
The students pour water into small fuel cells, using solar energy to break it into hydrogen and oxygen molecules. When mixed back together in the fuel cells the hydrogen and oxygen produce an electrical current and clean exhaust: water.
"When the water is gone, it's running off the gas it's producing," Higgins said. "When the gas is used up, it's time to refill it with water."
Hilary Benz, 15, had two words to describe the process: "It's complicated."
"It's pretty interesting, though, that we can make electricity out of water," chimed her lab partner, Caitlin Bilodeau, 15.
McCurdy's 10th-grade biology students had used the kits before, but many had not set up the fuel cells themselves. Some fiddled with the tubes and wires to attach them exactly right to make the red and black wheels on their ammeters turn.
"We got it! You guys, we got it!" one group yelled. Their wheel was spinning fast -- faster than even a fuel cell could turn it. The wheel was being powered directly by the solar cell, but the excitement made their classmates work fastidiously to make their fuel cells work too. Across the room, the handful of students with fuel-cell cars watched them cruise along the tile floor.
At the end of the class McCurdy showed off his 12-watt fuel cell, motoring a larger car that rested atop coffee cans on his desk so it wouldn't drive away. The wheels whirred as McCurdy opened the can of compressed hydrogen, and the entire class fell silent. Completely engrossed, they watched as McCurdy added oxygen to the fuel cell by blowing on it and asked questions about increasing the hydrogen.
Perkins grants like the ones McCurdy won are designed to bring hands-on technology to the classroom, said Gail M. Lawson, the business manager for the school district. McCurdy applied for his grants through the Cranston Area Career and Technical Center, which last year gave Ponaganset the lion's share of its grant money, Lawson said.
The fuel-cell industry is up and coming, McCurdy said, and the experiments are a good introduction for students who decide they want to work as engineers or technicians in the field.
The largest commercial fuel-cell system in the country is the U.S. Postal Service's mail-processing facility in Anchorage, Alaska, which has five 200-kilowatt fuel cells about the size of half a train car. Closer to home, South County Hospital, in Wakefield, has a backup generator powered by fuel cells, McCurdy said.
But fuel cells don't come cheap. The Alaska system cost about $5.5 million, including installation. A Toyota FCHV-4, a fuel-cell version of the Highlander, runs about $75,000, McCurdy said. A fuel-cell remote-control car sells for about $8,000 online, McCurdy said, and a 1,200-watt fuel cell -- enough to power a hairdryer -- costs about $50,000.
While cost may stop McCurdy from being the first on his block to buy a fuel-cell car, he said he's eager to find more ways to teach the technology in his classroom.
"I really want to get bigger fuel cells and get further into it," he said, excited about his new grant, which will help him buy a computer to measure the fuel cells' power output.
The students are excited about fuel cells, too. Michelle Boucher and Nicole Remington, both 15, said they were optimistic about the future of fuel cells as an energy source.
"I think the world would last longer," Remington said. "It'd be a lot cleaner and a lot healthier for everybody."
