The U.S. Department of Energy has awarded just under $14 million for an attempt to build a hydrogen-energy production facility at a nuclear power plant in Minnesota with the help of a research lab in Idaho. Idaho National Laboratory and Minneapolis-based Xcel Energy will work on devising and building the facility, most likely at Xcel Energy’s Prairie Island Nuclear Generating Station in Red Wing, Minnesota. The project announced this week is part of the Energy Department’s strategy to reduce U.S. greenhouse gas emissions using nuclear power to generate carbon-free energy. Vehicles using hydrogen fuel cells, for example, produce only water vapor and warm air as exhaust.
