Bloom Energy, a San Francisco based energy company, unveiled a ground breaking innovation on 60 Minutes last night, a little power plant-in-a-box that will power houses.

According to K.R. Sridhar, founder of Bloom Energy, two blocks can power the average high-consumption American home -- one block can power the average European home.

The idea is to one day replace the big power plants and transmission line grid, the way the laptop moved in on the desktop and cell phones supplanted landlines.

What makes this device a real stand out innovation is that it is wireless and emits zero emissions, Sridhar said.

Bloom Energy boxes cost between $700,000-$800,000, but Sridhar envisions making it available in every home, so he estimates they will lower the price to around $3,000 for a unit.

Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byer, a venture capital firm that has invested in Bloom Energy, describes that device as a flexible fuel cell system that produces clean, reliable and affordable energy from a wide range of fuels reducing carbon emissions by 50-100 percent per kilowatt.

Google was first to use Bloom Energy’s Bloom Box to power one of its data centers and has been using the device for the past 18 months. Meanwhile, FedEx, Wal-mart and Ebay are also taking initiatives to go green and have invested in Bloom Boxes.

Ebay has already installed the boxes on the front lawn of its San Jose location and is expecting to acquire nearly 15 percent of its energy needs from Bloom devices.

Bloom Energy (click here for their website) will go public on Wednesday, February 24, where it is expected to announce further details about their much-anticipated energy box.

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