WASHINGTON, D.C.– Congressmen Paul Tonko announced today that H2Pump LLC of Latham has received nearly half a million dollars from the US Department of Energy Fuel Cells Program to install and operate two hydrogen recycling systems to help bring the technology to market. Funded as part of the fiscal year 2012 federal budget, the cost share of the project is evenly split between the Department of Energy and H2Pump LLC, making the total investment in the two year project nearly one million dollars.

“This investment in a local Capital Region company is further proof that our region is at the cutting edge of new energy research and development,” said Congressman Tonko. “And we know that these are exactly the types of projects that create jobs and grow our energy security. I congratulate H2Pump on their receipt of this competitive award and look forward to the new jobs and expansion of their business that this investment could bring.”

“H2Pump is pleased to be partnering with the Department of Energy to demonstrate the viability of our hydrogen recycling technology in real world applications,” said Mark Sperry, H2Pump President and CEO.  “The award will accelerate our ability to move from the laboratory to the marketplace with the demonstrations providing critical feedback on the readiness of our products.”

“Innovations like this demonstrate how American ingenuity and targeted investment can accelerate breakthroughs in the hydrogen industry while driving the clean energy economy forward,” said David Danielson, U.S. Assistant Secretary for Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy.

Over the course of the next two years, this funding will be used to quantify the benefits and value of H2Pump’s latest Hydrogen Recycling System, which could lead to a scaling up of the business and bringing the technology to market at an accelerated pace.

Hydrogen is used in numerous industrial applications, including heat treating and semiconductor processing, but is not currently recycled because of the lack of viable technical solutions to do so. H2Pump has developed a unique system to do just that, recovering hydrogen and recycling it back into the original process.

Funding will be used to build two systems for use in industrial heat treating applications in order to collect data and real-world customer experience to demonstrate the value of the product. The goal of the program is to expand the test fleet into additional customer environments to accelerate learning and increase the success of a full product launch. This includes feedback from product installation, commissioning, service, support and customer evaluation.

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