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Toshiba To Show Laptop Fuel Cells at CeBit 293

Posted by timothy from the yes-please dept.
war3rd writes "According to The Register, Toshiba has finally been able to build a fuel cell for laptops that they will unveil at CeBit next week. The fuel cells are expected to last approximately 5 hours and are compatible with existing lithium-ion batteries. Form factor remains the only issue. The trick is that they use the water by-product from the cell to dilute the methanol source as it enters the reformer, and are therefore able to store higher concentrations of methanol in the cell. My only concern is how quickly can they get this to market?"
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Toshiba To Show Laptop Fuel Cells at CeBit More

Toshiba To Show Laptop Fuel Cells at CeBit

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  • Hehehehe ... (Score:2, Funny)

    by SuperDuG ( 134989 )
    ... I can see it now ... some poor geek on the side of the road with a sign ... laptop out of gas, help please ...

    hehehehe that makes me smile

  • SHOULD be ethanol (Score:5, Funny)

    by nweaver ( 113078 ) on Wednesday March 05, 2003 @03:39PM (#5442848) Homepage
    If you want a fuel cell to be practically usable, you should make it run on 40% Ethanol, 60% water. That way, there is a commonly available fuel (Vodka) which can be easily purchased most everywhere in the US (outside Mormonstan at least).

    If you can make the fuel cell deal with more impurities, you could also use Whiskey or Tequila or similar distilled spirits.

  • All we need now... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by swordboy ( 472941 ) on Wednesday March 05, 2003 @03:39PM (#5442854) Journal
    It'd be nice if the component makers would establish an "open laptop" form factor. We've alreadt got mini-ITX [mini-itx.com]. We just need a chassis/monitor and DC power specification.

    • Re:All we need now... (Score:4, Informative)

      by Junta ( 36770 ) on Wednesday March 05, 2003 @03:54PM (#5443043)
      The answer is that there is nothing in it for them. Manufacturing for OEMs means they have more control over the market and can get more cash per unit. The hard drives, optical drives, memory, CardBus, and mini-PCI all all standardized ways of manufacturers getting cash off the commodity laptop market. Meanwhile, the motherboards, case, power supply, battery, and display manufacturers make a killing by charging so much. Same reason Apple doesn't want clones, letting the market get too open and the prices start running down and eliminating profit margins very quickly. That is why PC laptops are almost as pricy as Apple laptops, and manufacturers recognize a good thing when they see it.

  • Well, there goes the neighborhood (Score:3, Interesting)

    by drblunt ( 606487 ) on Wednesday March 05, 2003 @03:40PM (#5442863)
    Does this mean you won't be able to take your laptop on the airplane with the fuel-cell battery? Nothing like having a lap full of methanol to freak people out.

    Doc

    • Re:Well, there goes the neighborhood (Score:5, Informative)

      by Sitnaltax ( 178828 ) on Wednesday March 05, 2003 @04:04PM (#5443151)
      Methanol on an airplane is hardly anything to worry about. It's no more dangerous than ethanol, which of course the airline will happily let you drink as much of as you want as long as you keep paying. It burns, but so does ethanol and paper.

      Explosion? Nah. It would be a very difficult task to get so much methanol vapor that an explosion would be much more than alarming pop--the same pop you could get by inflating a barf bag with your breath, twisting off the opening, and POPping it with your fist.
    • Although I don't know about this particular fuel cell as it mentions more concentrated meths, one made by PolyFuel received air clearance [com.com] and I think was mentioned on /. itself.
    • Methanol is a low explosive, which means it just burns rather than explodes. In order for it to explode, it has to be in an enclosed space. In your fuel-cell battery, the concentration is too low to cause enough of an explosion to damage the airplane. I'd probably be more worried about the hair spray on the woman that is sitting in front of you.

  • but how long will they last? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Pompatus ( 642396 ) on Wednesday March 05, 2003 @03:41PM (#5442874) Journal
    My question is, how long will the battery hold up? I don't mean a single charge, I mean how long will the battery be usuable. Also, it states at the end of the article it will take 2-3 years to get to market. It's amazing that the poster of this story can't even read the article

  • Good luck... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by szcx ( 81006 ) on Wednesday March 05, 2003 @03:42PM (#5442888)
    I'm not sure airlines or the TSA will be thrilled about people using fuel-cell-powered devices on those long-haul flights.

    • Re:Good luck... (Score:3, Insightful)

      by afidel ( 530433 )
      Why not, they already sell 40% alchohol solutions in greater quantities to anyone who wants to pay the couple bucks and allow liquid butane in larger quantities, both have at least as many BTU potential and in the case of the liqued Butane the conainer is activly designed to ignite the contents.

  • Dumb question... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by TopShelf ( 92521 ) on Wednesday March 05, 2003 @03:42PM (#5442889) Homepage Journal
    I RTFA, but still have a basic question - how does one recharge the battery? Will you purchase methanol packs, or just pitch the battery and get a new one? Either way, that cuts into the "environmentally friendly" bit...
    • The choice is, do you use a rechargable "hard battery" that has all sorts of nasty stuff in it that stays nasty even after the battery is dead or do you use a DMFC where what's left inside is water and maybe a little bit of unreacted methanol? My guess is that you wouldn't so much recharge them as maybe get them refilled. If they are refillable, that would mean they are much more environmentally friendly than traditional batteries (rechargable or not). If they aren't refillable, hopefully there is nothing too nasty left when they go flat and at worst you have a little extra junk at the landfill.

  • www.h2fc.com (Score:5, Informative)

    by MjDascombe ( 549226 ) on Wednesday March 05, 2003 @03:42PM (#5442891) Journal
    Is the best site for information about Fuel Cells [h2fc.com]
  • Make it run on atmospheric methane, and install a pay-per-use WAP in every Taco Bell.

    It'll like be like printing your own money!

  • Problem with Security ... (Score:3, Funny)

    by airrage ( 514164 ) on Wednesday March 05, 2003 @03:44PM (#5442911) Homepage Journal
    Ah yes, this will definitely get your through airport security?

    Rent-a-Cop: "Sir, you wouldn't happen to have a explosive gas in that laptop would you?"
    Slashdot-Geek: "Uh, no, duh -- it's a fuel cell laptop."
    Rent-a-Cop: "Riiiiiigggghhhhhtttttttttttt. Please come with me."

    Why do the chemists and chemical engineers keep coming up with such volitile compounds -- why can't we start fueling devices out of garbage like that dude on back to the future?

    I could be wrong --
    • Well, Marty, we just need to go to the year 2015 and bring back a Mr. Fusion [bttf.com] power unit.

  • First Legitimate Post (Score:4, Interesting)

    by ShadowDrake ( 588020 ) on Wednesday March 05, 2003 @03:45PM (#5442915)
    "Runs for 5 hours" under what circumstances and configuration? I'll be downright impressed if they can get five hours out of a desktop PIV running full-blast, and running those drives full-time and the 802.11 won't help. I'd be impressed if the 'smart' battery/fuel cell realy was. My "10% low battery alarm" means anywhere from 5 to 30 minutes on a 2:30 or so charge life.

  • Usefulness? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by mr_zorg ( 259994 ) on Wednesday March 05, 2003 @03:48PM (#5442962)
    Let's see. Now I can have a batter with a moderately longer runtime, but refilling it is much more difficult than simply plugging it in. Who's going to go for that? OK, it's cool. OK, it's environmentally friendly, but is that enough to overcome the convenience factor?

    • Re:Usefulness? (Score:4, Interesting)

      by dbrutus ( 71639 ) on Wednesday March 05, 2003 @04:43PM (#5443530) Homepage
      You can carry around a bunch of $2 refill packs and not need to be attached to a generator out in the middle of nowhere. Now there's convenience. You can also recharge your power source in a minute or two.

      This is important for other uses like a prospective Segway using these things. Right now you run out of juice, it's time to get tethered to a wall socket but with this you just fill it up and go further.
    • Two reasons I can think of:

      1) You can refill in places where you can't get to traditional power, like an airplane or in your car.

      2) You can refill in just a couple of minutes. How long does it take to recharge the batteries on your typical laptop?
      • although this does sound very convenient, it results in an additional recurring cost of using your laptop. I would be interested to see a cost comparison between the amount of electricity required to recharge a laptop battery, and the cost of the methane refil.

        i'd be hesitant to tack on another frequent recurring cost on top of all the other ones (food, cigarettes, etc).

        Maybe if there were methanol fountains in public places? that would be cool.

        • Re:Usefulness? (Score:3, Informative)

          by anon*127.0.0.1 ( 637224 )
          Laptop batteries have their own costs. A quick check of Dells website shows them selling a battery for $130, which is advertised as being good for 500 charges. That works out to about 25 cents a charge, assuming that the cost of electricity is negligible. If a fuel cell can approach that cost per charge ratio and not wear out, I'd rather go that route.

    • Nah. How long do you think it would be before there would be coin-op small-device refill stations everywhere, to serve the laptop and cell-phone geeks? Methanol would be cheeeaaaap stuff, like twenty cents or less per litre retail. So maybe you go to the refilling station, dial in a 250 ml fill, drop in a quarter (and curse those ridiculously high vending-machine prices), fill up your laptop, and off you go, good for another five or ten hours.

      Heck, even if it was the same price as gasoline it would still be cheap, considering how much you use. At home, you'll probably buy it by the gallon to fill up your own filling station. Offices will get it delivered just like jugs for the water coolers.

      Sure, the early adopters will have some annoyances, but I don't think it'd be too long before you'll see them at airports first... Shopping malls... Office buildings... Street corners... Remember, it's not just laptops, it's also cellphones and other gadgets that use the methanol.

      And no, this stuff isn't dangerous or volatile -- certainly no more so than vodka. I imagine the real-world implementation might have the methanol at a 75% (or lower) concentration, or something like that, to limit its flammability. Perhaps at home, you can fill with 100%, but in a public places they'll only serve up 75% to limit the danger. Whatever.

      I dunno, people will probably find all kinds of potential problems with my scenario here, but I have very little doubt that some enterprising entrepreneurs will find a way of addressing all the problems and getting it all to work.

  • fuel cells run hot (Score:4, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 05, 2003 @03:48PM (#5442967)
    Even with a good catalyst like a fuel cell has, the reaction that takes place has a temperature of several hundred degrees Centigrade.

    Sounds good for a little hot action on your laptop!

  • Great... (Score:2, Funny)

    by gpinzone ( 531794 )
    A technology that lasts about the same time as a battery and will label you a terrorist when you board an airplane. Can't wait until these are out either.

  • Not that great (Score:2, Insightful)

    by gr8_phk ( 621180 )
    Fuel cells would be great replacements for non-rechargable batterys, but not rechargables. Think about it. You hate to recharge your laptop, but you'll hate it more if you have to pay for fuel. You pay for electricity, but you don't usually think about it. You also don't pay for it if you charge your laptop at work. Yes, one way or the other we all pay for it - I'm talking about noticing it.
    • This is going to find applications in rural or out in the field settings. A jug of methanol good for 10 charges is a lot cheaper than the equivalent in lithium/ion battery spares. Both will get you through a week in the woods but why spend the extra money?
  • OK, how good is this as a fuel cell? Can you hook up a fuel tank and run it as long as the tank is kept full? That would be great for emergency power applications.

    • Re:More details? (Score:4, Funny)

      by DuckDuckBOOM! ( 535473 ) on Wednesday March 05, 2003 @04:12PM (#5443223)
      Can you hook up a fuel tank and run it as long as the tank is kept full?
      [snort] I just got a visual of some ubergeek with one of those stupid hats made to hold dual beer cans, two bottles of methanol in place, tubes running down to his laptop...

      ..actually, one can of methanol and one of beer wouldn't be bad. As long as you remember which tube is which.

      • GM is angling to sell its fuel cell cars to the 3rd world on the explicit promise that it'll give them electricity too. Ride around in it during the day and power up your home lights with it at night.
  • That's cool and all, and very exciting, but I thought fuel cells were supposed to give more than what batteries are giving. Sure sure we are just at the beginning, but you'd think they would be better than my 5 hours I get from my lovely powerbook. I'm guessing the chemicals in a battery are a bit more dense, but I'm wondering if this will add or subtract weight from laptops, etc. And are we talking microliters (uL) or milliliters (mL) of fluid required here? Working in a biochemistry lab will be nice when I can refuel my laptop from the flammables cabinet.

  • Mmmmm Methanol..... (Score:5, Informative)

    by smoondog ( 85133 ) on Wednesday March 05, 2003 @04:03PM (#5443132)
    Here is the methanol safety card [hazard.com]. I don't see these on airplanes anytime soon. Anyway, remember those old photocopies from the 70's/early 80's that made pages with blue text? They always smelled a bit and came out a little wet. Yup, methonal was the fluid used in them....

    -Sean

    • Re:Mmmmm Methanol..... (Score:2, Insightful)

      by sliph ( 191872 )
      Completely unlike the alternative [hazard.com] right? I doubt it would be too hard to package methanol into safe, disposable, self-sealing packages.
      At least methanol doesn't ignite when it comes in contact with air.

    • Lithium (Score:3, Insightful)

      by philip_bailey ( 50353 )
      The "safety card" for lithium [hazard.com].

      It's doesn't seem to me that methanol in a sealed cell is any more dangerous than the lithium you have in your current laptop battery, or for that matter than the ethanol in the spirits sold as "Duty Free" on international flights.
    • Egads! I remember turning the crank on the ditto machine to make the magical blue copies in school.

      We had our ditto machine in a not so well ventilated room, and you could almost get a contact high.

      I had a hard time reading your link to the hazard.com site due to my impaired vision and persistant headaches.

      Smelly Purple Faxes [halfbakery.com]
    • Those old photocopies were actually mimeographs, generally referred to as "dittos" (though I think there was some difference between a "ditto machine" and other mimeographs).

      Even though we had a photocopier, large runs went on the ditto machine, and it was always a mysterious and magical thing to operate. I miss them.

  • If I recall correctly... (Score:5, Informative)

    by edashofy ( 265252 ) on Wednesday March 05, 2003 @04:03PM (#5443134)
    The DOT has already approved Methanol in small quantities for uses such as powering fuel-cell powered laptops, see here [com.com].

    You "recharge" by popping in a new cartridge of methanol, which should be cheap ($3-5 initial starting price, probably down to $0.30 eventually. You don't actually have to plug the laptop in for a few hours to recharge it either, so on that long airline flight you can run the laptop indefinitely with enough little cartridges. I saw a pic of a prototype cartridge once somewhere, it looked about the size of a AA battery.

  • Isn't Hydrogen the desired fuel for a fuel cell? I may be wrong, but I thought that anything besides pure hydrogen would have additional exhausts besides just warm or hot water.

    If that is the case, I am not sure why I would opt for this, being that it 'only' gives me five/six hours run time between refills.

    That's another point - buying refills for every six hours use is a little bit more cumbersome than just plugging your laptop into the wall and charging the battery, even though the battery will not last as long.

    • Hydrogen is the preferred fuel, but it is unstable and difficult to work with. Methanol (which is easier to handle) can be used in conjunction with a reformer, which basically extracts the hydrogen from the methanol.

      At that point, it is the same thing as a normal fuel cell, just a bit less efficient

      HowStuffWorks has a good explanation about it http://science.howstuffworks.com/fuel-cell.htm [howstuffworks.com]
    • You are correct in that Hydrogen is the only fuel that lets out water vapor as its only by-product. Any other fuel has carbon dioxide (and possibly carbon monoxide) as byproducts. Insert Global Warming debate here. I don't think at these levels you'd have to worry much about the ice caps.

      The main problem is that hydrogen has a very low energy/mass ratio. The only way to get anything even close to a decent range is to have massively compressed hydrogen. This in itself is a hazard. If you see a fuel cell in a car, look at how much cladding they have on that hydrogen tank. You're not going to have that kind of hydrogen tank shielding on something meant to be portable. Methanol is the simplest chemical that is liquid (and therefore relatively dense) at room temperature that they can use in a fuel cell.

      The other big problem is hydrogen is very reactive - read explosive. Probably not a good idea to have explosives on your laptop.

      Also, its easier for you to refuel methanol than to refuel hydrogen. There's no hydrogen infrastructure. Not much of a methanol one either, but you probably could get methanol if you looked for it.
      • Water vapour is also a greenhouse gas. More importantly, by burning hydrogen we lose oxygen from the air rather permanently. Unless of course we generate the hydrogen from water by electricity, in which case the hydrogen only acts as a cumbersome and expensive battery.
        • Methinks you may be missing the point.

          A fuel cell IS a battery. It is a refillable battery. One of the biggest anoyances of rechargable batteries is how long they take to recharge. That is the reason (well, one of them) that electric cars have never become popular. If you run out of juice, they take HOURS to recharge.

          With laptops, this problem is not so bad. You can use a laptop while it is recharging, and most places you would want to use a laptop, you will be within range of a plug anyway. Still, there are times when I would like to be able to run unteathered for long periods of time. So whenever the fuel cell gets low, you just add some more methanol and in seconds, you're good to go for another 5 hours.

  • Um, what's the point? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Visigothe ( 3176 ) on Wednesday March 05, 2003 @04:21PM (#5443296) Homepage
    As others have pointed out, 5 hours on a laptop is *nothing* The batteries on my iBook do that just fine. Sure it takes me a couple of hours to fully recharge, but that's what a second battery is for, should I need one. Also, I don't have to refill, nor throw away spent fuel cells. It sounds like manually refueling would be a pain in the arse [for a laptop]. Vehicles using fuel cells sound much more interesting

    What would be interesting would be a fuel cell laptop that got maybe 24 hours on a "charge".

    This just seems like gadgetry for its own sake

    .
    • Given the battery life of an iBook, adding a fuel cell to an iBook probably means you could extract 8 or 9 hours.

      Don't tell me that wouldn't be convenient, with a recharge being as simple as swapping methanol cartridges.

      • Re:Um, what's the point? (Score:4, Informative)

        by Visigothe ( 3176 ) on Wednesday March 05, 2003 @04:56PM (#5443671) Homepage
        Quoth:

        Given the battery life of an iBook, adding a fuel cell to an iBook probably means you could extract 8 or 9 hours.

        Don't tell me that wouldn't be convenient, with a recharge being as simple as swapping methanol cartridges.

        While ~10 hours is cooler than 5, I don't think it is that much better [yes, technically it is *double*]. For it to make sense, it would need to last 20h at minumum to convince the majority of manufacturers and users to make the switch. It would also be nice to not have to throw away a spent cart.

        It's a value proposition. Can companies make more money by switching to the fuel cell technology? My guess is that it isn't at this time. Maybe in a few years when everything gets smaller/faster, but not now.

        I still think fuel cells in cars is a better idea than laptops.... of course now we're talking about a completely different fuel.

  • Ultracapacitors? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Cutie Pi ( 588366 ) on Wednesday March 05, 2003 @04:23PM (#5443311)
    Why don't we here more about ultracapacitors:

    http://www.maxwell.com/ultracapacitors/ [maxwell.com] According to the above page, ultracapacitors "deliver up to 10 times the power, last up to 10 times as long, operate more reliably in high- and low-temperature conditions, require far less maintenance and reduce environmental issues associated with battery disposal" compared to batteries. I recently read about a hybrid automobile that will be using ultracaps (don't remember who). It seems like these could be implemented in laptops and cell phones.

    • Re:Ultracapacitors? (Score:4, Insightful)

      by chill ( 34294 ) on Wednesday March 05, 2003 @04:39PM (#5443480) Journal
      Because batteries deliver the charge over a long period of time, whereas capacitors deliver it in a quick burst.

      Yes, "ultracapacitors", too. The company you linked to is trying to market their product as an adjunt to batteries -- to deliver the surge of power needed for certain operations like startup, burst writets, etc. They aren't a replacement for batteries.

      The confusion is the phrase "last up to 10 times as long" -- meaning their total lifetime is longer than the batteries, but not while delivering constant power.
    • Capacitors are great for giving a power boost (e.g. starting an electrci motor) but they don't directly replace batteries, they're a different thing altogether. For a capacitor, energy = 1/2 * C * V^2 where C is the capacitance, so as you drain the energy, the voltage V falls. For a battery you need something to keep the voltage roughly constant over the whole operating cycle.

  • Maybe (Score:4, Insightful)

    by papasui ( 567265 ) on Wednesday March 05, 2003 @04:28PM (#5443364) Homepage
    Computer manufactures should focus on lower power solutions instead of building better batteries (or combine the two). My 17" Powerbook I ordered is rated at 4.5 hrs already with a standard battery. In general the pc world seems that the solution is always to throw more power at the problem instead of trying to come up with a more elegant method of dealing with it. (This isn't a rip on PC's I use both Macs and Pcs daily, just that there's more than 1 solution to most problems)
  • Hopefully they'll be able to squeeze them down to AA size. I have some lithium AA batteries for my PDA, and the battery life is a little longer, but the big plus is that the amperage keeps up even when the batteries are low. With NiMH (or NiCD I suppose) if the battery is low and you turn on the backlight, the PDA shuts off and drops to backup battery power. Maybe with a fuel-cell battery you could actually use the PC-Card slot on the road for more than 30 minutes without draining the batteries dry.

  • Fuel? No, thanks. (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Frobozz0 ( 247160 )
    I really don't want a contained fire on my lap. I know Lithium-ion reactions are probably just as bad, but there's just a big mental difference. Do you really want something that can run your lawnmover on an airplane? Does the airline want it on your lap, either?

  • The InfoWorld Link says to Market in 2004 (Score:3, Informative)

    by DaveAtFraud ( 460127 ) on Wednesday March 05, 2003 @04:39PM (#5443481) Homepage Journal
    The Inforworld link [infoworld.com] (that I was submitting at the same time that this story got posted, BTW), says they will be available in 2004.
  • Just remember that these battery packs are for fueling your computer, not for drinking them like alcohol and then getting drunk with them...

    guess that's why they say "never drink your laptop battery!" ba dum bum!

    speaking of drinking laptop batteries as a substitute for alcohol, could I get another? ooh.. where do I come up with this stuff, I'm funnier than ALF
  • It would be more suitable for most of the executives I work with. They could top it off from the mini-bar.

  • The Water Byproduct.... (Score:3, Funny)

    by Fapestniegd ( 34586 ) <james AT jameswhite DOT org> on Wednesday March 05, 2003 @05:05PM (#5443747) Homepage
    Just needs to be re-routed to the single cup USB enabled coffee maker.

  • Tired of the Airline Regulations argument (Score:3, Interesting)

    by nonoriginal ( 108204 ) on Wednesday March 05, 2003 @05:22PM (#5443928)
    So, what makes carrying a small AA battery-sized container of methanol any different than carrying a butane lighter onto an airplane? I don't see one. Not to mention all the other flammable products carried in small quantities on airplanes in cosmetics and toiletries.

    As for the waste/disposal issue, the reason fuel cells are considered advantageous is that both production and disposal is cleaner, not containing toxic chemical compounds. The cartridges could easily be recycled into new cartridges...maybe even someday like inkjet printer cartridges.

    As for the runtime on a single charge, that is certain to improve over time. The point is that they get new technology in the marketplace.

  • Why I can't wait for small fuel cells... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by cr0sh ( 43134 ) on Wednesday March 05, 2003 @06:02PM (#5444369) Homepage
    I am currently in the process of building a recumbent electric vehicle from bicycle frames (I basically have everything done, still need to get the foot rests in place, and the drive system in) - I have designed it to use four 12V gel-cell batteries (ie, the 7AH powercell kind), or possibly even glassmat if I can get them cheap enough. However, the things are heavy. I would love to have a fuel cell that I could easily "fill up" with common fuels (gasoline, methanol, ethenol, butane, propane - I don't care).

    BTW, before anyone questions "why don't I use a go-ped like engine" - noise is the main reason, laws are another (as in legal grey area).

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