{"id":676,"date":"2010-02-24T12:43:02","date_gmt":"2010-02-24T17:43:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/itstheenvironmentstupid.com\/?p=676"},"modified":"2010-03-24T01:22:59","modified_gmt":"2010-03-24T05:22:59","slug":"clean-cheap-fuel-cell-technology-meets-skeptical-reception","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/itstheenvironmentstupid.com\/?p=676","title":{"rendered":"Clean, Cheap Fuel Cell Technology Meets Skeptical Reception"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em>by Todd Woody, NEW YORK TIMES, February 23, 2010<\/em><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/itstheenvironmentstupid.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/02\/image6.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" style=\"border-bottom: 0px; border-left: 0px; margin: 0px 10px 0px 0px; display: inline; border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px\" title=\"image\" src=\"https:\/\/itstheenvironmentstupid.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/02\/image_thumb6.png\" border=\"0\" alt=\"image\" width=\"202\" height=\"106\" align=\"left\" \/><\/a> A Silicon Valley company is claiming a breakthrough in a decades-old quest to develop fuel cells that can supply affordable and relatively clean electricity. <a title=\"More information about Google Inc\" href=\"http:\/\/topics.nytimes.com\/top\/news\/business\/companies\/google_inc\/index.html?inline=nyt-org\">Google<\/a>, <a title=\"More information about Bank of America Corp\" href=\"http:\/\/topics.nytimes.com\/top\/news\/business\/companies\/bank_of_america_corporation\/index.html?inline=nyt-org\">Bank of America<\/a>, <a title=\"More information about Wal-Mart Stores Inc\" href=\"http:\/\/topics.nytimes.com\/top\/news\/business\/companies\/wal_mart_stores_inc\/index.html?inline=nyt-org\">Wal-Mart<\/a> and other large corporations have been testing the devices, which will be formally introduced on Wednesday.<\/p>\n<p>The start-up, Bloom Energy, has raised about $400 million from investors and spent nearly a decade developing a new variety of solid oxide fuel cell, considered the most efficient but most technologically challenging fuel-cell technology.<\/p>\n<p>K. R. Sridhar, Bloom\u2019s co-founder and chief executive, said devices made by his company were generating electricity at a cost of 8 to 10 cents a kilowatt hour, using <a title=\"More articles about natural gas.\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/info\/natural-gas\/?inline=nyt-classifier\">natural gas<\/a>. That is lower than commercial electricity prices in some parts of the country.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe got into this business to make affordable electricity, not fuel cells,\u201d Mr. Sridhar said Tuesday as workers assembled stacks of fuel cells in tall, round cylinders and installed them in silver metal cubes at Bloom\u2019s headquarters in a Silicon Valley office park.<\/p>\n<p>The company has been working on the technology for eight years while saying little. The secrecy, and the prominence of the venture capitalists backing Bloom, have fueled both hype and skepticism about its efforts. Bloom is scheduled to unveil the technology Wednesday at a news conference attended by Gov. <a title=\"More articles about Arnold Schwarzenegger.\" href=\"http:\/\/topics.nytimes.com\/top\/reference\/timestopics\/people\/s\/arnold_schwarzenegger\/index.html?inline=nyt-per\">Arnold Schwarzenegger<\/a> of California and <a title=\"More articles about Colin L. Powell.\" href=\"http:\/\/topics.nytimes.com\/top\/reference\/timestopics\/people\/p\/colin_l_powell\/index.html?inline=nyt-per\">Colin Powell<\/a>, the former secretary of state and a member of Bloom\u2019s board.<\/p>\n<p>While Bloom may well have created one of the most efficient fuel cells, it is unclear how widely the company\u2019s technology will be adopted. Cost and durability have limited the use of other types of fuel cells, and it could be years before the potential of the company\u2019s approach is clear. <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2010\/02\/24\/business\/energy-environment\/24bloom.html?dbk\" target=\"_blank\">[Read rest of story]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>On February 24, Bloom Energy is formally announcing the advent of a low-cost, very efficient fuel cell technology that requires no exotic materials to make, and has had some serious &#8212; and successful &#8212; beta runs at major operations like Google. The reception, however, isn&#8217;t jubilant, but very cool and skeptical, like this story from the Times.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_s2mail":""},"categories":[17,69],"tags":[284,164,285,283,286],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/itstheenvironmentstupid.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/676"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/itstheenvironmentstupid.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/itstheenvironmentstupid.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/itstheenvironmentstupid.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/itstheenvironmentstupid.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=676"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/itstheenvironmentstupid.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/676\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":678,"href":"https:\/\/itstheenvironmentstupid.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/676\/revisions\/678"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/itstheenvironmentstupid.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=676"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/itstheenvironmentstupid.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=676"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/itstheenvironmentstupid.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=676"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}