Bloom Energy and the Electric Car

Bloom Energy, after operating in secrecy for more than eight years, has now unveiled a fuel cell that could change the way we think of energy and the grid.  Bloom introduced a potentially game-changing product that could provide us with a local, on-demand power source with the potential to help us power new devices that will wean us from dependence on petroleum.  Today, mass adoption of electric vehicles is a threat to the stability of our centralized power grid.  Local power generation solutions will help reduce the load on the grid as we shift to alternative sources of power and mobility.

At the heart of the Bloom Energy Server is a solid oxide fuel cell with some proprietary innovations that allow it to enter the market as a solution that rivals efficiency and price of any existing fuel cell.

Exotic Metal Catalyst?

One of the limitations of most fuel cells is they require the use of exotic metals such as platinum and palladium for the anode and cathode.  Solid oxide fuel cells are able to use more traditional alloys for catalysts since the electrolyte is a dry, ceramic material.  In the case of the Bloom Energy Server, the cells use a “sand-like” substance for the electrolyte wafer.  The anode and cathode consist of proprietary “inks” that are applied to the electrolyte and stacked together to build the cell.

Ceramic electrolyte with anode and cathode "inks"

Fuel Source?

Fuel cells in the Bloom Energy Server can use several different types of fuel sources including renewable or fossil-based gases.  In the current Energy Servers, there are installations that operate both on natural gas and reclaimed bio-gas.  According to Sridhar in a 60 Minutes interview, the fuel cells can even be powered by solar.  We believe that he is referring to the Energy Servers’ ability to reverse the reaction and create oxygen and fuel from an energy source.  If this is the case, the energy source could be from solar photovoltaics, wind turbines, biodiesel generators or conventional grid electricity.

Distributed Grid Security vs. the Centralized Grid

One of the features of the Bloom Energy Server is its ability to generate electricity at the point of consumption.  With the traditional electricity grid, power is generated at a central plant and then distributed to the point of consumption using transmission lines.  In route to the point of consumption these lines can lose as much as 80% of the generated electricity.  The Bloom Energy Server is located at or near the point of consumption and converts the fuel into electricity without requiring any loss of efficiency through transmitting the power over long distances.  By using this model of power generation, the Energy Server will always be more efficient at generating electricity than the current national grid.

With mainstream electric vehicles hitting the market by 2011, the Bloom Energy Servers are a timely innovation.  My hope is that residential versions of these fuel cells will arrive before Bloom’s projected date of 2015 (at the earliest)

David Mackay’s new book is a great resource for preparing for life after petroleum. Read Mapawatt’s review of the book. You can buy it on Amazon or download it for free.

Sustainable Energy – Without the Hot Air

Responding to a question from a city councilwoman about transportation and infrastructure in the stimulus bill during a town hall forum in Ft. Myers, Florida, President Obama said that the days of just building sprawl are over.

From a transcript provided by Transportation for America:

Not only do we need to rebuild our roads, our bridges, our ports, our levies, our dams, but we also have to plan for the future. This is the same example of turning crisis into opportunity…Now, look, this is America. We always had the best infrastructure. We were always willing to invest in the future. Governor Crist mentioned Abraham Lincoln. In the middle of the Civil War, in the midst of all this danger and peril, what did he do? He helped move the intercontinental railroad.  He helped start land grant colleges. He understood that even when you’re in the middle of crisis, you’ve got to keep your eye on the future. So transportation is not just fixing our old transportation systems but its also imaging new transportation systems.

That’s why I’d like to see high speed rail where it can be constructed. That’s why I would like to invest in mass transit because potentially that’s energy efficient and I think people are alot more open now to thinking regionally in terms of how we plan our transportation infrastructure. The days where we’re just building sprawl forever, those days are over. I think that Republicans, Democrats, everybody recognizes that that’s not a smart way to build communities. So we should be using this money to help spur this kind of innovative thinking when it comes to transportation. That will make a big difference.

OAKLAND, Calif. — It will cost $515 billion annually through 2030 to wean the world off fossil fuels in favor of clean energy sources, according to a report released last week by the World Economic Forum.

Onshore and offshore wind, solar thermal and photovoltaics, waste-to-energy, geothermal and next-generation and sugar-based biofuels were identified as large-scale clean energy sectors that governments throughout the world should pursue to address energy security and climate change, the report (PDF) said.

The report, released at the annual meeting in Davos, suggests the transition to clean energy should be included in government stimulus plans, which is similar to U.S. President Barack Obama’s efforts to include billions in renewable energy and energy efficiency measures in the massive stimulus bill making its way though Congress.

The report’s release comes within days of Texas awarding $5 billion in projects aimed at propping up capacity of the state’s transmission lines, which currently cannot handle incredible growth in wind energy generation.

When the projects are completed, there could be up to 2,900 miles of new power lines. Texas leads the country in wind generation, and current power lines are near capacity.

You can search and find many blogs or pick up most magazines and read articles on the future of ground transportation and how its use of petroleum adversely affects the environment.  The cost of petroleum is near the top of the list of conversation starters as consumers around the globe deal with the doubling and tripling of fuel prices.  However, you don’t often read about how to improve the efficiency of the airline industry and to transition away from petroleum-based fuels.

Bradford Plumer, in his article in The New Republic, “The End of Aviation,” writes of the coming downsizing in the commercial airline industry due to rising fuel costs.  He makes a case for why the current air travel industry’s business model doesn’t work with $135/barrel oil.Read how the spiraling costs of oil, as supplies are depleted, will affect the cost and availability of air travel.

Learn more…

 - Veggie Ranger

After researching several online sources for e-books on “running a car on water” and watching numerous Youtube videos, I settled on what seemed to be the most informative site on the technology.  www.hho-hybrid.com.  Instead of showing pictures of using a mayonnaise jar with some wire, steel mesh and hose, the hho-hybrid site discusses the use of a machined cylinder lying down horizontally to create the most surface area for electrolysis.  It also stated that their system could be used with a gas or diesel engine.  Since I run all turbo-diesel vehicles, I was curious to learn more about using this technology both with gas and diesel combustion engines.

I purchased the e-book for $30 and hoped to get a link to download the e-book after paying.  The delivery method was not automated but I did receive the e-book by email within two days of ordering.  I won’t give away the contents of the e-book but suffice it to say that the first two-thirds of the book described in detail how an internal combustion engine works.  A more detailed version of this content is available for free by going to www.howstuffworks.com and searching on “internal combustion engine.”  At the end of the e-book, they talked about the components necessary for building the HHO kit but left out some detail explaining that it was proprietary.

The last few pages does have pictures of the components that come in their $250 HHO Conversion kit.  The pictures and component list is enough information to build the kit but for gas engines, they also show pictures of a printed-circuit board and wires for a component that fools the emissions control system on a gas car to improve the fuel mileage based on the injected hho gas from the kit.  There is not enough information in the book to build these components.

After reading the entire e-book, I was disappointed to find that there was no mention of a diesel engine throughout the book.  I sent an email to the support desk for the company and received a prompt reply explaining that there aren’t details on using it with a diesel engine but it will work if the engine is non-turbo.  They also stated that they might be able to get a turbo diesel engine to work with the kit and would be happy to help with this.  I’m assuming this would be for a consulting fee.

I’m considering taking the research one step forward by building or buying the kit and trying it on a gas car.  I need to find a guinea pig with a gas car that is willing to experiment or I will have to wait until I can find an inexpensive gas car to play with.

Stay tuned for more analysis once I acquire or build the kit and install it on a vehicle!

- Veggie Ranger

I had a neighbor call me a while ago and ask me about HHO or Brown’s gas injection to save fuel. I’m known as the neighborhood’s energy “mad scientist” so he figured he would ask me before buying e-books and kits to convert his F-150 company vehicle.

I surfed the internet and was amazed at all of the sites discussing HHO as the miracle mileage saver both for gas and diesel vehicles. However, most of the sites gave little bits of information and offered the rest as a e-book download for a fee. It reminded me a lot of the first time I heard you can run a diesel engine on waste vegetable oil so I began searching for blogs and forum postings on people’s experiences with using HHO injection to get better fuel mileage. To my dismay, I found nothing credible; just people debunking it as a scam but not from their own experience in trying it. Others swear by it but couldn’t provide more than a few sentences on how much fuel they saved or a short Youtube video showing the device under the hood bubbling and boiling its contents with the engine running.

After further research, I did find some comments that appeared to come from an engineer that was involved in a research project at Caltech’s JPL analyzing HHO as a fuel enhancer.

In order to contribute more information and research on the actual results of researching, installing and testing an HHO or Brown’s gas injection system, I have purchased what appears to be the most complete and well-thought-out e-book on how to build and install an HHO injection system.

Over the next few months, I will be chronicling my experiences with testing HHO injection on gas and diesel vehicles. Stay tuned…

- Veggie Ranger

Sources:

Green Car Congress Article

35 Billion Gallons of Biofuel by 2017

from GreenFuel Technologies Biofuel White Paper

If GreenFuel algae facilities could be located at every operating
plant in the U.S., it would be possible to produce about 13.5
billion gallons of biodiesel and 8.5 billion gallons of ethanol per
year if those plants continued to produce electricity at levels
similar to production in 2005. While it may not be possible to
locate production at every plant, and not every plant has sufficient
land to site the GreenFuel operations – a high-level, first cut
estimate indicates that perhaps three-quarters of the plants are
feasible options. If this is the case, then GreenFuel could
theoretically supply about half of the alternative fuels that
President Bush called for in his State of the Union Address (35
billion gallons by 2017); reduce the amount of land that would be
needed by 90%; not use valuable agricultural land; and reduce
pressure on crop prices.

Also, if all plants are used, then there could be significant
production of biofuels in almost 30 states (Figure 11). This only
counts existing coal-fired power plants and GreenFuel could produce
algae co-located with natural gas-fired facilities, refineries and
industrial facilities that burn fossil-fuels so that there is
potential to locate biofuels facilities in a broader number of
locations. For example, California, which has little coal-fired
generation located in the state, has a number of refineries and
natural gas-fired plants that could produce algae giving fuel
suppliers the ability to produce fuels locally for the large
California market.
Figure 8: Theoretical production of biofuels if all coal plants have
a GreenFuel facility

GreenFuel has the potential to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from
these power plants. If sited at all the power plants, GreenFuel
might be able to reduce about 500 million metric tons of carbon. If
we take a conservative picture of the potential, where GreenFuel
would produce 16 billion gallons, then perhaps 250 million tons of
carbon could be reduced. This represents more than 10% of carbon
dioxide emissions from coal-fired power plants. If these emissions
are taken as credits in a potential greenhouse gas trading system,
it could be worth over 2 billion dollars a year.

Using GreenFuel algae as a portion of the biofuels demand and
supplementing corn and soybean feedstocks, the costs of delivering
biofuels to the economy can be reduced. Finally, what this
information tells the policy community is that we can safely push
towards a larger share of renewable fuels with very little risk that
the costs will be high because emerging technologies won’t be
available. If the cellulosic technology does not emerge as quickly
as expected, we can wait for it; we can produce 35 billion gallons
of biofuels by 2017 with a combination of GreenFuel and existing
technologies and have a cost-effective and robust energy system that
has fewer risks and more opportunities of wider geographic
production capabilities.

http://www.greenfuelonline.com/gf_files/WhitePaperBernstein051607.pdf

Microscopic alternative to biofuels
By Cristina Jimenez

Published: December 27 2007 19:55 | Last updated: December 27 2007
19:55

Oil from algae, the microscopic plants that produce a green covering
on the surfaces of ponds and neglected outdoor swimming pools, may
soon be filling diesel pumps.

As crude oil has moved towards $100 (€70, £50) a barrel and
sustainable alternatives are sought in a bid to reduce carbon
emissions, researchers are investigating “second- generation”
biofuels – those not made from food crops such as soya or corn.
Scientists have found that, in terms of oil yield, algae could be
the most efficient source of biofuel.

Algae produces oil yields more than 100 times those of common
biofuel crops such as soya, yet requires a fraction of the
cultivation area. For example, one corn crop covering an acre nets
about 81 gallons of ethanol a year, while palm may produce 650
gallons of biofuel. Algae may yield up to 15,000 gallons.

“No other source comes close in magnitude to the potential for
making oil of algae,” says Al Darzins, director of the Research
Center for Biofuels at the National Research Energy Laboratories of
the US Department of Energy.

Researchers at the laboratories have also found they can greatly
increase the amount of oil produced using genetic engineering
techniques. Modified algae can produce oil yields of 60-70 per cent
compared with the 5-20 per cent in oil contents of natural algae.

One of the advantages of sourcing oil from algae is that algal
biodiesel could be used in diesel cars without further modification
of the engine. But for relatively small volumes, bio-ethanol needs
to be blended with petrol unless the vehicles have been adapted.
Biodiesel is also a versatile source of fuel which, Mr Darzin says,
could be used for ships, trains, jet fuel and cars.

This month Royal Dutch Shell, Europe’s biggest oil company, became
the latest business to put its faith in algae, announcing that it
hopes to build a commercial research plant which it believes will
produce biodiesel from algae in two years.

It is taking a majority stake in a joint venture, with Hawaii-based
HR Biopetroleum, that will initially build a small research plant
but hopes to move to a full-scale commercial plant of 49,421 acres.

Shell says that algae’s environmental credentials are greatly
superior to those of “first-generation” biofuels. This is because
algae does not need to be grown on farmland and deforested land,
thus minimising the damage to ecological systems. Unlike soya or
corn, it does not add pressure to food prices when grown as a
biofuel.

Obtaining oil from algae is not new. Scientists working in the 1950s
discovered some strains of algae had a very high oil content that
could relatively easily be converted
to fuel.

However, the real barrier to algae taking off as a source of fuel
has been the cost of production. Growing algae in open ponds reduces
cultivation costs but makes it difficult to control the
environmental conditions. The algae can easily get contaminated with
naturally occurring but less efficient strains.

But if algae are grown in closed tanks, the process may end up being
too expensive. “The bottleneck in the process is the expensive
technology required for algae oil production,” says Ralph Simms, a
senior analyst at the International Energy Agency in Brussels.

Growing high concentrations of algae is difficult and the costs of
obtaining oil from it make algae more expensive than other biofuels.
At the moment, bio-ethanol production costs about $2 a litre
compared with the wholesale price of gasoline of $0.45.

“In order to be competitive, algal biofuel costs should be cut down
to less than that of the bio-ethanol price,” says Mr Simms.

Don Paul, chief technology officer at Chevron, the US energy company
which is also funding a research programme on algae, thinks the
success of second-generation biofuels depends on collaboration among
industry, universities, research institutions and governments.

Their co-operation will be essential to overcome the technological
and commercial challenges that these products involve.

Shell admitted at the launch of its algae joint venture that it
would be a substantial journey to make algae-based biofuels
commercially viable, and there would need to be technological
innovations along the way.

Even then, it added, the economics of algae-based biodiesel would
probably have to be supported by tax breaks or incentives that
reflected its superior environmental impact compared with first-
generation biofuels.

For the moment, algae oil output remains small, with the largest
production volume at a few hundred gallons a year, claimed by
several US start-up companies working on this technology.

But as the oil majors and clean technology companies race to
discover the technological breakthrough, the days of algae oil may
soon be on us.
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2007

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/95de5afa-b4a3-11dc-990a-0000779fd2ac.html

Leader pushes to find new fuel sources
BY HALLIE WOODS
HallieWoods@coloradoan.com

For Loveland Connection

Dr. Ken Reardon, a professor of chemistry and bioengineering at
Colorado State University, is pictured in a lab on campus. He is a
researcher in biofuels, especially algae, and is making a push to
find new fuel sources. Reardon is also the director of the Colorado
Center for Biorefining and Biofuels, or C2B2.

Think about squeezing energy from large-scale algae farms, or
genetically modifying bacteria to help turn plants into fuel sources
to power vehicles.

It may sound futuristic, but Fort Collins could make it happen in
the next year.

One of the leaders in the push to find new fuel sources is Ken
Reardon, a Colorado State University chemical and biological
engineering professor and a director of the Colorado Center for
Biorefining and Biofuels, or C2B2.

C2B2 is a collaborative organization comprised of CSU, the
University of Colorado, Colorado School of Mines and the National
Renewable Energy Laboratory in Golden. Its focus is on the research
of new biofuels.

While Reardon has been looking at biofuels on and off since the
1970s, he hopes with the funding from sponsoring organizations of
C2B2 and the collaboration of minds from the different participating
research organizations that headway can be made in the area of
research.

“It won’t be headway that people outside of the research circle see
as major headway,” Reardon said. “But our approach has a lot of
potential.”

With several grants providing some of the necessary seed money,
Reardon hopes to look at specific areas of biofuel research in his
own studies.

The first major need for information is in the production of
biofuels from algae.

Fuel from algae is expensive to create, and no one knows how to do
it on a large scale, Reardon said.

“No one knows how to grow it in an economical way,” he said.

Reardon will also look at what is called reactor engineering -
learning how to manipulate how fuels are created with different
reactors to find optimal timing and output.

Third, Reardon wants to see changes in the process to make fuels
other than ethanol that have a more similar molecular structure to
gasoline.

And with the possible move away from ethanol, C2B2 will also begin
looking at other plants that can be better used for fuel production.

“If we want biofuels to be a significant part of fuel production,
they can’t compete with land used for fuel crops,” Reardon said.

While the number of directions research can move in the biofuel
field may seem overwhelming, Reardon is excited about the upcoming
findings that will come out of the collaboration.

http://www.coloradoan.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=200771229015