Photo courtesy of Will Waldron/Times Union
SLINGERLANDS — Plug Power has started its first-ever contract with NASA to supply the U.S. space agency with liquid hydrogen.
The contract is worth up to $2.8 million to supply 480,000 pounds of liquid hydrogen to NASA’s Glenn Research Center in Cleveland, Ohio, and the Neil A. Armstrong Test Facility in Sandusky, Ohio.
The news is a big win for Plug Power, which recently lost out on tens of millions of dollars in grants from the U.S. Department of Energy for hydrogen expansion programs that were canceled by the Trump administration. The company also suspended plans to build out several new hydrogen plants using a $1.66 billion DOE loan guarantee so it could re-allocate its capital to more “higher-return opportunities” in the hydrogen sector.
In a statement, the company said the contract “underscores Plug’s capability to meet the agency’s stringent performance, purity, and reliability requirements for mission-critical operations” and “represents a large opportunity for liquid hydrogen in the coming years” for the company.
“Being selected by NASA for this supply contract is tremendous validation of Plug’s ability to deliver low-carbon, high-purity hydrogen where reliability matters most,” José Luis Crespo, president and chief revenue officer of Plug, said in a statement. “NASA consumes more than 37 million pounds of liquid hydrogen each year, so this award represents an important first step in what we hope will become a long-term, expanding partnership.”