Progress Energy has signed a contract to purchase the energy output from North Carolina’s first plant that converts poultry waste into biogas.

Progress will purchase the output of a 36-megawatt power plant in Montgomery County that will be owned and operated by Poultry Power USA.

Jacksonville, Fla.-based Poultry Power is a subsidiary of Green Frontiers Energy.

The plant will use a clean gasification technology that turns chicken waste into a biogas to be burned inside a boiler.

The heat in the boiler creates steam that then turns a turbine and generates electricity.

Are you an amateur or experienced diesel engineer and want to learn how to make biodiesel from vegetable oil? Wake Technical Community College is hosting a two-day biodiesel workshop on Feb. 16-17.

The Triangle J Council of Governments today won a $13 million Clean Cities grant in federal stimulus funds to help buy a fleet of alternative-fuel vehicles and build a network of fueling and charging stations in North and South Carolina.

The grant, announced by the U.S. Department of Energy, will fund about one-third of the Carolinas Blue Skies and Green Jobs Initiative for electric, hybrid-electric, compressed natural gas (CNG), propane, E85 ethanol and biodiesel vehicles. Many of the new stations will be located in the Triangle.

The Energy Department said the new vehicles will displace an estimated 724,000 gallons of petroleum annually. The program will build 45 E85 and biodiesel fueling stations, eight propane stations and 132 electric vehicle recharging stations. It will buy 55 CNG vehicles, 363 propane vehicles, 89 hybrid-electric vehicles and 56 neighborhood electric vehicles.

"We are ecstatic to get this award," said Sean Flaherty of Triangle J COG, a regional planning agency.

The propane industry wants to sell the public on propane-powered vehicles with a display and test drives at the State Fairgrounds.

The Propane Education & Research Council today is letting the public try out a pickup truck, school bus, platform truck and lawnmower -- all fueled with propane.

The public display will be held from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. at the State Fairgrounds' Exposition Center, accessible by Gate 11 off Blue Ridge Road.

A caravan of hydrogen-fueled cars and SUVs paused to refuel today at Duke University, lingering long enough to let local folks lift the hood for a glimpse of zero-emission technology that might become part of our future.

So when do we get to drive one of these things home?

“It will almost surely take several decades before hydrogen-fueled vehicles could comprise a significant share of the automotive fleet,” says Richard Newell, Gendell Associate Professor of Energy and Environmental Economics in Duke’s Nicholas School of the Environment.

Hydrogen fuel cells are pollution-free, but the complete environmental picture depends on how the hydrogen itself is produced — whether from nuclear or renewable energy sources or from fossil fuels. A mobile refueling tanker traveling with the tour carries hydrogen made with hydroelectric power.

“Significant scientific, economic and practical hurdles must be surmounted before hydrogen becomes a cost-effective part of the energy system,” Newell said.

For one thing, there can’t be a mass market for hydrogen cars unless the nation as a massive network of hydrogen fueling stations.

THE TOUR:
The Hydrogen Road Tour is ... 

A fleet of hydrogen-powered cars on a cross-country tour will make a refueling stop Friday at Duke University, just long enough for Triangle residents to see what all the talk is about.

Nissan, Toyota, BMW and other hydrogen cars will be on display from 1:30 to 3 p.m. in front of Duke Chapel.

At 12:15 p.m., the public is invited to a panel discussion on “Smart Grid and Hydrogen Economies” in Room 111, Biological Sciences, on Duke’s West Campus.

Here are online details about the national tour and the Duke event.

Nine auto-makers are among the co-sponsors of the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Hydrogen Road Tour, a two-week tour of 31 stops in 18 states.