Register Log in  Scientific Method / Science & Exploration  The
door to the hydrogen economy may be made of cobalt  New work may
be able to reduce the cost of hydrogen fuel cells by replacing …
    For years people have talked of fuel cells as as a salvation
from our current oil-based economy to a new, enlightened
hydrogen-based economy where pollution from energy will be a
thing of the past.  While this, like many visions of the future,
is a bit grandiose, it is based in fact.  Fuel cells are operate
on the same principle as all modern engines: they seek to turn
potential chemical energy stored in a fuel into useful
mechanical energy.  The big difference from the engines of today
is that the main source of fuel for a fuel cell is hydrogen, and
its by-product is merely fresh water.  One promising class of
fuel cells are polymer electrolyte fuel cells, an example of a
proton exchange fuel cell .  While these are not a new
technology—they were first used on the Apollo missions in the
1960s and 1970s—they have