Article

2010-02-22 Science & Technology

Can Bloom Energy's Bloom Box Deliver On Its Promise?

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Posted by tipper 2010-02-22 00:03|| || Front Page|| [11132 views ] Top

#1 Refuses to connect?

Posted by Redneck Jim 2010-02-22 00:34|| 2010-02-22 00:34|| Front Page Top

#2 Seems OK from here, Redneck Jim.
The site may be crashing due to exposure on 60 Minutes.

Posted by tipper 2010-02-22 00:37|| 2010-02-22 00:37|| Front Page Top

#3 Doesn't work for me either, but from another source. Bloom appears to pushing 2 failed (to date) technologies - fuel cells and hydrogen.

Fuel cells cost/performance just isn't better than old fashioned batteries.

Hydrogen; you can't store the stuff.

But then what do you expect from 60 minutes.

The big picture is that renewable energy in the developing world has been a dismal failure, but the usual suspects are still pushing it to save the planet or because of vested financial interests (often the same thing).

Posted by phil_b 2010-02-22 03:52|| 2010-02-22 03:52|| Front Page Top

#4 Another source says Bloom's device is producing electricity from natural gas, which is the right answer for local electricity production. But we can already do this with small cheap generators.

This looks to me like a solution in search of a problem.

Posted by phil_b 2010-02-22 03:59|| 2010-02-22 03:59|| Front Page Top

#5 What is the Bloom Box? It sounds like something involving flowers, but instead it is Bloom Energy's fuel cell miracle, if its promise can be both believed and delivered upon. The Bloom Box was finally unveiled, on broadcast television, no less, on "60 Minutes" on Sunday night (watch the full report below).

There is much skepticism around Bloom Energy's Bloom Box. Fuel cells have been tried before, and always come up short. With all the secrecy around the project, such as no sign on his building, a cryptic Web site, and no public progress reports, there are many doubters.

On "60 Minutes" on Sunday, CEO K.R. Sridhar invited "60 Minutes" correspondent Lesley Stahl for a first look at the innards of Bloom Energy's Bloom box, which he has been working on for nearly a decade. Here's a partial transcript from the very start of the story:

Stahl asked, "What could this power?"

"This could power a U.S. home. Average United States home." he said.

"Something that small?" she asked.

"The way we make it is in two blocks. This is a European home. The two put together is a U.S. home," he explained.

"'Cause we use twice as much energy, is that what you're saying?" Stahl asked.

"Yeah, and this'll power four Asian homes," he replied.

"So four homes in India, your native country?" Stahl asked.

"Four to six homes in our country," Sridhar replied.

"It sounds awfully dazzling," Stahl remarked.

"It is real. It works," he replied.

He says he knows it works because he originally invented a similar device for NASA. He really is a rocket scientist.

"This invention, working on Mars, would have allowed the NASA administrator to pick up a phone and say, 'Mr. President, we know how to produce oxygen on Mars,'" Sridhar told Stahl.

"So this was going to produce oxygen so people could actually live on Mars?" she asked.

"Absolutely," Sridhar replied.

When NASA scrapped that Mars mission, K.R. had an idea: he reversed his Mars machine. Instead of it making oxygen, he pumped oxygen in.

He invented a new kind of fuel cell, which is like a very skinny battery that always runs. K.R. feeds oxygen to it on one side, and fuel on the other. The two combine within the cell to create a chemical reaction that produces electricity. No need for burning or combustion, No need for power lines from an outside source.

It's obvious how promising Bloom Energy's Bloom Box would be. You could put two fuel cells at each U.S. house and rather than having transmission lines, generate electricity right there.

Japan is already pushing a sort of alternative idea: solar power in homes. In fact, solar power capacity in Japan rose to 483,960 kilowatts in 2009, 2.1 times more than the 2008 total. Some 88.6 percent of solar battery shipments in 2009 were for home systems. The new installations cover the power needs of more than 100,000 households at current consumption rates. Clean energy is an emerging market segment, and would be worth billions to the company or companies that can succeed.

How does Bloom Energy's Bloom Box work, without (in proposed production quantities) costing an arm and a leg to produce? That is a big question, and K.R. Sridhar let Stahl into some of the secret, though naturally, not all.

Sridhar said he bakes beach sand and cuts it into squares that are turned into a ceramic. Then he coats it with green and black "inks" that he developed, which is of course, the secret. "And you take that and you apply that. You paint that on either side of this white ceramic to get a green layer and a black layer. And that's it." The finished product is shown above, a skinny Bloom Box fuel cell. You need a stack of them to really get effective power.

One cell powers a light bulb. Between each cell is a metal plate. Unlike other fuel cells, rather than platinum, Sridhar uses a cheap metal alloy. "The stacks are the heart of the Bloom box: put 64 of them together and you get something big enough to power a Starbucks."
Sridhar gave Stahl a sneak peek inside the Bloom box, the first ever given to the public.

"All those modules that we saw go into this big box. Fuel goes in, air goes in, out comes electricity," he explained.

What is the fuel, however? Most recently, the fuel cells intended to power cars required hydrogen. That was an issue, because hydrogen is difficult to transport. In this case, the fuel can be a variety of choices.

"Our system can use fossil fuels like natural gas. Our system can use renewable fuels like landfill gas, bio-gas. We can use solar."

Of course, using fossil fuels is a dead end. Eventually that will run out. Renewable fuels as a power source is very encouraging.

Additionally, Sridhar already has 20 large companies using Bloom Boxes in California. They include FedEx, WalMart, Staples, eBay, and that power-sucking company known as Google was their first customer. Google is trying anything it can think of to reduce its power use.

One reason California companies have signed up is California subsidizes 20 percent of the cost, and there is an additional 30 percent federal tax break because it's a "green" technology. The total cut is therefore half.

Bloom boxes, many think, are not the be-all and end-all. After all, there is so much power used by the world, no one technology can cure our ills. Former Secretary of State Colin Powell, whio joined Bloom Energy's board of directors last year, put it this way, when asked if Bloom boxes could be the fix for our our energy needs.

"I have seen the technology and it works," but, "I think that's too big a claim to make. I think it is part of the transformation of the energy system. But I think the Bloom boxes will make a significant contribution."

Posted by tipper 2010-02-22 05:15|| 2010-02-22 05:15|| Front Page Top

#6 Doesn't connect for me either, but that's because the entirety of blogspot.com is blocked by the Great Firewall of China. ;)

Posted by gromky 2010-02-22 07:27|| 2010-02-22 07:27|| Front Page Top

#7 There's a sucker born every minute.

Posted by Parabellum 2010-02-22 08:20|| http://sidemeat.wordpress.com/ 2010-02-22 08:20|| Front Page Top

#8 typical of 60 minutes

Leslie Stahl can't seem to completely grasp the difference between electricity generation and storage and doesn't really understand the problem of recharging an electrical storage device. Thank God the bloom box guy didn't try to explain AC vs DC to her.

Posted by lord garth 2010-02-22 08:30|| 2010-02-22 08:30|| Front Page Top

#9 "He invented a new kind of fuel cell, which is like a very skinny battery that always runs."

Ummm... no. What he's invented is a new way to scam investors who are as gullible-- and technically ignorant-- as they are greedy.

Posted by Dave D. 2010-02-22 08:33|| 2010-02-22 08:33|| Front Page Top

#10 Besoeker on 'Beach Sand.' Scoop here, scoop NOW!

Posted by Besoeker 2010-02-22 09:18|| 2010-02-22 09:18|| Front Page Top

#11 Beach sand.... he means _glass_, doesn't he?

For all I know, you might be able to make a better fuel cell from glass. But if so, why not say so? And why the heck is color important?

Even if it works as advertised, all it does it move the problem around, natural gas still needs drilling rigs.

Posted by Thing From Snowy Mountain 2010-02-22 09:35|| 2010-02-22 09:35|| Front Page Top

#12 It may mean sintered glass - lots of little grains stuck together with a huge surface area. The color is from the different compounds used for the catalysts. Give 'em a break. These are journalists, not 6th grade science students.

Posted by SteveS 2010-02-22 10:11|| 2010-02-22 10:11|| Front Page Top

#13 Ceramic tile, not a glass tile.

Posted by twobyfour 2010-02-22 10:50|| 2010-02-22 10:50|| Front Page Top

#14 Cold Fusion, anyone?

I hope it's true, but color me unconvinced. Especially after the "we can do solar" line.

Posted by mojo 2010-02-22 11:45|| 2010-02-22 11:45|| Front Page Top

#15 So they start with silicon dioxide but get a ceramic rather than glass?

Can they explain the real details so this makes sense?

(And yes, I know there are "glassy ceramics" and ceramics made partly of silica).

Posted by Thing From Snowy Mountain 2010-02-22 12:32|| 2010-02-22 12:32|| Front Page Top

#16 It's a Solid Oxide Fuel Cell (SOFC). It's layers of ceramic materials (not SiO2), often Zirconium alloys. The benefit is it doesn't use platiunum like Proton exchange membrane fuel cells. The good (or bad depending on viewpoint) is that it operates at high temp, around 800C. Hot water (or air) is a useful byproduct. The problem w/ home use is that if it gets cold it must be (slowly) reheated before it can work, or use energy to keep it hot even when people are not home.

I will be surprised if they can sell it for $10K for a 2kW unit (not enough to fully power a home). Compare that w/ a $2k 8kW natural gas engine. Yes, the gas engine won't last as long nor as efficient.

Posted by ed 2010-02-22 13:14|| 2010-02-22 13:14|| Front Page Top

#17 Zirconium, while cheaper than diamond, is still AFAIK fairly expensive (one reference I found said 170 dollars per kg). So it's not just a case of scooping up beach sand and painting it different colors.

And while it's nice that it's a more efficient way of turning natural gas into electricity than an otto cycle engine, it still needs a natural gas supply.

Posted by Thing From Snowy Mountain 2010-02-22 15:49|| 2010-02-22 15:49|| Front Page Top

#18 Is this bloom energy of nigeria?

Posted by flash91 2010-02-22 18:05|| 2010-02-22 18:05|| Front Page Top

#19 These Bloom boxes cost $1 million each.

Another example of small increases in energy efficiency from very large inputs of resources (including energy). Cost being a good proxy for resources required.

Posted by phil_b 2010-02-22 18:50|| 2010-02-22 18:50|| Front Page Top

#20 Zirconium
would some nice tweezers from a dental floss tycoon help Mr Bloom.

How about Mr Green in the hallway with a lead pipe?

Posted by 3dc 2010-02-22 19:35|| 2010-02-22 19:35|| Front Page Top

#21 Wonder how cheap Intel or TI could make one of those boxes. Companies that know how to do cheap complex materials.

Posted by 3dc 2010-02-22 23:41|| 2010-02-22 23:41|| Front Page Top

#22 I would look to the automobile companies.

Posted by ed 2010-02-22 23:44|| 2010-02-22 23:44|| Front Page Top

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