Cow-Powered Hydrogen Fuel Cells

A Minnesota dairy farm is generating electricity with a hydrogen fuel cell, using a hydrogen source that it has in abundance -- cow manure.

To generate hydrogen, the farm places manure in a digester that yields "biogas," a mix of methane, carbon dioxide, water vapor and trace gases. It is then cleaned and converted to hydrogen for the fuel cell.

The fuel cell currently generates only 5 kilowatts of electricity. However, the experiment -- reportedly the first of its kind -- is encouraging enough for experiments to continue.

Source: Minnesota Dept. of Agriculture