SOLID OXIDE FUEL CELLS

“We are like tenant farmers chopping down the fence around our house for fuel when we should be using Nature's inexhaustible sources of energy — sun, wind and tide. ... I'd put my money on the sun and solar energy. What a source of power! I hope we don't have to wait until oil and coal run out before we tackle that.” -Thomas Edison

Nowadays it seems there are two popular approaches to solving nationwide energy needs. One is to greatly expand our use of “green” energy sources, such as wind and solar power. The aim here is to decrease pollution and use more sustainable sources of energy. The other approach is to increase our use of domestic fossil fuels. This way people who have invested their lives in an industry do not lose their jobs. Proponents of both approaches want one thing: energy independence. Rising oil prices are teaching us that global economic interdependence is not always a good thing. Is there any way to please both sides? Maybe solid oxide fuel cells (SOFCs) are an answer.

SOFCs are devices that harvest energy from the high-temperature reactions between oxygen and various fuels. Instead of using heat from the chemical reactions (as in traditional power plants) to drive turbines, a SOFC takes electrical energy directly from the chemical reactions. This means greater efficiency—more electricity for a given amount of fuel. Also, it is supposedly cleaner to put fuel through a fuel cell than to simply burn it. Even so, no one can disobey the laws of physics and chemistry. If fuel and oxygen go into a chemical process, then something has to be produced. You guessed right—carbon dioxide. Some people are very optimistic about this technology as a solution to our energy needs. Perhaps the most well-known example of a SOFC would be the Bloom Box, a mysterious project revealed to the world last year. Bloom Energy, the company that produces Bloom Boxes, has had hundreds of millions of dollars invested and boasts companies like eBay and Google for customers.

Green technology supporters can appreciate the efficiency of this technology. It produces less carbon dioxide per kilowatt-hour of electricity than a gas fired power plant. And because SOFCs can use fossil fuels, workers in the oil industry can keep their jobs. It sounds like an easy choice, but not when you consider the price tag on a SOFC. The high temperatures required for chemical reactions in a SOFC limit its functional lifetime. Exotic materials, such as Lanthanum strontium manganite and the metal scandium, are also needed for the reactions. Expensive metals and durable construction make for high cost of production. 100-kilowatt units that would be sold to businesses like Google cost over half a million dollars each. Smaller units that are suited for household energy consumption would be unaffordable to many homeowners. That is the main reason SOFCs are not yet revolutionizing how we get our electricity. Is it possible to make affordable fuel cells? Should we use SOFCs at all?