Bloom Energy Reveals Impressive Clients & Existing Functionality

Bloom Energy’s ‘Bloom Box’ flowered yesterday in California. Word is that co-founder KR Sridhar cringes with a smile over ‘Bloom Box’ but I think the term is here to stay. Naysayers remain abundant in the unveiling of Bloom Energy’s new energy technology, but it seems that the unveiling revealed more than a few surprises.

Like the hardy flowering cactus I chose to represent the story, Bloom Box runs on readily-available, plentiful sand for silicon, a key ingredient in the technology. More importantly, the product’s been in operational mode with some of America’s biggest companies who say it works.

Details please.

Flanked by California governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and former US Secretary of State General Colin Powerll, a member of Bloom’s B of D, Bloom Energy’s CEO Sridhar revealed its current client list: Google, Coca-Cola, eBay, Wal-Mart, Staples, Bank of America, Cox Enterprises, and Fedex Express.

Answering the naysayers, mentioned previously, Bloom executives say they will use lower-cost materials and more efficient solutions.

Bloom executives concede that fuel cells have so far under-delivered on their promise. That’s why the eight-year-old company has been so secretive until this point: It wanted to demonstrate solid experience with real customers to prove it’s really different. Bloom has now revealed that it made its first commercial installation in July 2008, and that since then, its boxes have collectively produced more than 11 million kilowatt hours of electricity and saved 14 million pounds of carbon dioxide—the equivalent of powering 1,000 American homes for a year and planting one million trees. via Business Week

The company says that in commercial applications, it can already generate power more cheaply than via traditional fossil fuels—for about 9 to 10 cents a kilowatt hour, vs. typical rates of 13 to 14 cents for power from the grid. Bloom’s corporate boxes cost about $700,000 to $800,000 and have a three- to five-year payback period, the company estimates. “We are twice as efficient as the U.S. national grid, which means we can produce the same amount of electricity for half the fuel and half the carbon footprint,” Sridhar says. via Business Week

Bloom wervers are 60 percent cleaner than coal-fired power plants and produce reliable energy on-site, rather than in far-off energy generation plants. 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.

General Powell believes the servers can be of great benefit to the military. “This is a breakthrough,” Powell said. “Sooner or later it is going to be in homes all across America. Think what it will ultimately do for humankind.” via Sydney Morning Herald

It’s believed that Bloom Energy will develop a relationship with the state of California and possibly New York and Connecticut, dense, highly-populated states where the economics should be beneficial.

Most researchers seem to be lamblasting Bloom Energy, which is intriguing to watch, as someone with a highy entrepreneurial mind but no vested interest in this discussion.

Perhaps the economics of Bloom Energy won’t work all over Texas, but what about Houston, Dallas, Austin and San Antonio? To have such high-level corporate support this early in the development of a new technology suggests that Bloom Energy may indeed be on a major global mission to change the world. Anne

Let’s Hope Bloom Energy’s ‘Bloom Box’ Is Bathed In Good Karma & Kilowatts of Clean Energy