Abstract
The long-term sustainability of our environment has been highly questioned in the recent years. To reduce the dependence on fossil energy and total carbon impact, improve efficiency on energy usage, distribute the source of energy, and also the constant need for longer battery life for consumer electronic have push many countries to throw resources into the research of hydrogen energy and fuel cell technology, which can be used in light duty vehicle, stationary power generation, and portable power source for consumer electronics. The entire Hydrogen Economy can be extremely large in scale, and by starting early in this field, it will help our country to be competitive in the world. Fuel cell has the advantage of high energy efficiency, low (near zero) emission, and can be applied to many different fields. It is also the best way to unleash the hydrogen energy, and is expected to become a major energy source in the future. However, the shortage of basic infrastructures surrounding hydrogen economy coupled with the cost and technical problems in the fuel cell technology has prevent fuel cell from broadly used aside from niche market, Overall the entire fuel cell industry is still in its infancy and an effort to step into the industry at an emergence stage will guarantee a better position in riding the success when the industry booms in the near future. Because the lack of attention from the government previously, fuel cell industry in Taiwan has lagged behind other countries, and many key components are not entirely produced here. However, it is still not too late to join the energy revolution, and the government should lead the industry to develop this technology. In short, the government should first outline the energy policy stating a clear path toward hydrogen power and lead the industry and the universities to put the resources into researches of fuel cell; while the industry should use their advantage in manufacturing processes in key parts to position themselves into the fuel cell industry, and invite collaboration from other countries to build stationary hydrogen power plants in Taiwan. In addition, the IT industry in Taiwan should begin an initiative to integrate consumer electronics and fuel cell technology to further advance our lead in micro-fuel cell that can be integrated into consumer electronics. In this research, the fuel cell technology and its derived products will be broadly described and the current states of technology development in fuel cell both in Taiwan and other countries will be discussed. Based on these, suggestions on how to start a hydrogen power and fuel cell industry for Taiwan will be made, and real case examples will be discussed.