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Fuel-Cell Power With Methanol
foaty writes: "It has been reported that Japanese electronics companies have developed prototypes for fuel-cell batteries that can power the smallest of electronic devices for long periods of time, and they only need refueling, not recharging! See the article at FutureEnergies.com." That article links to this piece at ZDNet; what's interesting is that instead of hydrogen, this article talks instead mostly about methanol-based fuel cells.
Fuel cells only use hydrogen. Sources of hydrogen, such as methanol, must be cracked and the hydrogen freed for use.
"Computers are useless. They can only give you answers."
-- Pablo Picasso
President Bush has been involved in similar research claiming that he has long needed a good fix of ethanol to get going in the morning.
Thanks.
I for one prefer a nice safe, Ni-Cad or Lithium-Hydride battery, but then I'm pretty health conscious.
Wow if this were really to happen in the next 2 years or so as the article indicates, what is going to happen to companies like Duracell and Energizer? Now all we need is a reason for such batteries in North America, hmmm... 3G heh ;)
lnxslak.
Fighting for Peace, is like Fucking for Virginity.
old news
The One Rule Of Chess You'll Ever Need: Don't play someone who carries a kit in their bookbag.
The ZDNet article mentions a fuel cell being developed by NEC using nanotechnology to process the methane, with 10 times the energy density of current lithium batteries - anybody know what that is about? I'd guess it was wild blue-sky stuff that won't be available for decades, except that I used to know somebody who worked at NEC research in the US, and they seemed pretty serious about practical applications of research.
Energy: time to change the picture.
I wonder if the OPEC cartel watches research like this like a hawk. I think it would foolish if they didnt, being as though, they have trillions at stake.
That being said, would you try to impede such research knowing that said technology could make your residual income dissapear ?
Help pay for my wedding! Go to my kickass website
My only question How do you refill it if a fuel cell is sposed to get smaller and smaller how do you refill a fuell cell. Or are they thinking that I will through mine away and then I woul buy a new one, "for the same price as a lithuim battery" I don't think so. the nice thing about regular battries is that they recharge and they tell you how they do that.
madness takes its toll please have exact change
This isn't some new miracle pulled out of the hat by the Japanese. For example, an MIT Technology Review article on some American work on a methanol fuel cell is here. A whole bibliography on recent Direct Methanol Fuel Cell (DMFCs) work is here.
Why would refueling be preferable to recharging?
I kind of like having only to plug into a wall to recharge my laptop, as opposed to having to stop off at a gas station, or buy a big supply of this stuff to keep in my garage.
Hemos posted methanol portable fuel-cells almost a year ago to the week - made by Motorola.
I'm a 2000 man.
Didn't /. already do a story on methane fuel cells for electronic devices some time ago? Let's have a story about how you can use methane with Beowulf clusters, dammit!
Canaries. You'll have to carry around a canary, and if he drops dead, roll down the window on your SUV.
"Would it kill you to put down the toilet seat?" -- Maya Angelou
Bad Booze contains Ethanol & Methanol.
Ethanol also contains Hydrogen.
=> Booze Cell !
Don't Drink & Drive !
Drink, Drive & Speak on the Phone 8)
It takes 40+ muscles to frown, but only four to extend your arm and bitchslap the motherfucker
As this idea seems to be more and more common, I wonder what would happen if I try and take my fuel cell powered laptop on a plane. The only place I really like to use my laptop is when I travel. I don't know that I see the airlines allowing me onboard with a flammable liquid powered laptop.
Did you ever take any chemistry classes? It is used as a solvent, grease remover and makes a large part of cooking/technical alcohol. Methanol is pretty harmless unless you drink it. Of course, breathing a saturated atmosphere of metanol is dangerous, but then there couldn't be much more than a few millilitres in an electronic device.
There is also the environmental aspect. Methanol can be made from wood, so the net CO2 pollution is 0. I'd rather have a spill of some alcohol than undegradable heavy metals.
One can imagine the confused look on the Gas Station Attendant's face when you hand him a nickel and tell him "3 cents on Pump #7."
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With all of the current concern about bombs and the like, this seems like it might be a big hurdle.
I've seen so many companies/labs/etc... with prototype portable personal fuel cells for running electronics over the past 5 years, but none of them have made it to production. I'll believe it when i can get one off the shelf and use it for my wearable, but until such a time, it's just pie in the sky.
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Play Six Pack Man. I
Use ethanol and then the user could kill two birds with one stone.
Hey, leave comments about my mother out of this!
can the fuel cells be overclocked!??!
Lizard "Never let them set limits on your mind!"
Oh boy, guess I am in real trouble from my "gas engine" model airplane days.
called SHIBUMI (don't remember author) about a Mother company regrouping all petroleum producers, specifically spying and killing all people having to do with new power sources...
And after reading, have a good strong look at US history and day to day practices, and make an educated guess.
Also, I seem to remember that first Electric car came out in 1954, and Fuel Cell (working) was 1956 (patented)
Now 50 years just to tel people Hydrogen CAN be used as energy source seems to me quite a long time to divulgate scientific research...
Hoping to read from you,
(Hey moderator ! Answer with words, or mod me up 8)
It takes 40+ muscles to frown, but only four to extend your arm and bitchslap the motherfucker
The defintion of an fuel cell is a cell generating
electrical power by using "semi-permable Membranen" (don't know the exact english words).
There is no need for hydrogene, methanol also works, but it is a quite more difficult. I already saw a methanol fuel cell here in Freiburg, Germany some years ago, so the idea is not that new, only that someone may have indutrial useable products soon.
On the other hand you are also right. When using gas or other materials, you normaly first split hydrogene out of them. But the idea of an methanol cell is that you have something liquid, not gas-form, and can put it directly in the fuel cell. (What the reseach is searching is the same for ethanol, but that seems not be reached yet)
What are you going to eat for dinner? Please reply, and reply truthfully. Thanks!
>>>
:-P
I've seen so many companies/labs/etc... with prototype portable personal fuel cells for running electronics over the past 5 years
>>>
Hydrogen gas 3x the energy of gasoline but takes too much space. Methanol has slightly less energy than gasoline but has comparable space requirement and able to use in fuel cell. What you want to look for is ROOM TEMPERATURE fuel cell which hydrogen can readily do (although is optimum at 60-70'C. Methanol with platinum catalyst need to be heated up above boiling point. For laptop this probably not a problem because we can finally put that heat from the microprocessor to good use.
Honestly, officer, that's just extra fuel for my laptop. It's a shame, but I think this technology is not going to make it for security reasons. Essentially, you are carrying a little Molotov cocktail on board.
For all intensive purposes, "whom" is no longer a word. That begs the question, "who cares"?
And your sister
They stab it with their steely knives,
But they just can't kill the beast.
hey boyo !
you missed the right mod or what ?
Oh, sounds so dangerous. It would never be possible. I mean, carrying a small amount of a highly flammable liquid in a small container so close to your body. The technological hurdles to make that safe are huge.
Hang on, let me light a cigarette...
oh wait...nevermind.
"would you try to impede such research knowing that said technology could make your residual income dissapear?"
Is there really any question there?
How long does it take to recharge a battery? My cell phone recharges the fastest for the time I use it. I have about 120 min talk time/12 hours standby, and the battery recharges in about 1/2 hour. My car, however has about 4 hours drive time/->infinite standby time, and I can refuel it in 10 minutes.
As little methonal as these batteries would use + a little good engineering + a little out-of-box thinking, and you just pick up a pack of 2 refuel packs for you Moterola 3G cell phone the next time you're at Wal-mart of OfficeMax. the next time your fuel cell runs low, pop out the unit and replace the snap-in fuel section. viola!
As soon as the patents expire, or the 3rd parties licence the technology, you'll be able to by FriendlyComputing or SimpleTechnology fuel cell fuels for 2/3 the price of brand methane.
I don't give a damn how dangerous this is, I NEED THIS!
I mean I'm getting sick of recharging the batteries for my Mp3 player, just fill it up with fuel cells and it might even run for more than 4 hours, maybe even more than 5!
The chance of some added pyrotechnics when listening to Rammstein's debut seems more like a bonus than a danger, in my opinion. But then again, unlike most other people, I tend to like stuff that blows up.
Anyway: Bring 'em on!
-- Si hoc legere scis nimium eruditionis habes.
I like your comment about methanol being made from biomass, but its use (maybe production too) would still release carbon dioxide.
The good thing about fuel cells is that they are highly efficient (not restricted like a heat engine), so their CO2 impact is likely to be less than using combustion to produce electricity.
The interesting thing about this device is its incredibly small size.
The nanotechnology they are referring to is commericial technology that isn't really nanotechnology, unless you count the structure of the solid phase metal oxide catalyst nanotechnology. I'm guessing they're referring to the size of the metal oxide which does all the chemical work of converting the methanol to hydrogen and CO2. If so, then they're using NMOs (Nanoscale Metal Oxides) as catalysts, and this technology has been around for quite awhile and is in use today. Technically, NMOs are "nanotechnology" in that the active structure is nanoscale sized. But its not the type of nanotechnology most people think of.
The fuel cells mentioned are probably based on technology that came out of Los Alamos about 4-5 years ago. It used a ceramic support for the NMOs (cerium oxide I think) to convert the methanol into hydrogen and CO2. The hydrogen then gets "burned" to generate energy and water. Again, this isn't blue sky stuff, it exists now.
Interestingly, water-based fuel cells can work as well. Some prototypes exist, but they're solar powered and the catalysts which breaks the water down into hydrogen and oxygen don't have a lot of catalytic cycles before they die. Also, they're VERY expensive, which is the big reason why they're not being used, even if they have great potential use.
-When going for broke, go for Ithaca!
At least one company claims to have a workable ethanol fuel cell, which would not have the toxicity problems of methanol. http://www.eetimes.com/story/OEG20010713S0075 They reportedly demo'd it running off plain vodka. "Stewardess! I need a refill, for, um, my laptop!"
>;k
How long before we'll have vending machines dishing out fully-charged batteries (and accepting your discharged ones in return, only to charge them and put them back in circulation) ? Just an idea...
As an experiment, try splashing a few drops of methanol on your hand and enjoy as you kiss your eyesight goodbye. And you thought gas with MBTE was bad!
Methanol sux - don't ever forget that. It's a scam by gas producers to keep sucking money out of your wallet while continuing to fuck up the environment.
We want hydrogen god-damnit (yes, harvested from water via wind, solar, geothermal etc)! Cut the bullshit!
Proteus
Haven't we been using stuff like lead-acid batteries for years...What's so dangerous about having to use another highly toxic product for our energy needs?
I guess the moderator doesn't have a very good sense of humor.
If you don't understand any of my sayings, come to me in private and I shall take you in my German mouth.
This doesn't work, I have proof. It may be more than my job's worth to reveal it though. If enough people want to see it, I'll post it up here.
Methanol is only poisonous if you chug a few ounces of it. That's why they put it in denatured rubbing alcohol. You can't suffer any harm from inhaling a few milliliters of the stuff.
Also, its not explosive. Alcohol WILL NOT EXPLODE. It just burns. It's not as volatile as gasoline. The fire danger is much less than if you carry a lighter in your pocket.
If you don't understand any of my sayings, come to me in private and I shall take you in my German mouth.
I'm just waiting for a laptop I can power off my venting ass.
I used to wonder what was so holy about a silent night, now I have a child.
I used to use methanol in an ultrasonic cleaner to remove crud from instrument parts. After the sonic bath, I would use a spray bottle of methanol to hose the deposit dissolved alcohol from the parts. I have gotten quite a bit of it on my hands and it did not make me go blind or even so much as get dizzy. I worked in a well ventilated room and neither drank or deliberately inhaled the stuff. It's toxic if you drink it or inhale a boatload of it.
A few drops on your hand will NOT make one go blind. Gasoline is more dangerous than this stuff.
BTW I sense some flames coming so I will point out the ultrasonic cleaner was NOT filled with methanol. The tub held water as usual and the parts were put in a little tupperware dish of methanol. The tupperware dish was covered and THEN put into the cleaner. Once the parts were cleaned and rinsed with fresh methanol, they were allowed to drip dry and then baked out in a lab oven.
Well, you know those crazy Japanese. We can expect to see sex robots with silver dildos on each of their 18 tentacle arms raping hog-tied schoolgirls for HOURS and HOURS on their methanol batteries.
Raping school girls? It's not really something to laugh at. I'm not sure why anyone would think of a child as a sex object, but keep it to yourself. The rest of us should throw some stones at you so other demented loosers are not encouraged. Those who actually do such evil things should be put to death.
Here are a few rocks for you:
off topic. Why not just talk about how nice your new RC Airplane would fly on one of these? Hell, if you enjoy a vibrator tell us about it, but rape?
overrated. dude, it's not funny.
troll. you knew better.
flamebait. Rest of World outraged. Americans, embarrased and outraged.
DMCA, Hollings, Palladium. What might have sounded like paranoia is now common sense.
There are too many preannouncements in the fuel cell business, and very few products shipping. Ballard Power Systems maintains the illusion of having a product line, but when you look closely, you can't actually order units and get delivery. Everything is a prototype.
Does anybody know:
* if this is the same technology that Motorola presented a year ago?
* who owns the patents to these concepts?
______________________________________________
sigamajig...
for linking to a site which is way more interesting than anything around here.
Don't read this!
People tended to drink all of it and the equipment ran dead.
Does anyone know if it would be possible to use fuel cells in place of large diesel enigines?
For example: Locomotive engines use a giant diesel engine to power a generator, the generator in turn powers electric motors that turn the wheels. If you replaced the diesel engine with a shit-load of fuel cells, you lose the weight of the engine and generator and have no emissions, but would there be sufficient torque to pull several thousand tons of rail cars?
Another use would be for industrial UPS's or maybe even larger fuel cell plants to supply residential electricity.
Would any of this be practical?
A vacuum is a hell of a lot better than some of the stuff that nature replaces it with. - Tennessee Williams
The point of making fuel out of biomass is that all the CO2 that is released has previously been removed from the atmosphere by the plants to produce the biomass in the first place. Thus, the overall amount of extra CO2 is zero, as opposed to fossile fuels that release CO2 that has been removed from the atmosphere for many millions of years.
The illegal we do immediately. The unconstitutional takes a little longer.
--Henry Kissinger
I hope the Japanese have found a way to safely transport and fill methanol or we'll be playing with fire.
Ignoring toxicity (perhaps not great in the quantity of one single device, but imagine the logistics of distribution and storage), one often overlooked hazard with methanol is that it burns with an invisible flame. You don't become aware of a methanol fire until you feel the pain; then it's too late.
California tried using pure methanol as a low-emission alternative fuel, but ultimately had to blend 15% conventional gasoline / 85% methanol to avert this hazard by producing a visible flame. The resulting mixture is known as M85.
Back in the old days, we had methylated spirits, an ethanol/methanol mixture. Some people drank it and went blind.
However, at least one legitamate use was lighting the Tilley Storm Lantern, a pressurised parrafin lanp. To get the mantle up to temperature to burn the parrafin mist/vapour, you had to light a heater composed of wad of cloth which had been soaked in meths. The stuff was also often used as a solvent for cleaning, less so now, but it still gets used.
See my journal, I write things there
Medis's cell also runs on ethanol. See here:t or yid=270
http://evworld.com/databases/storybuilder.cfm?s
I like your comment about methanol being made from biomass, but its use (maybe production too) would still release carbon dioxide.
The good thing about fuel cells is that they are highly efficient (not restricted like a heat engine), so their CO2 impact is likely to be less than using combustion to produce electricity.
No the amount of carbon dioxide produced is going to be exactly the same (unless someone can produce a hydrocarbon fuel cell which also grows diamonds.)
The important issue is that the carbon in biomass derived fuels was carbon dioxide a short time ago. So by using such fuels little change is made to the proportion of carbon dioxide in the air. Since on average for every carbon atom coming out of the "engine" as carbon dioxide a molecure of carbon dioxide is being taken into a plant used to produce the fuel.
At least one company claims to have a workable ethanol fuel cell, which would not have the toxicity problems of methanol.
:)
Ethanol is still fairly toxic, just that a fair proportion of people have mechanisms for dealing with it. Because their ancestors dealt with contaminated drinking water by turning it into beer. (Presumably people who's ancestors made tea are more likely to be resistant to the kinds of chemicals plants put in their leaves...)
They reportedly demo'd it running off plain vodka.
For a fuel cell you want as pure as possible a fuel. It certainly wouldn't like it with tonic water added
I read that methanol's main use currently is in window washer
fluid.
It is much safer than gasoline; it has been used at the Indy
500 ever since a major fire in the 60's or 70's. I read that
Henry Ford built a car out of mostly hemp; and it was
powered by methanol, which can be made from hemp.
Unfortunately, our government is fighting a war on drugs right
now, so hemp-based products might be illegal; whether or
not they are safer and better for the environment.
And on that topic, look at how toxic it is to make Nylon,
when hemp fibers are just as good and grow naturally,
and don't require disgusting pesticides and processing
like cotton.
Yet another opportunity for the obligatory "Get an iPod" post. I swear, you can post that on almost any story now!
Am I going to have to take my laptop for a pee?
No sig here. Move along.
I saw a documentary where a farm family collected methane from their pig sty and used it as cooking
fuel. This has to have some applications for transporatation -- a self-fueling pig-truck!
Think of the implications for the cattle-transportation industry.
-Your favorite sig goes here-
I'm sure that today you will be visited by members of the FBI and Secret Service, who wish to know of your al-Qaeda links. Please post your experience in a follow-up.
"What is the sound of one belly slapping?"
I lived in Tokyo for a summer and I never saw anything like that. People will produce things to satisfy a market. Don't assume the Japaneese are pedofiles because you find yourself wading though kiddie porn from Japan. MAMBA does not make the US a nation of pederasts. If anything, the Japanese are healthier about sex than the US.
I'll take my beating for being offtopic as long as the offensive parrent, and you get taken down.
DMCA, Hollings, Palladium. What might have sounded like paranoia is now common sense.
Gee I hope someone has figured out a way to safely transport and fill GASOLINE or we'll be playing with fire.
Gee I hope someone has figured out a way to safely transort and fill DEISEL or we'll be playing with fire.
Gee I hope someone has figured out a way to safely transport and fill PROPANE or we'll be playing with fire.
Gee I hope someone has figured out a way to safely transport and fill BUTANE or we'll be playing with fire.
Gee I hope someone has figured out a way to safely transport and fill NATURAL GAS or we'll be playing with fire.
Can anybody think of any other fuels in common use today that we can add to this?
If Mr. Edison had thought smarter he wouldn't sweat as much. --Nikola Tesla
. it really pisses ya off when you submit the exact same story a few days earlier only to be rejected.
Your hair look like poop, Bob! - Wanker.
2001-12-30 02:52:39 Fuel cell PDA's in the near future. (science,tech) (rejected)
HAHAH! beat ya!!!
Your hair look like poop, Bob! - Wanker.
Try International Fuel Cells!! The "Woking Project" is a good example of a working fuel cell. See the full project details at FutureEnergies.com check out the Woking website !! all the best Gordon Foat
Methanol has been a fixture in fuel cell development for some time now. It seems like storing hydrogen itself is going to offer the best efficiency and "energy density" - the number of watts per kilogram of cell - the key figure for most applications. The biggest problem with how fuel cells are promoted is that they are said to be a way to "burn" fuels like hydrogen or methanol. While that's true, that's not at ALL what makes fuel cells interesting! The cool part is that you can use them as regenerative cells - like a regular battery - to STORE energy very efficiently. In other words, you can keep re-using the same hydrogen over and over again, like a lead acid or NiCad or NiMH cell does, but without extraneous processes that eat up efficiency. The future is in recharging fuel cells, not in dumping new, different toxic substances into your car. Remember, a few drops of methanol will blind you. Not much more will kill you. No thanks.
So, we're both cheated. Join the club.
as the fuel is used up, the bag shrinks, voila, no fuel vapor.
Hope to see you there.
Pat
Fuel cells produce water as one of their waste products right.
Do I *realy* want water dripping out from my mobile when I use it? - I think not.
Wet pactches in your pocket. - no thanks.
I suppose it could be stored in a little tank, so you could squirt it at your mates or drink it 9-).
"Oh no, not again"
Yeah, I know. Juvenile. :-p
Then I'd have an excuse to carry one of those cool silver flasks filled with vodka.
It's just for my laptop, dear!
Anybody want a peanut?