The Bloom Box: a power plant for the home (video)
By Thomas Ricker 
posted February 22nd 2010 1:57AM
posted February 22nd 2010 1:57AM
Those two blocks can power the average high-consumption American home -- one block can power the average European home. At least that's the claim being made by K.R. Sridhar, founder of Bloom Energy, on 60 Minutes last night. The original technology comes from an oxygen generator meant for a scrapped NASA Mars program that's been converted, with the help of an estimated $400 million in private funding, into a fuel cell. Bloom's design feeds oxygen into one side of a cell while fuel (natural gas, bio gas from landfill waste, solar, etc) is supplied to the other side to provide the chemical reaction required for power. The cells themselves are inexpensive ceramic disks painted with a secret green "ink" on one side and a black "ink" on the other. The disks are separated by a cheap metal alloy, instead of more precious metals like platinum, and stacked into a cube of varying capabilities -- a stack of 64 can power a small business like Starbucks.
Now get this, skeptics: there are already several corporate customers using refrigerator-sized Bloom Boxes. The corporate-sized cells cost $700,000 to $800,000 and are installed at 20 customers you've already heard of including FedEx and Wal-mart -- Google was first to this green energy party, using its Bloom Boxes to power a data center for the last 18 months. Ebay has installed its boxes on the front lawn of its San Jose location. It estimates to receive almost 15% of its energy needs from Bloom, saving about $100,000 since installing its five boxes 9 months ago -- an estimate we assume doesn't factor in the millions Ebay paid for the boxes themselves. Bloom makes about one box a day at the moment and believes that within 5 to 10 years it can drive down the cost to about $3,000 to make it suitable for home use. Sounds awfully aggressive to us. Nevertheless, Bloom Energy will go public with details on Wednesday -- until then, check the 60 Minutes sneak peek after the break.
[Thanks, Abe P.]
I don't trust indians
indian invent ... japanese refine ... chinese produce ...
and whole world is benefited..
Inferring from the limited video that this is something from nothing is a mistake. He states that the device uses LESS natural gas, (aprox. 1/2). It would appear that the gasses needed to fuel the opposite side of the wafer is normal atmosphere. Much like a fire uses air+fuel+spark to burn. The question is: What is the spark? The "Paint" used on the wafers? An outside spark to get the reaction going? That is why the investors are entrusting the big bucks in the project. Apparently he has figured out a way to produce energy more efficiently. Not free, but more efficiently.
Perhaps we would all do well to re-learn the laws of thermodynamics
@znmeb I don't think they are claiming a perpetual motion device or some kind of crazy device that creates energy from nothing. Albeit, the 60 Minutes piece was very low on the technical information, but I think the gist of this is that it's a smaller, cheaper, more efficient way to convert fuel into electricity than our current grid system. You still need fuel, but it cuts out the middle man of the electric company.
I offer up two of his papers from when he was at NASA: http://www.lpi.usra.edu/meetings/isru97/PDF/SRIDHAR.PDF and this gem http://quest.arc.nasa.gov/mars/ask/humans-on-mars/Oxygen_Production_on_Mars.txt which has the specs for power startup input and operating temp of the oxygen generator he proposed - 750 Celsius that's 1400F -- no wonder there was a lot of insulation and the units are outside.
and if he's using similar materials at least yttria is available in Canada rather than China which is reducing it's rare earth exports so that they can use the materials themselves. It's about $75/oz which is much cheaper than platinum though the original oxygen generator had platinum bands.
Don't get too excited, Its not like it just magically creates power. It still requires some form of gas ( hydrogen, Natural, ext ). I would be interested in how much gas it takes to generate a given amount of electricity. Even if they provided some figures on the cost equivalent in natural gas, these figures would be meaningless, because if everyone got one of these in their home, the demand for natural gas would skyrocket, causing prices to go up. Also how is this thing supposed to run off solar? Sounds like they just wanted to use a buzz word to get the attention of investors who lack the ability to see the bigger picture.
@blogwhitesitescom
The demand for natural gas can be met pretty easily, and from domestic sources. Between the Barnett, Marcellus and Haynesville shales (Google 'em) we have roughly a kilobuttload of natural gas that can be drilled and connected to our existing natural gas grid.
As I have stated before, if you listen to that part of the program it sure sounds to me like 60 Minutes edited a longer answer into "Yes we can use solar" without including the explanation as to how. There is an intermediate step he's probably explained, but it's boring and technical so 60 Minutes cut it.
Anyone else notice that she keeps saying "in my basement" and he says "on the lawn". My guess, this guy doesn't want to be sued when someone chokes on a buildup of the exhaust (whatever that is) in their unventilated building.(particularly if that someone is a future president of
uh-merica).
Wait, lets look at some numbers. Estimate residential cost of $3-4000us. Plus you have to supply it with fuel of some kind which will also cost you.
So, I currently spend about $2200us per year on electricity and natural gas. So this is going to cost me more, especially up front.
What I want to know is...
1. How much energy is used relative to output?
2. How much cost is there for replacing the consumable components?
3. What is the actual carbon footprint of this INCLUDING input fuel?
Is this really any better than my electric and natural gas, especially since if anything goes wrong with those, I make a phone call and it's taken care of at no out of pocket cost to me.
@strommsarnac
Your comment about the startup cost is not viewed correctly.
1. This guy's previous devices for NASA ran at 1400F. This unit has a lot of insulation inside, you may be able to make use of the heat to replace your furnace (which for natural gas, run in the $2-5k range with install).
2. His original device used carbon MONOXIDE as input materials. He said he reversed it. Maybe it puts out some carbon monoxide? I would certainly NOT want it inside my home.
3. A fully electric heating home only exists in a few places in the US. Many homes use circulated hot water for heating either to heat hot air heat exchangers or radiators, a unit that ran on electric to do this would have to be installed as a replacement unit for the furnace. At least a $1000 for such a device installed.
4. With a small US's home's electric bill running $1200 a year, even with a 4 or 5 grand upfront price to redo the infrastructure, the units would pay off in 5 years or less. If they last 30 years as suggested, they are a real bargain at $3K
Guys why dont u see that it can be run on biogas. I guess if biogas is produced from wastes of a family of 4, it can run the thing atleast for 8 to 12 hrs, that is enough time to save money and to get back the sunlight.
N if people dont want to produce biogas at home, city councils can do that on large scale with the civic waste. So this can be one of the way our homes will be light, not sole way i will say but one of the way.
So its thing to couple with wind and solar power. And looking at its efficiency it will use biogas much better than the current biogas based power stations.
I think the bigger questions is, "why was space going to get this before us?"
@leanbarton
The unit for the Mars project was designed to heat ceramic plates that run at 1400F and used carbon monoxide passing over rare earths like yittirum (available from Canada and Texas(?)) to create oxygen. It was not designed to create electric. See my prior post with the link to the guy's papers from NASA.
Now it's possible that this unit also runs at 1400F and leaks out carbon monoxide, but without the specs, who knows. But tellingly, they are all placed OUTDOORS.
@Lando Calrissian
Made in America by Americans? if so a step in the right direction. We need to pick up the pace and be a leader again.
Biggest load of crap....
Put more resources on nuclear fuel. Those are millions of times more efficient.
Heck get me a nuclear fuel cell in a similar to that thing.
Space wasn't. He retro-engineered another project with a different purpose, and re-applied it to this one. Another reason to keep funding the Space Program. Thanks, Obama, now drink your Tang, er, Kool-Aid.
Space wasn't. He retro-engineered another project with a different purpose, and re-applied it to this one. Another reason to keep funding the Space Program. Thanks, Obama, now drink your Tang, er, Kool-Aid.
Two posts I recently wrote that frame the disruptive element of disributed power:
http://www.garrygolden.net/2010/02/23/bloom-energy-box-disruptive-future-of-distributed-energy/
http://www.garrygolden.net/2010/02/21/future-of-portable-personal-power-via-micro-fuel-cells/
Best,
Garry G
Brooklyn NY
Solar Electricity + Air = More Electricity?
whoa
someone should sample the surrounding air... I want to know how they can put two things together and be left with just electrons.
When every home gets one. People are going to start ripping it open. The technology is going to get more evident.
I'm really optimistic. hope it works.
And Mr. Green Gadget Guy: F&@# off.
@ongadget
These things cost hundreds of millions. I'd like to see someone voiding their warranty on something like this so they can post an unboxing on Youtube. And it's 10-20 years until this becomes consumer-oriented (i.e. ~$3,000).
@Invader Par
* hundreds of thousands
@Invader Par Probably not then. But you still have rival companies that can afford 3k.
This all hinges on the kinds of fuels they can use to power it. If solar energy can really be used to create more energy than it requires to run, this man has solved our energy needs and can reduce pollution at the same time. He will be the world's first trillionaire.
- Using 50% less fossil fuels is an amazing jump in efficiency, but still time limited and still polluting. Natural gas is at least cleaner and cheaper.
- Biofuels are not practical large-scale - the Earth simply cannot support the biomass necessary to meet current fuel demands. If anything, this is more wasteful because it takes away potential food.
- Landfill gas is just like biofuels - not practical on the large scale, although as far as energy goes, its is fairly renewable, since we will always have waste.
- Wind power is also not practical large-scale because only certain areas on the planet have a constant enough wind for it to be effective.
- Solar power is the holy grail, but our levels of efficiency (cost, size, and conversion) are just too low to be practical, yet.