Posted on 02/26/2010 10:29:48 PM PST by neverdem
Fuel cells deserved to hit the headlines this week, but not the way that it played out. The big splash came thanks to CBS News' 60 MINUTES and heavy hyping of a stationary fuel cell developer emerging from stealth-mode development. More surprising, and of real significance, was a projection yesterday by Pike Research that fuel cell-equipped vehicles will go commercial in just 4 years.
The problem with Bloom Energy's Bloom Box stationary fuel cell is that, despite 60 MINUTES' assertion that it might be the holy grail to free Americans shackled to a coal-fired grid, the company has yet to deliver a product. Moreover, the technology is hardly new.
The Bloom Box will use stacks of solid oxide fuel cells to electrochemically turn natural gas into power, eliminating the pollution that comes with fuel combustion. Some fuel cell experts have been blistering in their criticism of Bloom and its hypers. "I'm actually pretty pissed off about it, to be quite honest," is how Nigel Sammes, an SOFC expert at the Colorado School of Mines, expressed his emotions on the Bloom Box to National Geographic. "It really is nothing new. Go to any [SOFC] Web site and you'll see the same stuff."
It's also a market that has been tried before. In fact, more than 200 stationary fuel cell generators were already operating a decade ago when United Technologies first raised the technology's profile, installing a pair in NYC's Four Times Square office tower--an early development in what's since become a green building craze (see Energy to Count On from the August 17, 1999 issue of the New York Times). The 200-kW generators, using an older phosphoric acid electroyte design, generate enough power the tower's nighttime electric demand, and turning waste heat into space and water heating...
(Excerpt) Read more at spectrum.ieee.org ...
I saw some of that hype and realized it was hype when they said it wouldn’t be available for 10 to 12 years. That told me that it was probably vapor-cells.
But the article mentioned freezing in cold weather. Wouldn’t a simple solution be to have the fuel cell self heat?
The best methanol fuel cell can run 3000 hours total using laboratory level purity methanol fuel before the fuel cell stack must be replaced due to clogging as impurities in the air are sucked into the system causing side reactions/residuals. Byproduct of water forming ice in the cell must be resolved during cold temperature starting of vehicle.
these fuel cells have been active for the last couple years at a number of companies in silicon valley.
A 10 gallon tankful should produce 5kw at 220volts for approx 12-20 days.
Thread:
Is the "Magic" Alternative Energy Bloom Box for Real? ( Developer is EX-NASA...)
A prototype is not a product. So the article is correct. LOTS of promising technologies fail at the prototype stage. The only thing unique about the "Bloom Box" is that they manged to convince 60 Minutes to do a story about them.
I thought I read somewhere there was a power source which would utilize water as it’s “fuel” and work by extracting the hydrogen from the water as the source of energy and having as a by product the oxygen molecules.
Meanwhile the US Patent Office continues to lie
and deceive the American public.
Controlled by the IAEA and the DNC, the USPTO
will NEVER allow alternative energy patent applications
to go anywhere but to China and the IAEA Islamic countries.
Those involved should be indicted, convicted and imprisoned.
Names to follow.
“the company has yet to deliver a product”
Not true. Bloom has some of it’s boxes running at several locations and they have been operating for a couple of years.
http://www.microfueler.com/t-technology.aspx
I have a friend who distributes these systems in the Grand Rapids MI market.
Sammes runs neck and neck with fellow ripoff artist Marconi in the "expert" race.
There's a reason why Sammes is at the School of Mines and not in the industry developing product.
btrl
"If stationary fuel cell's haven't taken off it's because they produce power at higher cost than the grid, and there's no evidence that the Bloom Box will fix that. Cost estimates given by Bloom of 8-9 cts/kwh include healthy subsidies that cut the price in half."
I don't want gov't picking winners and losers when they can't even control gov't spending.
They haven’t taken off because the technology to make them viable is just now arriving. The concept has been around for a very long time but the materials needed to make them hasn’t. Until now.
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