Thread

Oracle on the hook to pay data centre investors even if site has no electricity

158 points · 154 comments · Betelbuddy

peri-cl · 1790334571 · focus · HN ↗
I'm very curious what happens now to the several gigawatts of fuel cells, that this project supposedly purchased to supply power.
> "Oracle signed a deal with solid oxide fuel cell (SOFC) developer Bloom last year for 1.8GW of power, expanding it to 2.8GW of capacity in April."
<a href="https://www.datacenterdynamics.com/en/news/new-mexico-regulators-reject-natural-gas-pipeline-for-oracles-25gw-project-jupiter-data-center/" rel="nofollow">https://www.datacenterdynamics.com/en/news/new-mexico-regula...
<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bloom_Energy" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bloom_Energy
I was surprised to read we're already building fuel cell power plants on this scale (this is a first of its kind project—by far this startup's largest customer). I didn't realize the tech was that mature. Now I'm left wondering if they actually ever intended to, or whether this was some kind of circular financial-engineering vaporware.
1. arijun · 1790335885 · focus · HN ↗
  I thought fuel cells were an energy storage system, not an energy generation system. Surely it’s cheaper to just connect the data center to the generation directly (either by upgrading the grid to handle it or building generators nearby).
  1. peri-cl · 1790336622 · focus · HN ↗
    Fuel cells are an electricity generation method. They oxidize fuels (methane, hydrogen) at low temperature, electrochemically, without combustion—going directly from fuel to electrons.
    This would have been simply a natural gas power plant, of a different type.
    m4rtink · 1790339180 · focus · HN ↗
    I'm really wondering about the air filtering needed for this to work. Gas turbines are already quite sensitive to bigger particles in the air but for the fuel cell membranes, this could be a much harder problem.
    throwaway173738 · 1790341286 · focus · HN ↗
    I bet you could spin the natural gas in a centrifuge to eliminate larger particles.
    amluto · 1790365566 · focus · HN ↗
    How about a HEPA or ULPA filter? These are very mature technology, work extremely well, and are not particularly expensive.
    m4rtink · 1790725030 · focus · HN ↗
    Sure, that would work - but with the massive ammounts of air needed I would assume those would be quickly clogged and unusable.

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