Startech Environment Continues StarCell Hydrogen Program For DOE

Company receives an additional $500,000 for further demonstrations of the Company's StarCell Hydrogen system as Phase Two begins

Wilton, CT — Startech Environmental Corporation, a fully reporting company, has announced that Phase One of the Company's StarCell™ contract with the Department of Energy (DOE) to demonstrate the production of hydrogen from Municipal Solid Waste (MSW), and also coal, processed through the Plasma Converter System™ is near successful completion. The Company has received the additional $500,000 for Phase Two of the Program to continue the demonstrations and development for optimization and scale-up. The work for Phase Two has begun.

What is StarCell?
Joseph F. Longo, president of Startech said, "StarCell is the Company's proprietary ceramic filtration system; it is not a fuel cell. It is a patented hydrogen-selective membrane filter that separates the hydrogen from the Plasma Converted Gas (PCG)™. PCG is the clean synthesis fuel-gas mixture, rich in free hydrogen, produced by the Plasma Converter System(TM) when it processes organic wastes.

The Plasma Converter System safely and irreversibly destroys wastes by its process of molecular dissociation during which it converts those wastes into valuable commercial products that include PCG. PCG is a valuable syn-gas as it is, but StarCell increases its value by its ability to extract the hydrogen. PCG is the key.

Beyond its use with the Plasma Converter System™, StarCell can also be used, stand alone, as a low-cost method of separating hydrogen from the syn- gas produced by various coal gasification processes.

Applications for StarCell Produced Hydrogen
StarCell-produced hydrogen from PCG can be used in the emerging 'distributed power generation' markets as a low-cost, pristine fuel to power automotive, stationary and portable fuel cells, as well as Internal Combustion Engine (ICE) vehicles.

According to the Environmental Protection Administration, not counting industrial waste, the United States produces about 700,000 tons of municipal solid waste (MSW) each day. A facility using both a Plasma Converter System and StarCell to process 2,000 tons of MSW per day can produce enough hydrogen to power almost 100,000 fuel-cell vehicles driving an average of 11,000 miles per year for the entire year.

What is fuel cell?
The fuel cell was invented about 150 years ago in England by Sir William Grove. He called it his 'gaseous battery' to distinguish it from another invention of his, our every day electric storage battery. The fuel cell is an electrochemical device that combines hydrogen with oxygen to produce electricity. Air can even be used as an oxygen source. The principal by products are water and heat. It is hydrogen that is the fuel in a fuel cell. It is the bonding together of the hydrogen and oxygen that produces the power in the form of electricity. The basic process is efficient and pollution free.

Why is hydrogen important?
The use of hydrogen to power vehicles eliminates tail-pipe pollution and dependence on foreign oil. Used to produce stationary power, it will help clean up the air and will be the critical contributor to the development of a pollution-free "distributed power generation" industry.

Hydrogen, the most pristine of all the fuels, when combined with oxygen to produce power results in only heat and H2O... water. It produces pollution- free electricity in fuel cells.

Pound for pound, hydrogen contains more energy than any of the other fuels by far.

In addition to the importance of the role it will play in clean power, it is also a basic material used in many industrial processes to make many of the products we use in our lives every day.

How hydrogen is currently produced
The Sun and stars are almost pure hydrogen. The paradox is that while hydrogen is the most abundant material in the universe, it is not readily accessible. Nearly all of the hydrogen produced today is made from fossil fuels, natural gas among them. These hydrocarbon fossil fuels consist primarily of molecules made up of carbon any hydrogen. An industrial thermo- chemical reformation process is one of the methods used to break the hydrogen away from the carbons. The PCG mixture, however, is rich in free hydrogen.

Hydrogen in your garbage can
Most household and industrial wastes are packed with hydrogen. To make the point, even landfills can be mined so that the recovered trash can be processed by the Plasma Converter and StarCell to unlock an abundance of dormant hydrogen. It is a biomass waiting to be tapped.

Converting renewable resources into hydrogen is an important goal of the 'Hydrogen Economy'. Waste is a valuable, ever-present and increasing renewable resource. The use of waste for hydrogen will decrease our dependence on dwindling reserves of fossil fuels.

One objective of achieving a Sustainable Society and meeting the energy needs of the new millennium is the widespread use of hydrogen as the primary energy source. In the Hydrogen Economy, hydrogen -- either liquefied or as a gas -- is the principal source of chemical energy, replacing natural gas, heating oil, gasoline and other petroleum products. Applications include electrical generation, industrial process heating, residential heating, transportation fuel, and many more."

He also said, "Traditional hydrogen-reformation manufacturing processes require purchases of fossil fuel feed-stocks that impact the cost and availability of hydrogen. StarCell Hydrogen doesn't have that problem. Our Plasma Converter market is made up of customers who generate waste, and customers who process waste. Many wastes are excellent feed-stocks for hydrogen. Customers who generate waste don't have the feed-stock expense when PCG is produced; as a matter of fact, they save the money they would otherwise pay to others to accept their waste. Customers who process waste get paid for accepting and processing the waste of others, and also produce PCG. In either case, when the PCG is used in StarCell to produce hydrogen for sale, the customers can produce it at a much lower cost because they don't have the cost burden of fossil fuel feed-stock purchases.

Plasma Converters are being sold commercially now. In addition to the money earned processing waste in the Converter, our customers will also be able make money using StarCell to sell hydrogen."

SOURCE: Startech Environmental Corp.