Cal State Northridge fuel cell power plant now online

Southern California Gas Co. has presented a $2.2 million incentive check to California State University at Northridge (Cal State Northridge) for what appears to be the single largest fuel-cell power plant at any university campus in the world.

The 1-megawatt, $5.8 million project was commissioned last Friday. The fuel cell generates enough electricity to power 800 homes.

The university purchased the high-efficiency Direct FuelCell (DFC®) power plant from FuelCell Energy, Inc. (NasdaqNM: FCEL), based in Connecticut.

The plant will generate base load electricity for the university’s facilities and surplus heat for buildings, showers and food service hot water, and for heating the University Student Union’s swimming pool.

College of Engineering and Computer Science faculty and students are actively studying the energy production and overall efficiency of the plant.

The power plant is also providing an opportunity for students in the College of Science and Mathematics to study the carbon dioxide enrichment potential on plant life provided by the power plant to the university’s greenhouse. University officials are routing carbon dioxide exhaust from the plant’s heat exchanger into an adjacent miniature sub-tropical rainforest developed specifically to be sustained by the fuel cell plant’s operation.

Cal State Northridge qualified for the $2.2M incentive award by participating in the Self-Generation Incentive, a state-sponsored program that provides financial incentives to government and businesses for generating their own electricity on-site.

The California Public Utilities Commission launched the Self-Generation Incentive program in 2001 in response to California’s electricity crisis. The program provides qualifying businesses with incentives to help offset the costs of buying and installing electric-generating systems.

Southern California Gas Co. is the nation’s largest natural gas distribution utility, providing safe and reliable energy to 19.8 million consumers. The company’s service territory encompasses approximately 20,000 square miles in most of central and Southern California.