Fuel Cells I: Small and Cool
Sure, the fuel cell is a Powercosm technology. But whose cell? The long winding fuel cell trail leads us to the edges of the technology curves, and to the least-hyped units.
Electron Spin
From the outside, the off-white cabinet looks much like Power Ones’s DC silicon power plant or Capstone’s microturbine. Inside is the kinetic-energy equivalent of a Mack truck rolling at 50 mph: two 600-pound steel flywheels, stacked vertically, and spinning silently in a vacuum at 7,700 rpm.
Jet Engines for Dot.coms
A jet engine to power a dot.com? Yes. It looks like a top-of-the-line refrigerator, and runs about as quietly.
Silicon Power Plants
The room literally hums with power. We are standing in Liebert’s fully operational Nines demonstration facility in Delaware, Ohio. Its floor is crowded with innocuous gray cabinets. Each one occupies just three square yards of floor space, and stand just slightly taller than a refrigerator
Cisco of the Powercosm
The first great debate of the Powercosm pitted DC against AC, Thomas Edison against George Westinghouse. Westinghouse won, and the 60 Hz AC century followed: Alternation current is easier to transform (step voltage up or down), more efficient to transmit, and a natural fit with rotating and machinery — generators and motors.
The Law of the Powercosm: Burn Silicon
If you’re looking for 20 percent margins — on mileage, pollution, ROI, whatever — buy a Honda. Most power analysts are looking in that general direction, focused on yesterday’s problems and opportunities.