Another green technology scam with no increased benefits.
The Institute for Energy Research writes:
In 2010, fuel cell manufacturer Bloom Energy unveiled its “Bloom Energy Server.” The unveiling and subsequent press attention claimed that these “Bloom Boxes” were green, efficient and represented the future of energy production. But three years later it appears that Bloom Energy’s success can be attributed to savvy PR and government subsidies—not a superior product. After reviewing Bloom’s products in the real world, it appears that not only are Bloom Boxes functionally the same as natural gas power plants, but they are less efficient.
It Started with a Fawning Media
Bloom Energy generated buzz in 2010 after 60 Minutes correspondent Leslie Stahl became the first journalist to tour the Sunnyvale, California headquarters and look inside the top-secret “Bloom Box”. Stahl’s piece, however, was much closer to advertising than journalism. For example, Stahl starts, “In the world of energy, the Holy Grail is a power source that’s inexpensive and clean, with no emissions. Well over 100 start-ups in Silicon Valley are working on it, and one of them, Bloom Energy, is about to make public its invention.”
…
Bloom’s good PR extends beyond Apple. A number of well-known companies have purchased Bloom Boxes, including Adobe, FedEx, Staples, Google, Coca-Cola, and Wal-Mart. One reason these companies signed up is because of government subsidies. As 60 Minutes explains, “In California 20 percent of the cost is subsidized by the state, and there’s a 30 percent federal tax break because it’s a ‘green’ technology. In other words: the price is cut in half.” Getting the price cut in half definitely makes expensive energy technology look appealing, especially if it has the veneer of being “green.”
While Bloom Boxes aren’t green (unless you consider natural power plants green), the most important question is whether Bloom Boxes are efficient. According to 60 Minutes, Google has some Bloom Boxes that “use natural gas, but half as much as would be required for a traditional power plant.” The claim that Bloom Boxes are efficient does not stand up to scrutiny.
Is Bloom Green: Unboxing Bloom Energy’s Costs
A couple of engineers in California decided to compare Bloom’s energy efficiency with a cogeneration facility running on natural gas. These two engineers, Bob Spitzka and James Hall, have worked on the feasibility and design of nearly 100 cogeneration facilities and wanted to see how Bloom compared in terms of efficiency. After all, as 60 Minutes noted above, Bloom Boxes received subsidies because they are perceived as “green.”
Spitzka and Hall find that conventional cogeneration, which also produces usable heat, can achieve better CO2 reductions than Bloom Energy fuel cells when operating on the same fuel. The following chart compares a cogeneration unit to a Bloom Energy unit, each rated at 100 kw and operating 90 percent of the year:
As the chart shows, a conventional cogeneration unit would cost $500,000 less annually than a Bloom Energy unit. Moreover, the Bloom unit actually increases CO2 emissions by 98.2 tons per year, despite Bloom Energy’s claims that Bloom Boxes are better for the environment. Moreover, cogeneration is nothing new; the technology has existed for more than a century, yet these old units cost less and are more efficient than Bloom Energy’s Bloom Box.
more here: http://www.instituteforenergyresearch.org/2013/06/18/the-bloom-is-off-bloom-energy/
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That is not their only problem…
http://sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com/2013/02/04/sunnyvale-green-energy-firm-paying-workers-from-mexico-a-fraction-of-minimum-wage/
This is a bit of an apples-to-oranges comparison; not all installations are going to have a use for the recoverable waste heat the cogen plant makes.
denniswingo – that’s blooming hysterical. Wonder what kind of generators those ‘tourists’ were refurbishing.
Coal can use cogen too. Efficiency can go from 45% to 80%, a 77% improvement, or a 44% reduction in fuel use for the same power delivery. That’s a 44% reduction in CO2 emissions as a bonus (the rest of us will be happier with lower energy costs).
Of course, a 44% reduction in coal use is still considered “dirty energy” by the Climate Industrial Complex. Dirty energy makes dirty weather, of course. If you’ve had a lobotomy.
I imagine waste heat isn’t always desirable in hot places like California, even when used to heat water, though I can see its utility in colder climes during winter. So it depends on where you’re installing it.
Taking as a given Leslie Stahl’s conclusion
[leaving aside the bogus math that she alleges got her there — $800,000 – (.2 x 800,000 cost + .3 x Fed. tax on the Bloom unit) = $400,000 — I-don’t-think-so!],
even assuming her conclusion, the Bloom at $400,000 is still $100,000 more per unit than the Cogen. AND the Cogen generates thermal heat while the Bloom does not.
Q. Is the reason businesses prefer the Bloom that the Cogen requires about double the Fuel Input and those particular businesses find that the thermal heat benefit of the Cogen is far outweighed by the cost of that Fuel Input?
That is, while the purchase cost is higher, is the operating cost of the Bloom lower?
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All I can say is, REGARDLESS of the above actual costs and benefits, tax payers should not be funding anyone’s costs of production directly or, as here, paying people to buy their products (this is even WORSE, for it lets the producer charge a higher price regardless of cost of production!) — let the market sort out the winners and the losers!
Way to get the truth out, A-th-y!
And they are 2-tone drab to boot.
Maybe they could produce some in nice colors – green, blue, pink, or camouflage based on the site, such as pine trees, sun flowers, or derelict alleyways. That ought to be worth a few bucks.
For those who don’t know, 1 therm = 29.3kWh
Any electrical generator takes in fuel and produces heat and electricity. If you give yourself a credit for the waste heat, with an efficiency markup, then an inefficient generator is bound to score better than something that generates electricity without waste heat.
The bottom line here is that the Bloom gets almost twice the electricity per unit fuel. That’s not bad.
That table seems designed to deliberately confuse.
For Bloom – 193.6 kW gas input = 100kW(e) output
For CoGen – 375 kW gas input = 100kW(e) output + 205.1 kW (heat)
IF you’ve got a complementary heating requirement, CoGen is a no-brainer.
There are many problems with Bloom Solid Oxide Fuel Cells but the biggest:
1. SOFC excessive cost per KW(e) installed is $8000 while a magnitude in order less is the marginal resource like a combined cycle gas turbine (CCGT) at $700/KW(e).
2. The SOFC may sport a higher Mechanical to Electric efficiency of 58-60% but not much higher than a CCGT approaching 55% for newer models.
Bonus for Bloom:
3. Although the Bloom is distributed generation (at the point of use) it is often sold on power reliability issues. However at $8000/KW(e) there are probably cheaper options: Standby gensets $1200/KW(e), UPS (Batteries and inverters) $1500/KW(e) or even flywheel rotational machinery such as Pillar for smaller outages measured in a few cycles.
4. Typical installations are high profile type customers who can afford to take the credits on their own balance sheets or work with an investment group that can.
5. The remaining payback after goodies is a total spark spread calculation.
Although the science is pretty cool behind the SOFC, the economics still leave a substantial gap for commercialization.
“Another green technology scam with no increased benefits.”
Not quite true.
The snake-oil salesmen from Bloom Energy did quite well.
Janice Moore says:
June 24, 2013 at 10:38 pm
“…..let the market sort out the winners and the losers!”….
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Took a while, but it is like releasing a fox in the hen house.
There is something about foxes, they just kill everything in the house.
Ashby, get up to speed waste heat is great for running air conditioning and making hot water. Saves a bundle.
Nick Stokes, wrong, you look at total usable energy. Use the waste heat simply and effectively.
IER link: “The ill-fated VTA arrangement exposes the real costs of buying Bloom Boxes. According to VTA, a 400 KW system would cost $5.8 million, or $14,500 a KW in capital costs. To put this in perspective, conventional combined cycle natural gas plant only costs $1,017 per KW in capital costs.”
Solar PV panels are about 1 euro / watt one-off retail price in Europe now. Plus some for the associated electronics. Makes Bloom , blooming expensive.
If they’d added some thermal solar to the CHP unit they could have totally eliminated the boiler fuel consumption.
However, I’m not sure that this comparison is totally honest because it _assumes_ that you need and use all the heat produced by the CHP system all year round.
Do the sites being considered need serval 100kW of hot water 24/7 during the summer? I doubt it. Which means the “fuel credit” is like most “credits” in energy discussions: largely ficticious.
I will spell it out hopefully for nick
Say your total demand for electricity is 100kw covering electricity, air conditioning and hot water.
The Bloom 100 kw unit, costs so much and consumes so much fuel
Now go cogen, you only need a 30kw unit, that supplies your electricity demand, the waste heat provides the rest.
Result, less fuel consumption, less capital cost.
Simple,
Joe Public says: That table seems designed to deliberately confuse.
Yes, I also did not like using two different units of power that makes the number inverifyable without further research.
Like I said above, you actually have to NEED that much heat for the calculations to be valid. Their use of different units seems intended to mask the obvious flaw that you probalby don’t. It seems no one is capable of an honest presentation on energy issues any more , it always has to be spun one way or another.
In Manhattan, AC units can be run by steam power to cool buildings.
http://www.coned.com/steam/kc_faqs.asp
Try to run Your computer on waste heat at “low” temperatures.
Waste heat is useful only if You have som practical use of it.
All this cooling tower with vapor cloud AGW side love to show as CO2 polluter is, You may guessed it, waste heat. To no practical use.
Cogeneration is perfect in colder climate where You can use the low temperature heat to as an example use it for house heating. But the electrical load in southern USA is higher in summer than in winter. Only usable heat sink in summer would be old fashion chillers. But it is still cheaper to dump the waste heat and use a electric compressor for cooling than to use large chillers.
Grey Lensman says: June 24, 2013 at 11:23 pm
“Nick Stokes, wrong, you look at total usable energy. Use the waste heat simply and effectively.”
Well, if you wanted electricity, you’re not going to get much out of waste heat. If you just want warmth, you could generate 193 kW with the 12.8 therm/hr fuel (Bloom), and use the extra 93 kW to pump heat; you’d need a COP of 2.2 to break even. And if you want to use the cogen waste heat for something else, that’s another thing to buy, with limited prospects.
Nick, electricity is just a means to an end. Air conditioning and water heating use the most electricity. So providing them via waste heat makes a lot of sense. In this context, it is vital to make the distinction as I show in my example given above.
Nick, as you seem so keen to save the planet and push economy, why do you refuse to see the full efficiency, using the wider spectrum of energy available to us.
The simple figures speak for themselves.
Here we use waste heat from air conditioners to heat water. Very very efficient and cost effective
I’ve just done a quick check on UK prices. According to Energy Saving Trust, gas on average costs £0.0464 per kWh, while electricity is £0.1532 per kWh. So the cost for 100kWh of electricity bought from the grid would be £15.32, and generated from this Bloom device would be (193.6*0.0464=) £8.98. So the saving is £6.34 per 100kWh. If this thing costs $800k (about £500k) you would therefore have to generate almost 8 million kWh to break even. And that’s ignoring space costs, maintenance, and cashflow. These things should be sold to power generation companies, not to consumers!
Typo: “(unless you consider natural power plants green)” should be: “(unless you consider natural gas power plants green)”.
So far nobody has raised the issues related to how long the systems last and how much it costs to keep them running. Neither fuel cells nor engines last forever.
Hi Anthony,
Thank you for an important post. However, the case is even stronger than you suggest. I will try to fill in the details, and maybe other readers can help fix any errors.
We have twelve Bloom boxes at Caltech. In addition to the subsidies that were mentioned (30% federal, 20% state), I believe that they were also eligible for the CA SGIP (self-generation) program $2.50/W and for the biogas subsidy $2.40/W (we do not actually consume biogas, but someone burns biogas somewhere, and we get the credit somehow.) That would bring the total subsidies close to $8/W. Presumably it is not a coincidence that this was the price you quoted. The lifetime of the fuel cells appears to be about two years, based on our conversations with the maintenance people.
For comparison, Caltech also has a combined-cycle cogen plant, which also uses natural gas. Our cost was $1/W, and it also provides the heat for the entire campus. This plant does not receive any subsidies. The turbine has a lifetime of 5 years.
I think the key to understanding all of this is the political connections of the venture capital firm that funded Bloom, Kleiner Perkins. Al Gore is a partner.
Thats cool. I assume waste heat to heat the water is very efficient. How efficient is using waste heat to run the AC?