Unlike cold fusion, they already have working examples in real applications. Bloom has a new version of a fuel cell, and is claiming it has some new advantages, but fuel cells in general are already proven technology, and have been around for a long time. Fuel cells work. That's already been established beyond any reasonable doubt.
Bloom just has to prove his can be made smaller and cheaper for the same output, to compete with many other fuel cells ALREADY AVAILABLE ON THE MARKET.
But you probably went to public schools. Or, your neighbors kids do. And they become productive members of society, which benefits you. Uneducated people are far more likely to become a burden on society.
If you drive, traffic is a lot less because of the MTA.
Or they benefit you indirectly. Just making society as a whole work better benefits everyone. Not every tax has to benefit everyone to be worth its cost.
I note you were not complaining, so I suspect you personaly recognize this.
Does the $100K saved include the cost of gas?
That says that it doesn't release carbon, which is obviously erronious if it is using carbon based fuels.
If these things are 50% efficient, the excess heat could be used to heat houses at the same time they power them.
...
Which is only one of the many mysteries yet to be revealed by the Wizard behind the curtain in the Land of Bloom...
There's a minor inconvenience of 2nd Law and conservation of mass that _will_ have to be dealt with eventually. Maybe they've got it down and it is something radically new and different; there surely isn't enough information yet publicly available to make one confident of such. And surely the 60 Minutes segment doesn't do anything to help in that regard.
--
I'd say Bloom has far more than "just" that to demonstrate...and there's a lot of things to make "just that" happen.
Power to 'em if they can; I'm not holding breath just yet.
Of course, you forget the cost of money.
Making the payback 28 years, ignoring interest and maintenance. Not so good, even if it's not a lie.
Your objections have been pretty much along the lines that fuel cells couldn't work. Reality seems to disagree with you.
There's so much breathless crap about this device, nobody can make a judgement yet. CBS' report has no useful information. Another news website claimed the box "mixes oxygen with...renewable fuel like solar..." for a chemical reaction..!! Yet another points out the fuel/oxygen mix has to be heated to a very high temperature. So where's the energy for *that* come from? Google "saves" $100,000 because of the state government heavily subsidized the investment (with money the state does not have). And then there's the magic "ink".
Nothing to talk about yet.
I'm as skeptical as the next guy, and also have the background to do my own time/value/cost analysis of a device. Even with good math helping someone, the more you dig into any complex system, the less reliable is the result. Even when you have a black box with a NG/Propane pipe running in, an inverter on the side and an AC line run to the home's meter, the number of variables and assumptions in particular are astounding. For instance, what do you assume the payment for power fed back to the grid will be over the life of the unit? What's the life of the unit? What will it cost to repair the unit when it (expectedly) breaks down? What will the replacement unit cost? What will the grid SELL power for over the cost of the unit? What will the cost of NG or Propane be over the life of the unit? What will be the ratio or loan to equity when acquiring the unit? What will be the interest cost of borrowing and the amortization period? What will be the LOST interest that could have been generated by the equity and also the amortized portion of the loan? What will labor cost to repair the unit over its life?
These are only a smattering of the assumptions that must be made to analyze the cost effectiveness of the unit. OTOH, we live with assumptions every day and ranges of probability can be assigned to each one. In a nutshell, it's usually a crap shoot and if you are selling them or have bought one, you'll pick assumptions favorable to you. OTOH, if you're a competitor, you'll pick variables and assumptions that tell your tale better. Now, it's a biased crap shoot.
However, there can be other factors involved that are not directly related to cost/reward, such as distribution of our power generating ability, ability to meet peak demands, use of existing infrastructure and social good in reduced emissions. There are also downsides, including the increased cost to regulate the new devices, how can taxes foisted on utilities be supplemented or reallocated with the new devices online and even minor things like a device being improperly installed and backfeeding a line thought to be dead.
It's a great thought to have distributed power generation like this and I'm sure that if the concept and pronouncements prove correct, that the loose ends will get worked out.
What abt cracking urine to get hydrogen out of ammonia?
Speaking of cold fusion, there was another 60 Minutes story on that about a year ago. Turns out there are several respected labs around the world that are still working on it. After carefully accounting for energy in vs out, they are still seeing more energy come out than can be accounted for and can reproduce it reliably now. Now that doesn't mean it's actual nuclear fusion, particularly because the normal by-products have not been seen. But something apparently is going on and it looks like the reason they get similar results as the original two professors is that they are doing some things slightly different and the process is very tempermental. It could very well be that something new has been found, but exactly what and if it has any commercial appeal is unknown. But research is actively continuing to try to understand what exactly is going on.
60 Minutes asked one of the repected physical chemistry organizations to recommend a highly qualified chemist to go take a look at what one of these labs was doing. He spent time there and looked at how they were measuring energy. He said initially he was highly skeptical, but after doing due diligence and looking everything over, he agrees that they are in fact getting more energy out than they are putting in and he cant explain it.
Who pays for the repairs when your car has a problem? Or when your AC or furnace goes out?
Sure there are scammers, but I hardly thing Bloom falls into that category. Don't you think Kleiner Perkins did lots of due diligence before they gave this guy $100mil and knew that it would ultimately take $400mil to get to production? This venture capital firm has been around silicon valley for 4 decades and has funded some of the most successful startups in history. Sun Microsystems, Compaq, Google, Amazon, Genentech..... They certainly have access to the best and brightest minds that would know fuel cell and any other technology involved.
It's still a start-up company that is doing hand built prototype testing. It's not at all unusual for a new company to not disclose everything until they are at a point where they feel it's appropriate.
Geez, I don't see anyone here blindly believing anything or failing to consider the FULL situation. I do see you being extremely negative and trying to dismiss a strawman that you created.
snipped-for-privacy@dog.com wrote: ...
My objection is simply that there's much hype and little fact.
Fuel cells _do_ work; they aren't magic.
These are some novel concept that hasn't been documented as to how; what is the energy and/or material balance, etc., etc., etc., ... The previous NASA-supported work from which these apparently evolved also work; they're known but don't have anything close to the performance claimed on this innovation.
Simply no solid data from which to judge just what level of innovation is really present inside those unlabeled black boxes.
When that revelation of reproducible data occurs, _then_ they'll have something (or not)...
Nonny wrote: ...
...
"...if the concept and pronouncements prove correct, ..." :)
Ayup...there seems to be an echo in here...
--
Hydrogen Fuel cells are CURRENTLY installed and working successfully in many places. Sure seems like there is plenty of reproducable data.
Do some simple intenet searches for terms suchs as "Hydrogen Fuel Cells" and there are MILLIONS of hits.
Of course there is and there is a very good reason why current fuel cells are typically used on space craft etc and not much more. But this thread is about magical fuel cells using unstated and unreviewed technology.
The only thing we know about their "magic fuel cells" at this point is marketing hype. There is exactly nothing to form any sort of conclusion. As soon as they produce data that can be peer reviewed they are in the same class as the magic weight reduction pills or super oil additive or whatever other "magical" thing is being hyped.
Baloney. They are being used at public schools in Connecticut among other places. Fuel Cells have been around for well over 100 years.
Even Sprint (among others) is aggressively working to develop hydrogen fuel cells for CELL PHONES.
Do some simple intenet searches for terms suchs as "Hydrogen Fuel Cells" and there are MILLIONS of hits.
A little more data is leaking out here:
There are about six main types of fuel cells in various stages of commercial viability, and experts often break the field into "low temperature" fuel cells that rely on hydrogen and "high temperature" solid oxide fuel cells that can use other fuels like methane or natural gas.
Solid oxide fuel cells operate at red-hot temperatures ? usually about 1,000 degrees Celsius.
"Because they operate at high temperatures, they can accept other fuels like natural gas and methane, and that's an enormous advantage," said Michael Tucker of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. "The disadvantage is that they can shatter as they are heating or cooling."
Solid oxide fuel cells are not new: since 1999, the Department of Energy, researchers and leading companies have been collaborating on efforts to accelerate the commercial readiness of "SOFCs."
"Solid oxide has always been the holy grail of fuel cells, and there are a lot of companies working on it," said Mike Brown, vice president of UTC Power in Connecticut, a division of United Technologies and a leading fuel-cell maker. "The issue is durability and cost. Fuel cells have to be as durable as utilities, and operate for at least 10 years."
Earlier this month, UTC Power announced that the new Whole Foods Market grocery store currently under construction in South San Jose will use a UTC Power fuel cell system to generate 90 percent of the store's electricity needs; since a byproduct of fuel cells is heat, the thermal energy will be captured and used for the store's heating, cooling and refrigeration.
Bloom's secret technology apparently lies in the proprietary green ink that act as the anode and the black ink that acts as the cathode. Bloom executives would not disclose the composition of the ink. Small cells are then stacked to make a larger device. A key question for Bloom is "stack life": How long are the stacks going to last? What warranties are they providing their customers?
"What has to be proven by any fuel cell manufacturer is that their technology can operate reliably for years, ideally 10 years, with the 'four nines' ? 99.99 percent reliability, or very little outages," said Scott Samuelsen, director of the National Fuel Cell Research Center at the University of California-Irvine and a professor of mechanical, aerospace, and environmental engineering. "At this point, Bloom has excellent potential, but they have yet to demonstrate that they've met the bars of reliability."
HomeOwnersHub website is not affiliated with any of the manufacturers or service providers discussed here. All logos and trade names are the property of their respective owners.