晨读英语美文60篇(含lrc字幕)Energy in the Future
 音频下载[点击右键另存为]同步字幕下载[点击右键另存为][00:00.00]Fuel Cell—Energy in the Future The price of oil has soared from $43.45 a barrel to $65.35, a 50% gain. It is transportation such as driving back and forth to work and visiting companies that burns lots of fossil fuel. Suppressed by the increasing oil price, does it ever occur to you that a new, lightweight fuel cell running on methanol power you electric car? If they work, methanol fuel cells could be a major breakthrough in energy consumption and conservation and drastically cut air pollution from auto emissions. Whether they are used to run cars and buses or to make electricity for other applications, fuel cells operate by converting hydrogen to electricity without combustion. They are akin to continuously-recharging batteries. Hydrogen and oxygen are fed into a stack of plates that create electricity, with harmless water vapor as the by-product. These silent, zero-emission gadgets have long been used in NASA spacecraft. They represent the great hope of many environmentalists to power the first mass-produced electric car. Now the fuel cells are favoured by many venture companies through the world, such as Fuel Cell, Plug Power, French carmaker PSA Peugeot Citroen. Fuel-Cell Energy specializes in stocks of alternative energy companies. Plug Power is one of the few publicly traded fuel-cell companies. Unfortunately, neither company is making money at the moment. Fuel Cell lost $1.58 per share the past 12 months. Plug Power lost $64 cents a share. In the future, we may rely on many different types of power. Hydrogen, for example, has been praised as a clean fuel with great potential. But it’s still in the experimental stages. Two possible hydrogen plays: Quantum Fuel System Technologies, which designs and engineers hybrid and fuel-cell, vehicles. It, too is losting money. Praxair, an industrial gas company, making hydrogen, earned $2.29 per share the past 12 months. French carmaker PSA Peugeot Citroen on Monday unveiled the smallest fuel cell currently available for cars and pledged further research to halve the price of these environmental friendly power sources by 2010. The fuel cell is an 80 KW power unit and the size of a big suitcase that can be used in light municipal vehicles. It can run for 500 km, but still insufficient for general use. Furthermore, the cost and size of them remain a problem that needs to be solved. Part of the fuel cell is made from platinum, which is an expensive precious metal. Its size should also be reduced. At 57 litres, Genepac is much smaller than previous versions but would still not fit in a small passenger car. Another problem remains starting with cold temperatures. We can say confidently it offers a real answer for the future, as is put it by the vice president of French Carmaker PSA Peugeot Citroen. |
