GE HomeGen 7000 Residential Fuel Cell to be Sold by NJ Resources
On Sunday, Slashdot broke a story about the announcement of the General Electric HomeGen 7000 Residential Fuel Cell Power System. This is the first fuel cell system that we are aware of that is designed to be installed in residential and small business applications.
Close examination of the GE MicroGen Web Site indicates that GE has signed an exclusive distribution agreement with New Jersey Resources for deployment of the Fuel Cells in New Jersey.
CTDATA is very concerned about the reliability of the public power grid in the Northeast and California. This fuel cell product looks like a way to improve the reliability of electric power delivered to our business locations and our homes.
We have difficulty imagining how fuel cell access will not be a requirement of a co-location facility once the technology becomes widely available. Everyone in the computer industry has focused on deploying Uninterruptable Power Supplies (UPS) behind every server in order to increase up-time. Fuel cells will change that equation.
We will all have to watch carefully in order to see the total cost of operation (TCO) of one of these units.