UND's Energy and Environmental Research Center gets $4.2 million to develop hydrogen cell technology

Mar. 15—GRAND FORKS — The Energy and Environmental Research Center at the University of North Dakota will receive $4.2 million to develop commercially viable hydrogen cell technology.

The funding was announced by the office of U.S. Sen. John Hoeven, R-N.D., late Friday morning, March 15. Hoeven is a member of the Senate Energy and Water Development Appropriations Committee.

The announcement connected the grant funding with a large-scale hydrogen development effort that was announced last year, saying the hydrogen cell technology work "aligns with broader efforts to establish (the) Heartland Hydrogen Hub."

According to the release sent by Hoeven's office, the "EERC will develop an oxygen ion-conducting solid oxide electrolysis cell (O-SOEC) that operates at lower temperatures, with greater efficiency and less degradation than existing technologies."

Doing so, the release said, "will help reduce costs and simplify operations for hydrogen production, supporting efforts like the Heartland Hydrogen Hub, which is also being led by the EERC."

"This project comes as an important step to establish North Dakota and the surrounding region as a hub for hydrogen production and transportation," Hoeven said in the release. "This is just one of the ways we are working to maintain our state's role as an energy powerhouse for the nation, where we utilize all of our abundant energy resources to make the U.S. not only energy independent, but energy dominant."

The nationwide hydrogen hub plan was unveiled last year.

In a story explaining the project, the Herald reported

that some are comparing it to "the forward-thinking efforts that led to construction of the interstate system, some 70 years ago."

"If you look at the investment decades ago to build a federal interstate highway system, and what it has produced today with transportation across the U.S., I think there are (comparisons) that can be drawn to this hydrogen hub," Xcel Energy's Tony Grindberg told the Herald in October. "We wouldn't have a federal highway system without the federal government. Likewise, with this hydrogen (initiative) we probably wouldn't be talking about accelerating it without the seed from the federal government."

Overall, the funding for seven proposed regional hubs nationwide amounts to $7 billion; of that, $925 million is available to the Heartland Hub, in Minnesota and the Dakotas. The Heartland Hub, according to a release from the Biden administration, seeks to utilize the region's energy resources to:

* Help decarbonize the agricultural sector's production of fertilizer;

* decrease the regional cost of clean hydrogen;

* advance the use of clean hydrogen in electric generation and for cold-climate space heating;

* and offer equity ownership opportunities to tribal communities, local farmers and farmer co-ops.

The Energy & Environmental Research Center is taking a lead role in the Heartland project. Hoeven was among those who worked to secure $925 million for the EERC's hydrogen hub partnership.