Technology Management Inc (TMI), has, it says, successfully demonstrated the world's first kilowatt-scale solid oxide fuel cell system that generates electricity using vegetable oil from soybeans. The Ohio-based company together with the Ohio Soybean Council presented the new technology at The Ohio State University Farm Science Review this week (9th October ).

"We believe this is the first time a complete farm scale fuel cell system has ever been shown to convert unblended soybean oil into renewable electricity outside the laboratory," said Benson Lee, president and CEO of Technology Management, Inc. "TMI is proud to be among the few companies in the world that are demonstrating that this revolutionary technology is not decades away, but just around the corner."

The project received contributions from the USDA Biomass Initiative Program, the Ohio Soybean Council and Ohio's Third Frontier Project, a $1.6bn initiative that fosters the creation of high-paying jobs through innovation, research and development and the commercialization of next-generation products.

TMI is collaborating with The Ohio State University's Biomass to Energy Program as part of an ongoing relationship examining the conversion of various biomass waste and organic matter into on-site electricity and marketable biofuels.

"If biofuel-powered fuel cell systems, using renewable fuels like soybean oil, were available to small farms and agri-businesses across the Midwest's farm belt it would allow America's strongest engine for economic growth - the small business - to join with big business to help reduce our nation's dependency on foreign oil and consumption of fossil fuel," Lee continued. "The combination of Ohio's manufacturing, technology and agricultural strengths could create a new industry based on small-scale, on-site, distributed power generation operating on renewable biofuels such as soybeans. And, as the nation's fourth most energy intensive state, Ohio would benefit by being its own best customer."