The next 30 years will be marked by a massive transformation in how the world produces and consumes energy. Bloom Energy is poised to meet energy challenges of the future with its core technology which generates resilient, reliable, sustainable power.
Video Synopsis
Sneak Peek: Power Generation | Bloom Energy 2022 Technology Showcase
During the 2022 Bloom Energy Technology Showcase, Bloom Energy’s Justin Saia and Scott Reynolds walk you through how our core technology generates resilient, reliable, sustainable power with engineer Jessica Mahler and stack manufacturer Gema Huynh.
Speakers:
- Justin Saia: Senior Director, Corporate Communications at Bloom Energy
- Scott Reynolds: Global Head, Structured Finance and Corporate Development at Bloom Energy
- Gema Huynh: Senior Manager, Stack Manufacturing at Bloom Energy
- Jessica Mahler: Director, Mechanical Engineering at Bloom Energy
Full Transcript
Justin Saia: Good morning and welcome to the 2022 Bloom Energy Investor Conference. Thank you for being with us today. I am currently standing inside Bloom Energy’s Fremont, California manufacturing plant, Bloom’s newest state-of-the-art 164,000 square-foot manufacturing facility that will provide a gigawatt of capacity when fully utilized. Beginning at 9:30, you will have a chance to hear directly from our CEO K.R. Sridhar and other leaders right here on this stage as they share our vision of a decarbonized energy future, and plans to execute on an aggressive multi-year growth strategy.
As the energy industry transform, Bloom Energy is well-positioned to meet the moment with an unmatched ability to directly convert fuels to net-zero resilient electricity and electricity into storable net-zero fuels of the future. You’ll notice today’s theme behind me is mission decarbonization. We chose that theme because our core technology platform was invented to create fuel and oxygen from the atmosphere of Mars using solar power.
Now, back here on planet Earth, we are at a pivotal moment in history with regards to climate change. The next 30 years will be marked by a massive transformation in the way we produce, transport, and consume energy. Bloom Energy is ready for this transition. We have the technology to address many of these challenges, and we are excited about the market this creates for our business. Now, before we join the live business presentation at 9:30 today, we will have an exciting technology showcase for you where you will have a chance to learn firsthand about the unique solid oxide platform technology that underscores our power generation and hydrogen production solutions.
My colleague, Scott Reynolds, is just down the street at the Bloom Energy Research and Technical Center where he’s standing by with some of Bloom’s best and brightest. All of them are ready to take you on a journey through a path to a decarbonized world. Welcome, Scott, how are you this morning?
Scott Reynolds: I am good, my friend. We’re really excited to show off some really cool technology today and the people that are making it happen. So thanks for that great introduction. I am very excited to be with you here today because one of my favorite things to do at Bloom is to show off what we do and the people that do it.
Solid Oxide Fuel Cell
So I am joined today for our first description of what a solid oxide fuel cell is. I’m joined by Gema Huynh. Gema, thank you for being here today. So, Gema, we talk a lot about a solid oxide cell, so maybe you could start by telling us, first of all, how long have you been at Bloom?
Gema Huynh: So I’ve actually been with Bloom going on almost 11 years now.
Scott Reynolds: 11 years. So in 11 years, you’ve been working on manufacturing solid oxide cells. Maybe you could start by explaining what is a solid oxide cell.
Gema Huynh: Yeah, so a cell looks exactly like this and it’s made of an electrolyte. And in-house, we print special inks for the anode and the cathode layers. And we use our simple and low-cost and effective screen printing lines to print the inks onto the cells.
Scott Reynolds: So you use low-cost processes to manufacture cells. So are these cells capable of making both electricity and hydrogen?
Gema Huynh: That’s right. And using the same manufacturing process on our end, it doesn’t change.
Scott Reynolds: Okay. So how do they make power and then explain how do they make hydrogen?
Gema Huynh: So-
Scott Reynolds: So in one direction they make hydrogen, right?
Gema Huynh: Yes.
Scott Reynolds: We put in electricity.
Gema Huynh: Yes. In charge mode, they produce fuel hydrogen, in discharge mode, they turn stored energy into electricity.
Scott Reynolds: So the same cell does both. So this is a core part of our technology. So you’ve been here a long time, what kinds of changes have we been making to improve these cells over time?
Gema Huynh: So we’ve made many changes. Since our first model, we actually tripled our power output by making a few changes. We reduced the cell thickness of the cells, which gave us the ability to have more power density in each unit and increasing our kilowatts per square footage. And looking forward into the future, we’re also increasing the size of the cell to produce even more power.
Scott Reynolds: So that’s really cool. So in addition to making more power, we’ve also reduced the amount of material that we use. So that must have a really strong impact on cost.
Gema Huynh: Definitely. Cost reduction, as far as material goes, has been huge. As far as reducing the size of the cell, the thickness of the cell, and going forward to our new product, we’re also simplifying our manufacturing process and reducing some of the components that we currently use, which are quite pricey. So you take away those components, the material cost go down and also the manufacturing process simplifies. So we also get cost savings there.
Scott Reynolds: So that’s really cool. And in addition to that, they’ve gotten a lot longer life, right?
Gema Huynh: Yes. They’ve actually increased the life cycle by five times since we first started.
Scott Reynolds: Wow. That’s really amazing. So the core part of the technology has improved dramatically, Justin, back to you.
Justin Saia: Thank you, Scott and Gema, for teaching us about fuel cells. I’ll tell you what, I learned a little something there that I didn’t know. For the next stop on our tour, you will learn how our core solid oxide platform can generate power through our fuel flexible energy servers running on responsibly sourced natural gas, biogas, or even hydrogen all without combustion. And it’s not just on land, but on sea, as the maritime industry takes aggressive measures to decarbonize that sector.
Our platform is sea ready and capable of replacing heavy fuels as a means of propulsion and auxiliary power for ships and ports. Our third stop today will take you through the process by which Bloom readied its fuel cells for life on the high seas. And our final stop on the tour today will explore Bloom’s efforts to support the growing hydrogen economy. Bloom’s core solid oxide platform can produce zero-carbon hydrogen for renewable electricity through the highly efficient Bloom Electrolyzer. Clean hydrogen will be a critical foundation for the energy industry of the future. Scott, can you tell us more how the platform works and how it all comes together?
The Platform
Scott Reynolds: Happy to do it, Justin. So I’m standing behind a visual that’s going to be really, really helpful for people. And the core of the visual here, you’ll see this image a lot, this is the core part of the platform, we call it a module. So whether we’re making hydrogen, whether we’re making power, whether we’re running a microgrid, whether we on land, at sea, this is the core module that we use that powers everything.
So the great thing about this is the more of these we make, the cheaper they get. That’s a big part of our strategy is make a lot of them, have the cost come down. So what you’re going to see here in a second is the first application of the module which is making power, which is where we started as a company. So what we’re going to do is we’re going to walk over to our power generation section. We’re going to go through the overhead here, and we’re going to do a little bit of a history lesson where we show folks where we got started, how we evolved.
And to do that, I am joined by one of our amazing star engineers, Jessica Mahler. Jessica, maybe you could start by telling us how long have you been at Bloom Energy?
Jessica Mahler: Hi, Scott. It’s great to be here today. I’ve been with Bloom for 14 years now.
Scott Reynolds: 14 years. You’re going to hear that as a theme from us today a lot. A lot of experience at Bloom. And a lot of us have been around for a long time. And we started engineering this device quite some time ago. So why don’t you explain what’s behind us here?
Jessica Mahler: Sure. So what’s behind us is our generation zero product. It could make five kilowatts of power. It could also co-produce hydrogen. We’ve been working on hydrogen since the early days, but since the market wasn’t ready, we focused on making power.
Scott Reynolds: So this made both hydrogen and electricity.
Jessica Mahler: Yeah.
Scott Reynolds: And I think we recirculated the hydrogen to put it in and make more electricity, right?
Jessica Mahler: Yes.
Scott Reynolds: But we were making hydrogen from the early days.
Jessica Mahler: Correct.
Scott Reynolds: And you can see here, this is the size of maybe kind of two refrigerators side-by-side.
Jessica Mahler: Yeah. I’d say two refrigerators. Yeah.
Scott Reynolds: So early days, that was kind of a power density, but of course, we’ve been innovating for a long time.
Jessica Mahler: Absolutely.
Scott Reynolds: So why don’t you explain a little bit, maybe we can walk over here.
Jessica Mahler: Let’s take a look at our-
Scott Reynolds: Go down a memory lane here and talk about what you have over here.
Jessica Mahler: So what we have here is our Bloom 1.0 product. It could make 25 kilowatts of power.
Scott Reynolds: Okay. So five times the increase.
Jessica Mahler: Five times the increase, lower footprint.
Scott Reynolds: Okay. Yeah. So this looks smaller. So how did we manage to get a lot more power out in a smaller footprint?
Jessica Mahler: Well, we continue to innovate on our cells in stacks. We package things more innovatively and we improve on our power density.
Scott Reynolds: Okay. So packaging and cell improvement. And Gema just talked about the cells getting better. So the cells get better, we get more power.
Jessica Mahler: Yeah.
Scott Reynolds: So what’s the benefit of that for customers?
Jessica Mahler: Well, as we continue to innovate on ourselves, our costs will stay the same and we bring cost per kilowatt down.
Scott Reynolds: So more kilowatts, less cost per kilowatt.
Jessica Mahler: More kilowatts, less cost per kilowatt.
Scott Reynolds: Got it. Okay. Of course, this is ancient history now.
Jessica Mahler: Ancient history.
Scott Reynolds: Ancient history. What did we do next?
Jessica Mahler: Well, so next-
Scott Reynolds: Keep us going.
Jessica Mahler: Let’s keep walking. So next, this is our Bloom 2.0 module. We could produce 42 and a half kilowatts of power in this particular module.
Scott Reynolds: So another big jump in power output. Another big cost down because of the power improvement.
Jessica Mahler: Yeah. Utilizing very similar components and continuing to improve on our cell and stack technology.
Scott Reynolds: Now this one’s ancient history.
Jessica Mahler: Also ancient history.
Scott Reynolds: Okay. So let’s keep going. Let’s walk over here and let’s talk about this unit. So this is the unit that’s most of the revenue today. So tell us what this is here behind us.
Jessica Mahler: So what we’re looking at here is our Bloom 5.0 Energy Server. Each one of these modules can produce 50 kilowatts of power.
Scott Reynolds: 50 kilowatts. So now we’re at a 10X improvement.
Jessica Mahler: Yes.
Scott Reynolds: From the early days.
Jessica Mahler: Yeah.
Scott Reynolds: And one of these modules is kind of the same size, so huge power density improvements.
Jessica Mahler: Power density improvements, and then continuing to use a lot of the same system architecture and components bringing cost per kilowatt down.
Scott Reynolds: So major theme for us, innovation cost comes down. And this one’s starting to become-
Jessica Mahler: Now, more ancient history.
Scott Reynolds: … an old relic as well, right, because we’ve made more improvements. So let’s go to the last part of the tour here.
Jessica Mahler: Let’s go take a look at our brand new one.
Scott Reynolds: Brand new one. So you’ve been working on this one for a while.
Jessica Mahler: Yes, we have.
Scott Reynolds: So what we have here is the final stop.
Jessica Mahler: So each one of these modules can produce 75 kilowatts of power in the same footprint as one of the ones from our previous generation.
Scott Reynolds: So now we’re at a 15X improvement.
Jessica Mahler: 15X improvement and 50% improvement over our previous generation.
Scott Reynolds: So we’re making big leaps and bounds.
Jessica Mahler: Yes, we are.
Scott Reynolds: And again, you’re doing that because we’re-
Jessica Mahler: Improving on cell and stack technology using our same system architecture to bring cost per kilowatt down.
Scott Reynolds: Terrific. So I know in addition to doing the work on cost and power-density improvement, we’re adding features and functionality.
Jessica Mahler: Yes. And you should go check those out next.
Scott Reynolds: We’re going to go check that out. So we have a video for you, Justin, to play, to talk about one of our cool features, which is power independence through microgrids.
Power Independence Through Microgrids
Narrator: With each innovation, our economy becomes increasingly digital and electricity is shaping the world we live in. But what if the electricity powering your business stopped? Do you wait until the electric company restores power, or do you fire up the dirty generator that you haven’t used since the last time you lost power? More than ever, electricity’s critical role in manufacturing, commerce, transportation, and communication directly impacts our digital economy.
Traditional electricity is supplied by above-ground and aging power lines, which are susceptible to outages. These outages are increasing in frequency, duration, and the damage they leave behind. Entire communities have been left without power following recent fires, heat waves, flooding, hurricanes, and cyber security breaches. The Bloom Microgrid increases your access to electricity. We provide onsite power 24/7 with or without the electric grid. The Bloom Microgrid is both reliable and resilient. So your business is no longer vulnerable to unexpected outages.
With Bloom, the power is always on by providing primary power at a lower more predictable cost. Your business saves money every day. And with 50% less CO2 than the US grid, it also reduces your carbon footprint. The backbone of the microgrid is the Bloom Energy Server, which converts natural gas or biogas to electricity onsite without combustion. Natural gas, supplied by the significantly more reliable underground pipeline, gives the system the ability to generate electricity through prolonged outages. The modular and redundant design of the energy server provides the fault-tolerant architecture necessary for a standalone microgrid.
And if you already have a generator in place, Bloom’s enhanced microgrid can parallel with your existing equipment and lengthen the runtime while reducing emissions of your backup solution. In addition, our solution integrates with multiple technologies, including batteries and solar to form an advanced microgrid. The reliability of this mission-critical technology has been proven through successful deployments at data centers, retailers, campuses, and manufacturing facilities around the world. So a microgrid from Bloom Energy is not just another bright idea, it’s the ultimate solution for reliable, clean, affordable power.