Bloom rolling out more-powerful fuel cell boxes

Delaware fuel cell maker Bloom Energy released the first public details Tuesday on the latest upgrade to its line of "Bloom Box" energy servers, saying its mainstay product can now produce roughly twice the electricity in the same size box and footprint.

The innovations could open new doors for Bloom, seen as one of the nation's leading commercial fuel cell makers and one of the most-prominent – if still unproven – landmarks in Gov. Jack Markell's two-term economic development effort.

"What we've done is, we've shrunk it in half," said Arne Ballantine, Bloom system engineering vice president, during a Tuesday briefing for The News Journal at the company's Newark plant. "So now, in the same footprint" of a 250 kilowatt system "we can fit 500 kilowatts."

In densely built urban areas with little room for solar panels or big battery arrays, the Bloom upgrade could make fuel cells more attractive and feasible for main power supplies, backup electricity or other uses.

"Rooftops aren't huge," Ballantine said. "If you double your power density, you become twice as effective for a skyscraper."

Fuel cell manufacturers focus on generating electricity from the chemical and physical reactions that occur when fuels and sometimes-exotic materials are combined under the right conditions. The power comes without burning and with drastically lower, or zero pollution, emissions compared with conventional sources.

Although other approaches are used, Bloom's electro-chemical reactions are produced using stacked arrays of thin ceramic plates coated with what the company describes as a relatively lower cost, proprietary, sand-like material. Clean burning hydrogen, natural gas or bio-fuels can fuel the systems.

Past company statements have indicated that Bloom's earlier, 200-kilowatt server could power about 160 American homes, indicating an output on the scale needed to supply for 400 homes with the new Energy Server 5.0 line.

The present 250-kilowatt setup now powering the Newark plant would cost in excess of $1 million, although overall costs vary by installation requirements.

Company officials said the new models could help the company expand sales in a range of areas, including rooftop power installations in major cities, and in establishment of micro-grids designed to take buildings or neighborhoods off the traditional power delivery network.

"In Delaware or New York City and Manhattan, you're going to have a situation where you have a very high cost of electricity and very different installation challenges," said Asim Hussain, Bloom marketing and customer experience vice president.

"From a customer's standpoint, it's a great innovation, because it takes up a lot less space. You can go flat up against your building, you can go around corners."

The previous, 250-kilowatt setup, with six component boxes in a straight line, weighed 19 tons and covered an area about 8.5 feet wide, 26.5 feet long and 6.75 feet tall. The new design can cut the width for the same amount of power to about four feet, with individual boxes able to be arranged or clustered as needed.

Jeffrey Osborne, an industry and financial analyst who follows the fuel cell market for Cowan and Company, called Bloom's move "positive."

"Getting more power and going after industrial users and commercial users to augment their data center focus is certainly a positive," Osborne said. "I don't think it's a revolutionary change because of the size. I would have to see what they are selling it at on a price per kilowatt basis."

Ballantine said that a combination of space-saving improvements in support system designs and technical changes in the cylindrical assemblies of the company's stacked, solid oxide plates resulted in the more efficient, or "dense" power output.

The company already powers much of its own manufacturing facility off Christina Parkway using the new design, and some have been delivered to customers.

Bloom, a privately held company formed in 2002, did not release other details on its prices or current employment at the Newark plant on Tuesday. Company-wide, Bloom has sold thousands of boxes, enough to generate about 160 megawatts.

Publicly identified customers take in a range of industries, and include companies from Apple and ebay Inc. to FedEx, Target and J.P. Morgan Chase. Its largest installation, at 27 megawatts, is the Red Lion plant, which supplies renewable energy for Delmarva Power. Its smallest is a 100-kilowatt energy server used for City Hall in New York City.

The statements were among the most open yet for Bloom, which began making fuel cells in mid-2013 in a new factory building on 50 acres that were originally part of the former Chrysler Newark plant, now the University of Delaware's Science, Technology and Advanced Research Campus.

Delaware granted Bloom $16.5 million to locate its new factory in Newark, under a plan that also included hiring and salary targets. State officials and regulators agreed to a 21-year deal that assured the company guaranteed minimum revenues – currently well above market rates – for supplying up to 30 megawatts of fuel cell power to Delmarva Power.

Terms for the company's grant require it to pay $108 million in salaries by September 2017, with penalties for shortfalls. The company said in its agreement that it intended to employ 300 at the Newark plant by September 2014, 600 by 2015 and 900 a year later.

Employment had reached only 208 by September 2014, according to a report the company filed with the Delaware Economic Development office. Wage payments were $9.55 million by the same time, short of the $12 million target cited by the company.

The company's new server could help bring down the costs of monthly premium payments by Delmarva Power customers for Bloom's electricity supply to that company. The newer configurations will replace the older ones as internal components wear.

Average residential customer bills for September are expected to include $4.29 to cover Bloom's subsidy, although state and company officials have said Delmarva might have had to pay a significant share of that amount anyway to meet renewable energy purchase requirements.

Contact Jeff Montgomery at 463-3344 or jmontgomery@delawareonline.com.