Posted by
rycK on Friday, February 26, 2010 2:02:47 PM
The Bloom May Be Off
the Bloom Box Fuel Cell because the Politicians Cluster Around. A Farce in the Making? II: Update
I must
include an analysis of this Bloom Box from
By Chris Nelder. He has more extensive research on the details and we now find
out this runs on natural gas. He raises some of the same questions I did below
with these salient additions to mine:
[1] “One cell produces 25 watts. A
"residential sized" stack of cells produces 1 kilowatt (kW), which Sridhar claims could be on the market at a price point of
$3000 in five years.”-- Is the Bloom Box Energy's Holy Grail? By Chris Nelder Friday, February 26th, 2010 [Emphasis is mine in
all quotes.]
[2] “First, a 1 kW unit isn't enough to
power a house in the U.S. I know from my experience in the
solar business that 2.5 kW on an averaged demand basis is more like it. [now $7000 plus cell replacement costs e.d. so payback will be 15 years or
longer]
[3] “Second,
since nearly all customers will run the unit on natural gas, it doesn't fulfill
the claims of clean, abundant, or cheap power.”
[4] “The short lifespan of the device and the need to swap out the cell stack every five years must be factored in as well. The
cost of maintenance and the availability of service technicians are important
questions that still loom over the Bloom.”
[5] “I remain
staunchly rooted in numbers and of the mind that it's better to have no hope
than false hope, because it pushes us toward real solutions.”
Right On
Chris!!
Previous blog:
Want to
see a scam in the making? You have only to look for places where flocks of
politicians cluster to get some face time and show their feathers. The scam usually unfolds by first offering
something that is too good to be true and then the suckers are all serviced by
attendant groupies trained in both bordello and political tactics until the
bloom is off the onion, economic realities set in, and the suckers can face the
Magic Mirror on the wall without blushing.
Such a
potential scam is roiling up in California over a new fuel cell that offers
electricity at a fraction of the cost from the power grid. This new gadget may
be a quantum leap beyond what we now have and many homes and businesses might
well buy these and save on energy costs and also meet stringent emissions standards
for pollutants and non pollutants such as carbon dioxide. We shall see. We
should note that fuel cell technology dates back way beyond a hundred years.
First, we
need to ask some hard questions and see if the barkers blush or evade the
probes. If they turn tail and resort to bold rhetoric, wild promises or the
testimony of politicians or attempt to hide critical costs then we know we are
on our way to a Coney Island Freak Show. Let us reserve judgment and ask the
pertinent questions and then wait for a response. We can then find out.
From previous experience:
“The
quest for cheap energy by the rabid left has fashioned such follies as Cold
Fusion ,
the counterfeit Bluewater Wind platforms
that might generate electricity at $ 0.12 per Kwh, probably more, while currently we get it form coal at $0
.03. Then there is the question of solar energy. The ugly facts here are that
these ‘alternative’ forms of energy are very expensive and highly inefficient. A trip to Home Depot in 2006 to look at solar
power systems for an average house shows that they could supply, at best, 25%
of the power consumed in the home, about $600 worth of electricity per year in
Mid Atlantic terms. But, this would cost
$14,000 to install the solar collectors.
That modification requires a 25 year payback period, which does not
include financing, which could push it to 40 years. And, who would believe that
such a device would even last 20 years? Those kinds of economics make sense to
the political hacks at the New York Times. “It’s for the children.” Let us all
freak out and bawl about global warming.”
Bluewater Windmill Follies has pushed up the cost to 14.75 cents
now in Delaware.
Here is the
potential chum:
“Computerworld - A Silicon Valley start-up is getting ready to
unveil an energy device this week that executives say could one day power
individual homes and businesses while replacing the traditional power grid.
“Bloom
Energy, one of the 26 companies named in the World Economic Forum's list of top
2010 Tech Pioneers, took some of the wraps off its Bloom Box in a story that
ran last night on the CBS TV newsmagazine60 Minutes.:” -- Fuel cell of the future promises cleaner energy
By Glenn
Chapman February 25, 2010 - 2:26PM
Here is the juicy claim:
“Electricity generated by Bloom servers costs about nine cents per
kilowatt/hour as opposed to the 14 or 15 cents typically charged here by
utilities.”--
Fuel cell of the future
Then, a few caveats start to be
almost mentioned:
“The cost of the servers is recovered in
three to five years by energy savings, Sridhar said. The servers are guaranteed for 10 years. Sridhar
would not disclose the life spans of the fuel cells.”-- Fuel cell of the future [Emphasis is mine in
all quotes.]
Now, we need to ask some serious
questions:
[1] If the fuel cell can deliver at 9
cents can this efficiency be maintained at all levels of power load? According
to the experts
the efficiency of the cell drops with power output. We need to see “…graphs of voltage versus current (so-called polarization curves)…” [for these] fuel cells. Are they available? What if the voltage drops
at a mere 20% load and the cost rises above the average 9 cents? How high does
it go? If we cannot depend on this device delivering electricity at a cost of 9
cents with a 90% load then this may be just another shiny walnut shell in the
usual Three
Card Monte game.
[2] How long does this cell last? If we
look at the financials of this device, the path to break even on a cost basis
is the total cost of the device with installation and financing amortized over
the expected lifetime of the device with repairs and component and periodic
fuel replacements included in the calculations.
[3] Is it cost-effective everywhere?
The average of the cost of electricity per Kwh in the entire United States is 11.76 cents per kilowatt-hour. This is an
average compiled from all US states that
range in cost from a high of 26.45 in Hawaii, 19.17 in New York State, 14.75 in Delaware to 9.58 in Indiana,
8.39 in Missouri, and 8.15 in Idaho. California is 14.08 the
highest on the West Coast.
What bothers me is the presence of Arnold and
Powell as this circus celebration may turn out be just another Colonic
Discharge to
soak the voters with another phony social program.
We need to press the
makers of this cell for pertinent facts on costs and lifetimes and efficiency
before we throw some more taxpayer’s money into the latrines.
rycK
Comments:
ryckki@gmail.com
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cold_fusion
Colonic Discharge from Colon Powell. Affirmative Action Shows
Off its Best Creation.