(Bloomberg) — A New Jersey power plant that feeds New York City plans to run at least one of its turbines on hydrogen in a project that could show how to clean up electrical grids while keeping them reliable.
Developer NovoHydrogen plans to install electrolyzers – devices that use electricity to strip hydrogen from water – at or near the Bayonne Energy Center, which supplies power to the city via an underwater cable. The electrolyzers, made by Ohmium International Inc., will run on renewable power, so the hydrogen will be produced without greenhouse gases. It will then be burned in one of the plant’s 10 turbines, possibly two, said Matt McMonagle, NovoHydrogen’s chief executive officer. The other turbines will continue burning natural gas, although if the project works as expected, it could be expanded to more of the turbines, he said in an interview. The electrolyzers could be operational in 2025, and the project is expected to cost more than $150 million.