Bloom Energy Is Riding the Data Center Boom to a $25 Billion Backlog. Plug Power Is Passing on It. Here's Why.

Bloom Energy Is Riding the Data Center Boom to a $25 Billion Backlog. Plug Power Is Passing on It. Here's Why.

Rick Orford, The Motley Fool

Sun, September 20, 2026 at 1:25 AM GMT+3 4 min read

Two fuel cell companies face the same AI-driven power opportunity, but they're taking opposite paths. Bloom Energy (NYSE: BE) has lined up $25 billion in financing to chase the data center boom head-on. Plug Power (NASDAQ: PLUG) is largely sitting this one out.

The reason this matters is simple: Data center electricity demand is still accelerating. Artificial intelligence data centers are projected to consume 11.8% of total U.S. electricity by 2030, and power providers will have to scramble to meet that demand.

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Bloom Energy is moving directly into the power bottleneck. Plug Power is focusing on its existing hydrogen businesses and aiming to achieve profitability first.

So which strategy will pay off sooner?

How Bloom Energy's fuel cells landed a $25 billion boost

Let's start with Bloom Energy's core product: the Bloom Energy Server.

The concept is simple. In many existing power generation technologies, fuel is burned, and the resulting heat, in whatever form it takes, is converted into kinetic energy. That energy drives a turbine, a generator, or another mechanical system that ultimately produces electricity. It's a lengthy process, even without all the trouble of storing, transporting, and receiving the generated electricity.

Bloom's Energy Server skips combustion entirely, using solid oxide fuel cells to turn natural gas, biogas, or hydrogen directly into electricity. Installed on-site, it also bypasses the grid, eliminating the need for substations, transmission lines, or interconnection queues. That makes it a golden opportunity for data centers.

Bloom has also steadily pushed efficiency and durability gains across successive generations of its Energy Server. Furthermore, in the company's second-quarter 2026 earnings release, CEO KR Sridhar said that every major U.S. hyperscaler and more than a dozen U.S. neoclouds, AI labs, and colocation data center operators have validated and approved Bloom's power solutions for their AI factories. "Bloom is now a standard for AI onsite power," he said.

Bloom also has a major financing advantage. Brookfield Asset Management just expanded its agreement with Bloom to fund AI-related power infrastructure projects, increasing the total to $25 billion. That gives Bloom access to substantial third-party project financing.

Wall Street has certainly taken notice. A consensus among 26 analysts rates the stock a "Moderate Buy," with up to 35% potential upside based on a $354 high target price.

Why Plug Power is sticking with forklifts over data centers

Plug Power's progress looks smaller in scale, and its focus is entirely different. Both companies have a real technological parallel in their top products -- they both offer fuel cells that avoid the combustion cycle for energy generation. This is why many investors tend to lump these two companies together. However, Plug Power's primary product, the GenDrive Hydrogen Fuel Cell, squarely targets an industrial customer base centered on forklifts, pallet jacks, and other warehouse vehicles.

That's not to say the company has no presence in the data center industry. In July 2026, Plug Power announced a technical collaboration with Microsoft to test its proton exchange membrane fuel cells as a potential replacement for diesel backup generators.

However, CEO Jose Luis Crespo said on the 2026 second-quarter earnings call that Plug remains focused on material handling, electrolyzers, and hydrogen production, and hasn't made any decisions on data centers.

To many investors, that suggests the company isn't exactly rearing up to chase the AI hype, like many other companies these days.

Wall Street has a consensus "Hold" rating for Plug Power based on 20 analysts. Now, to be clear, not prioritizing the AI boom isn't necessarily a bad thing. Plug Power's growth story will just be very different from Bloom Energy's.

If you want more exposure to the AI power boom, Bloom Energy is the clear choice. Its deep-pocketed backing is exactly why it's positioned to capture this moment, while Plug Power's decision to sit on the sidelines for now is a bet on a very different growth story.

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Rick Orford has positions in Microsoft. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Bloom Energy, Brookfield Asset Management, and Microsoft. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.

Bloom Energy Is Riding the Data Center Boom to a $25 Billion Backlog. Plug Power Is Passing on It. Here's Why. was originally published by The Motley Fool