Fuel cells get high-powered boost-Bush’s pitch a huge help for Avista Labs

Although most of the national focus is currently on hydrogen-powered cars, it may be companies like Avista Labs that further alternative fuel development.

The Spokesman Review

"There aren’t a lot of fuel cells in cars right now," said Scott Sklar, Avista Labs’ D.C. consultant. "There are a lot more stationary fuel cell applications out there. … Most alternative energy developments begin at the smaller level."

Avista Labs, a subsidiary of Avista Corp., sold 57 fuel cells in the second half of 2002, mostly as backup power sources to telecommunications towers, railroads and utility companies.

Sklar is working to ensure that tax credits for small fuel-cell operations are guaranteed in the final energy bill.

Last year’s energy bill, which was passed in the Senate but died in a House committee, had provisions where governments and nonprofits could assign tax credits to businesses for using alternative power sources. Sklar expects similar provisions this time around.

Both Sklar and Davis, an assistant secretary of the U.S. Energy Department under the first President Bush, said they fully expect Congress to push through Bush’s proposal.

"Now it’s time to forge this into legislation," Davis said.

Speaking at the exposition Thursday, Bush told entrepreneurs and fuel-cell companies to "keep dreaming your dreams" and keep developing hydrogen power sources to wean the United States from dependence on foreign oil.

"The U.S. government will not stand in your way, but will stand by your side," Bush said.

Hydrogen-power technology could reduce dependence on oil by 11 million barrels a day by 2040, Bush said. Current U.S. oil consumption is roughly 20 million barrels a day.

Democrats, however, say Bush’s energy plan does not go far enough. After Bush’s speech Thursday, Sens. Byron Dorgan, D-North Dakota, and Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-N.Y., said the plan had no goal in sight and only proposed $720 million in new funding.

Instead of waiting until 2040 to see results, Dorgan said Congress should pass more finely tuned legislation to put millions of hydrogen-powered cars on the streets in as little as five years.

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