Is CHP based on fuel cells coming to a home near you?

Tyler — Thu, 10 Dec 2009 01:54:34 +0000

Bloom Energy, a semi-stealthy investment of Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, has been making more noise lately about its fuel-cell technology. The company, in a recent BusinessWeek article, claims its system — about the size of a refrigerator and capable of supplying both heat and power to a home — will come down so much in cost over the next three to five years that it will hit grid parity. It’s not like the technology that Bloom’s product is based on is new. Solid-oxide fuel cells have been around for years and several startups have combined heat and power products based on the design. But Bloom, obviously, has figured out a way of making it reliable and cheap enough to deploy widely — or so we’re led to believe. The system would run on natural gas or a selection of renewable feedstocks, such as ethanol, offering a way for natural gas companies to indirectly become power utilities. I compare it to the battle between telephone and cable companies, which have infrastructures based on different technologies but eventually began competing in each other’s market for the same services — phone, cable, Internet. Utilities — gas or electric — will soon just be called energy utilities, capable of providing a package of electrons and BTUs.

Like many secretive Kleiner Perkins investments — EEStor, for example — let’s hope the hype and promise leads to something truly disruptive. Speaking of EEStor, tick, tick, tick… the end of the year fast approaches.

Clean Break » Kleiner Perkins

Is CHP based on fuel cells coming to a home near you?