Bloom Energy Behind Massive Apple Fuel Cell Farm?

Bloom Energy may be working with Apple to create a massive 5 MW fuel cell farm at its data center in Maiden, North Carolina, reports GigaOm.

The site has heard from several sources that Bloom is behind the project. Although Apple and Bloom refuse to comment, there are several factors supporting this prediction.

Bloom offers boxes capable of supplying 100 kW, which could translate into 50 Bloom Boxes being installed at Apple's data center. Bloom has been in negotiations for similarly large-sized deals in the past, such as its negotiations in Delaware to build a 30 MW fuel cell farm (300 Bloom Boxes), and it has already installed 12 Bloom Boxes at Adobe's campus in San Jose, Calif. Apple is also touting the fact that its fuel cells will be run on biogas, and Bloom has substantial experience selling biogas-based fuel cells. Both Adobe and eBay are running their Bloom fuel cells on biogas.


Looking at alternative companies, FuelCell Energy says that Apple is not a customer at present and UTC Power sells 400 kW phosphoric acid fuel cells which doesn't evenly add up to 5MW.

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