Fuel Cells - The Ultimate Alternative to Combat Automobile Emissions

Essay by BeckyGailUniversity, Master'sA, March 2004

download word file, 13 pages 4.2

MBA - Environmental Strategy

Fuel Cells: The Ultimate Alternative to Combat Automobile Emissions

Two years ago, Hanover, Germany, hosted the World's Fair and Expo. Several countries joined together under one theme about which they all felt passionate. This theme was how countries are using technology to improve the nature of our environment. One exhibit focused on combustion engines and explained how fuel cells were already seen as the next technology to significantly reduce the greenhouse gases we emit with our automobiles. Many technologies have been studied over the past decades and yet not one has been tested long enough to be labeled as the most beneficial for consumers to lower the problems that the present internal combustion engines have created. The problem does not have an easy fix though. There are several obstacles which need to be evaluated before pollution will change which include government laws and consumers' interests. The only way this pollution crisis can be solved is through the technology of tomorrow.

This technology is currently thought to be fuel cells, the best alternative. Before it can be understood why fuel cells are the best technology, we need to be educated on other alternatives as well as the setbacks alternative fuels experience.

In today's world, people cannot survive without using fossil fuels. Almost everyone in modernized cities gets around with an automobile. It is the standard item for a person to have. The effect of driving all of these automobiles is having a huge impact on the environment. Those who use cars for transportation are pumping tons of pollution in the air each day. This pollution results in smog, acid rain, and it also supports the greenhouse effect leading to global warming. Even Kenneth Derr, the Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Chevron Corporation, is urging people...