Another marvelous creation by an Indian

[psyph3r]

So this thing is being touted as the greatest invention of the decade.
Will be displayed to the public tomorrow.
for now watch the video.
Looks like a boon for us Indians considering our awesome power companies.
The Bloom Box - 60 Minutes - CBS News

 

[raksrules]

What is this ?? Can any one throw some light ??
In office so cannot watch the video.

 

[blr_p]

all i got is..

avg cost : $3k
supposed to half your electricity bill.

so if your current bill is $200/month, then in under 4 yrs you make money.

What about fuel costs for this thing ? I did not get what it runs off.

How long does this thing last, and what are the maintenance costs ?

Looks promising, but let see how the trials go.

 

[medpal]

this thing runs on CNG or other biofuel.

but its environment is as good as a fuel cell.

right now its not cost effective for a small household but is expected to be available with in next 6 - 10 years.

right now silicon valley corporates like ebay, google and others are using.

ebay is claiming that their electricity bill reduced by 100k dollors per month after the device was installed.

 

[Uriel]

It runs on any kind of fuel... cng, kerosene, solar panels etc... basically, the bloombox uses fuel cells to generate the electricity without emissions. High cost though, and this has been tried before a few times. eBay, Google and some other companies have installations, but it seems a little hokey anyway

 

[Emperor]

I too not able to see image, can any other link for same product... pls. post.

Thanks

 

[NinByChoice]

Its does have CO2 emissions, since it takes petroleum fuel as input. It just oxidises the petroleum fuel more efficiently than regular generators. Also it converts chemical energy directly to electricity, without the mechanical inefficiencies of a regular power plant.

It operates at rather high temps, 1000C. Maximum theoretical efficiency if its operating between 1000C and room temperature (25C) is ~76%. Even if it achieves 50% thermal efficiency its a big improvement over regular power plants or generators. It also looks to be more area/volume efficient for producing a given amount of power.

Lets just hope its cheap.

 

[amol_cool]

Lets just hope its cheap.

Now that is what is going to decide future for this thing! Cheap and reliable but not clean would be the real reason for migration to whatever alternative source in future.

 

[Hacker]

What happened to the backyard nuclear power plants

 

[Lord Nemesis]

^^ The compact underground nuclear reactors are still there. But I guess they still need to work out the safety aspects and of course pricing. Further, I don't think a lot of people would be comfortable with the idea of sleeping over a pile of radioactive material