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Toshiba Develops World's Smallest Fuel Cells
An anonymous reader writes "When you think of Toshiba, you might think of notebooks, but fuel cells? Never. Well, at least not until up to now. Toshiba claims to have made the world's smallest fuel cell to date. The direct methanol fuel cell can fit inside of the smallest of gadgets, ranging from MP3 Players to portal DVD Players. Most fuel cells require a pump that can mix the methanol and water, and a fan to help cool the pump. This makes installing fuel cells in smaller items out of the question. However, Toshiba's new fuel cell does not require a fan or a pump to operate, which means it's much smaller in size, and can be installed in almost any small device."
Motorola designed this sort of thing in 2000, and it's smaller.
That what was all this school was for... to teach us how to solve our own problems. -- janeowit
Hours of runtime, and portable, which makes it better than a shower massage. Carpe technology...
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
One would think that the lack of a pump and fan would improve the effeciency, as well.
Toshiba's fuel cell lacks any so called "safety features" meaning it could blow up at any time. Makes using electronics seem XTREME.
Considering the summary here a good 9/10 of whats in the linked Overclockers Club here's some links from some more normal news outlets
Your hair look like poop, Bob! - Wanker.
It is I who has developed the world's smallest fuel cells. See them here:
See? They are so small that you can't even see them. Toshiba has a long way to go before they catch up with me.
On the other side, we will now be able to talk on our cell phone anywhere any time. No loger will 'my battery is dead' be an accetable reason for not calling the boss back. Gee, thanks guys.
I stole this sig.
...Is a fule cell that produces 2 things, electricity for our gear and as a byproduct of the energy it makes some form of caffienated beverage.
Dear aunt, let's set so double the killer delete select all
More info from . If that link doesn't work (it has a session ID I couldn't remove), try looking at the EE Times front page
One third of the volume of the device is fuel; if you doubled the volume, you'd get 4x the life.
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TOKYO -- Toshiba Corp. has developed a matchbox-sized direct methanol fuel cell (DMFC) with no moving parts.
The prototype measures 22 x 56 mm with a thickness of 4.5 mm and includes a 2-cc capacity fuel tank. The fuel cell weighs 8.5 grams, and has an output power of 100 mW. Using a 99.5-percent concentration of methanol, the fuel cell can power low-power consumption devices such as MP3 audio players for about 20 hours, Toshiba said. Toshiba divides its DMFC development into two types, "active" and "passive." The new passive fuel cell aims for higher power -- more than 10 W at 10-20V generated by active systems, which use a pump and fan to feed methanol and oxygen into a cell stack where oxygen reacts with the methanol to produce electricity.
Toshiba unveiled an active prototype to power notePCs last spring, and plans to introduce a product later this year.
The passive model features a simpler structure, making use of the concentration gradient to feed methanol and oxygen to the cell stack. "We eliminated mechanical components such as a fan and fuel pump used in active-type DMFCs. Instead, we devised a way to supply fuel and air uniformly," said Fumio Ueno, a technology executive at Toshiba Display Device & Components Control Center.
Toshiba engineers reduced catalyst particles nanometer size. The electrodes measure 2 x 3 cm, but deliver the same output power as Toshiba's conventional DMFC using electrodes five times larger.
Toshiba plans to introduce the small DMFC with an output power of about 100 mW sometime next year.
Toshiba engineers said the fuel cell can power some portable devices such audio players. "We'll work on improving the output, then the fuel cell can power cellular phones," said Kazunori Fukuma, managing director of Toshiba Display Devices & Components Control Center.
For cellphone applications, Toshiba is targeting an output level of 2W at 4V. "More functions are implemented in a cellular phone, such as TV reception. This will increase the need for fuel cells," Fukuma said.
Initially, it will be difficult to replace current lithium ion batteries with DMFCs, and a hybrid configuration may make the most sense. The fuel cell could charge the lithium ion battery when the phone is idle.
HIV Crosses Species Barrier... into Muppets
I assume these things are perfectly safe to use?
since the battery is their weakest link.
Wonder how long it takes when we see iPod or iRiver or other hard-drive based players with cell inside.
They do after all emit co2. I wonder if you can smell them?
DPReview has a pic of it.
b af uel.asp
http://www.dpreview.com/news/0406/04062401toshi
If the items are so small then how much energy can they realistically generate? Sure, I may get an extra five hours of my iPod, but if I have to go though the trouble of refilling the damn thing instead of just plugging it in, then I don't see the point.
I like portable fuel cells for laptop use because you can get about 18 hours out of one cell, which is great for flights to India, but when else do you really need that much battery life?
GroupShares Inc. - An Interactive Stock Market Community
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artlu.net
Or is that an entendre?
call it a battery! and we'd run all sort of magical devices on them ;P
I like muppets.
Wonder if you're on an airplane and a despresurization happens, the fuel cell blows and nobody can see the flames (because they're invisible). can you flight safe carring one of these?
How long before I can get one converted over to ethanol, and installed in my stomach to use excess fuel to power my array of personal electronics?
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
From the post:
:-)
"ranging from MP3 Players to portal DVD Players"
What's a portal DVD player? Is that like a Stargate?
If you want true portable methane power, find a way to harness the awesome effects of my award winning Split Pea Soup! A small hose could be ran from the "back end" of the methane converter to a meriad of electronic devices. My wife can vouch for the consistent power output.
Yeah, I guess I'm funny like that.
methanol is highly flammible i dont think i would be too worried about 2cc's of it, even with it sitting in my lap.
Another article reports that the power output is only 100 milliwatts for the 8.5 gm device. This suggests that a 1/2 kg version of the thing would only put out 5.9 watts - not enough to power a laptop. It looks like an interesting powersource for low-power devices, but anything with a backlit display or modern mobile processor is probably not feasible with this tiny unit.
Two wrongs don't make a right, but three lefts do.
More can be read here...
News links from google...
I suppose in the near future we'll all have huge methanol tanks in our homes so that we can "recharge" all of our many fuel cell devices.
Someone better un-invent house fires.
I even RTFA and didn't see any mention of how much they might cost.
John Kerry is a Joke!
Here is another article related to the fuel cell in question, and what they are going to use it for. http://quote.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000080& sid=a5sZn3vGo1js&refer=asia I haven't seen anything on cost yet, anyone heard?
When I think of Toshiba, I think of plastics, bulk chemicals, PLC's, motors, instrumentation, batteries, X-ray machines, and I'm not sure that they still do this, but they used to even be into heavy machinery . . . as well as computers, semiconductors and consumer electronics. Are fuel cells really a stretch?
Does the author of the topic really think that /. readers are that naive?
This is great! Now can we finally buy one of these f00king things? Or must we be constantly taunted with these advances only available as prototypes to large multi-national corporations and well financed government labs...
*Condense fact from the vapor of nuance*
Along with yet another article regarding Toshiba's new fuel cell, Fuel Cell Today has some other interesting news items regarding Fuel Cell technology worth reading.
This is great, but is there any word on how much methanol something like this would go through? More importantly, when are Radio Shack and K-Mart going to begin distributing methanol? I'll need to pick some up on my way out of town.
Then don't think about the lithium ion cells in your laptop/cell phone right now, because they have extremely high energy densities(the battery pack in my Powerbook 17" is probably the same volume as a CD jewel case, and yet contains 61 Watt-hours of power), and require careful management by the device to keep from entering thermal runaway mode, where the battery gets hotter and hotter until it explodes- and I do mean -explodes-. Rather violently.
For several years(possibly still) battery companies wouldn't sell Lithium Ion batteries to anyone except certified "solution providers" to assure the batteries had proper charging and monitoring.
Please help metamoderate.
"Toshiba Develops World's Smallest Fuel Cells"
Actually no. Your cells have the world's smallest fuel cell. And they were first.
Most fuel cells require a pump that can mix the methanol and water, and a fan to help cool the pump.
I read several of the articles linked here, but I don't understand why the original article implies that this fuel cell is special because it doesn't a pump to mix methanol and water . . . this implies that water is needed by most fuel cells . . . which brings me to the crux of my question . . why is water needed in the first place? According to other posters, this fuel cell uses 99.5% pure methanol . . . which would imply no (or very little need for water). I assume that the methanol is oxidized in the presence of catalyst to form water and carbon dioxide, but is water needed for this process? Maybe to disassociate the -OH from the CH3+?
iPod
Jonathanjk.com
Ballard stocks have already gone up and down several times. If you invested say 10 years ago you would have made a killing. You've pretty much missed the boat now.
Moo!
Fuel cells, holographic memory cubes (1 inch cubed please), OLED monitors for your laptop/desktop...
/. stories over the last 5 years.
they are all fscking vaporware - and they comprise at least 1% of all
i vote on a ban against all these stories until the story is....
"(insert technology) deivces arrive at Best Buy"
guns kill people like spoons make Rosie O'Donnell fat.
Who thinks of tractors when they think of Hitachi? Probably just about no one but they do make them. These Japanese conglomerates are huge and they have their fingers in a whole lot of pies.
... and here in New Zealand there's a market for 70million MP3 players for sheep.
Engineering is the art of compromise.
You may think I am overly worried, but having a can of compressed methanol sitting around to power kids iPods causes visions them huffing the stuff to pop into my head.
The inhalant fact sheet at rimrock.org has methanol listed as a common inhalent.
Does anybody know of any studies being done to see what having EASY access to methanol will do?
It is normal for several companies to have the same name in Japan. They are often associated, but not necessarily the same company.
As for me, I remember Toshiba has many arms. A division (C.Itoh) of an associated company Itochu sold equipment to the USSR in 1989 or so that allowed the USSR to make their submarines more quiet so we couldn't track them.
Toshiba suffered through import tariffs for a while due to this (not long enough IMHO).
Every time I think of fuel cells, I think back to the couple of times in Terminator 3 when Arnold cut himself open and chucked a blinking hunk of circuitry, followed by a huge explosion.
Perhaps manufacturers of these fuel cells should take note, as it would be a great theft deterrent.
methane = CH4; methanol = CH3OH
At least they do here - large quantities of methylated spirit (the same thing) is available over the counter for houshold use. It's very cheap too, about AU$5 for 2 litres. Not sure if this stuff would be sufficiently pure for a fuel cell though.
I wonder will passengers be permitted to board an aircraft with items that are powered by these fuel cells? Heck, the fearful fascists take away cigarette lighters. Why not fuel cells?
Who wants safe?!? Of course it's not safe!
We like to design things that catch on fire or, better yet, blow up. We want our customers to be mamed or killed. If you don't have the guts to risk dismemberment or death, you are not worthy of our product!
Sure the cells themselves are fine, but will you be allowed to take a pressurized canister of combustible gas on the plane??
"Toshiba claims to of made the worlds smallest fuel cell to date."
Does that make anyone else wince in pain?
now for the oil companies to find some way to put a stop on this area of research.
dpreview has an blurb that is much more comprehensive. And, to spread the hits, you can see the original press release The content of the two links is the same, only the background color and periphery information is different. (dpreview is black; toshiba is white)
Er... If you're flying a plane and in a situation where the cabin is de-pressurizing, a few tiny flames doing damage to the innards of your laptop should be the LEAST of your worries.
I don't know about you, but I would be more concerned with dying of asphyxia, or crashing, or the terrorist who shot the hole in the plane, or whatever the hell else made the cabin de-pressurize.
For the curious: don't try it. I used to work for a battery manufacturer. Suffice it to say that if one of the chemical tanks were to rupture, they would have had to evacuate most of that city immediately because of the toxic gas. And that's just one ingredient.
Trust me, it's not worth it, even if you're curious. You might regret it for the rest of your (short?) life!
Here's a link to the press release. It has more details than the link in the main article. http://www.prnewswire.com
Perhaps, because this fuel cell is so small, you don't need the same safety features that a larger cell would need. The plastic casing might be enough to contain a 'catastrophic failure'.
Kinda like that christmas tree sized nuclear reactor that just doesn't have enough mass to melt down...
I don't read AC A human right
but bigger in Cleveland.
Now wash your hands.
CO2 is poisonous when it replaces all of the avaliable Oxygen for humans to breathe
Obviously the refill market will be interesting for these batteries. Will the manufacture try to make its money upfront or will you have to buy the special concentration of methanol from the manufacture.
If its the latter its time to fire up my companies GC mass spec and find out the concentrations.
Maybe the best way for companies to prevent refills wihout using their refills would be to build a sepcial refilling adapter for the fuel cell.
Anyway I hope they charge the price up-front on the fuel cells. And then offer refills to people who don't want to make there own solutions.
Veramocor
I used to invest in Manhattan Technologies (mhtx), which made micro fuel cells that ran off methanol, before they ran out of money and went into hibernation. These things were manufactured using printed circuit technology on plastic sheets, no moving parts, rolled up pretty small. They made prototypes, but never divulged which technical details were keeping them from going production. They've got lots of patents. They'll probably wake up and sue anyone who actually succeeds in manufacturing small fuel cells.
Hello dear frient nasebähr ohwnz!!!
This account has been seized by the GNAA. That is all.
Well, last I checked.
As to it not being out of the ordinary, well, they are one of the few to be sanctioned for it, so if it is common, few get caught.
Anyway, this wasn't arms, this was machining equipment to make arms. Rare equipment they couldn't get elsewhere (at least then).
methanol, bad
ethanol, good
Every time a fuelcell announcement is posted to Slashdot (and elsewhere), there are immediately panicked replies about fires and explosions. Of course prudence requires caution with any new, unprecedented technology. But have you ever noticed an *actual* fire or explosion problem with *any* fuelcell, at least in the last 5 years?
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make install -not war
That parent post lacks any so called "insight" or information, meaning it was posted by an Anonymous Coward talking shit. Makes typing seem like posting.
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make install -not war
and just wait until they start turning purple and falling off.
Oh, what was I talking about? You have no clue! HAHA!
They didn't just pick green for fun, green on black provides very good contrast with little eye strain.
Blue's a good background colour too, lots of Dyslexia associated sites recomend it.
thank God the internet isn't a human right.
Methyl alcohol is also known as "methanol", and also known as rubbing alcohol. Rubbed into human skin. For theraputic purposes, including relief from pain. In other news: don't chew your Li/ion battery.
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make install -not war
Imagine a world where you could recharge your cell phone by finding a coin op fuel dispenser unit (which could be as ubiquitos as pay phones in urban areas)..
:)
Some of my friends like to bemoan how we will never be able to get off of oil dependence but I tell them "necessity is the mother of invention".
Nice to see
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om Shanti
Have fun trying to compress a liquid.
givent hat nearest example abeit a poor one is racing cars with methanol fuel cells, such as Nascar, how do they plan to account for static charges not setting of the vapours?
Don't Tread on OpenSource
These fuel cells are powered by Methanol, or wood alchohol, instead of Ethanol, the stuff you can drink. So the ATF wouldn't be involved if you're makeing/distilling methanol. Other agencies might be involved for the safety aspect, but as long as you produce it yourself on your own property, you shouldn't be bothered.
On the other hand, I can see it getting quite expensive to produce the quality that these cells probably require to keep from fouling/ruining the catalyst.
I don't read AC A human right
Fill it with alcohol instead and we have the dawn of a new 'can-less' technology
Stop invalid scientific research. Ask your local scientists to feed their lab rats with a phytoestrogen-free chow.
yeah, methanol is bad IF YOU DRINK IT. In terms of flammability there isn't much difference.
I won't jump on board until they make a fuel cell that runs on methane. Thate way all of the sugar alcohol in those damn low carb candy bars that I eat could run my laptop, instead of running my wife out of the house. A battery that runs on farts will surely win the nobel prize.
rubbing alcohol is ISOPROPYL alcohol
maybe they could use methanol, but they don't and here's why:
if you ingest isopropyl alcohol, you get unpleasant/painful gastric disturbances and everybody laughs at you for being a loser
if you ingest methanol your body metabolizes it into formeldahyde and (if you drank enough, a moderate amount) you die
When you think of Toshiba, you might think of notebooks, but fuel cells? Never. Well, at least not until up to now.
When I think of fuel cells, I ONLY think of Toshiba:
http://www.toshiba.co.jp/product/fc/fce/
currently it runs about 81 cents / gallon.
And since fuel cells last 2-10 times longer than batteries... the future is bright indeed for them.
The only catch i see is the difficulty in recharging on the road. I mean, I can take my rechargable battery charger and plug it into any electrical outlet and keep batteries fresh. One would need to either a. Find a place that sells recharges or b. Carry some kind of portable recharger that holds a few ounces of methanol in it but has yet to be invented...
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missed the boat? stocks tend to fluctuate, and stocks in -relatively- speculative technologies much more so. Obviously one cannot predict the future.
Also obvious is that there are periods where speculation in this industry is rampant, and shares of these companies surge. Equally obvious is that there are times when relatively, there is mild interest in this sector, and share prices reflect that.
I would argue that right now, interest is fairly mild compared to recent history.
And, if you are one who believes that fuel cells will, in the forseeable future, become mainstream, it stands to reason that that fact will become appreciated in the price of a diversified portfolio of companies in the sector.
Due to the huge fluctuations, though, build a portfolio a little bit at a time, and be patient.
The Bloomberg article offers some insight into the business strategy. The plan here is to make units that require a "fuel cartridge". "Fuel cartridges" contain just methanol and water, but will have markups previously seen only for printer ink. Toshiba expects to make ten times as much on the "fuel cartridges" as they do on the fuel cells.
Look for strategies to prevent "refilling".
Analogy wise it holds. Also it's reenforced from the function POV of it's output (i.e. ATP==Electricity)
When a stock splits several times its pretty easy to see that you've missed the best time to buy. Several my friends made a killing on this a couple years ago.
Moo!
I had a disposable lighter explode (left it on the dashboard, Doh!). The nasty sharp shards went all over the inside of the car, making me glad I wasn't in the car when it went off.
They whose government reduces their essential liberties for temporary security, receive neither liberty nor security.
Would something like this work in a very high altitude, Where the Oxygen is a little more thin? I know gasoline engines have some trouble operating at high altitude. I suppose you would haveto go quite high up for it to be a problem. Just a thought...
I wan't that can work with wiskey, rum, gim or anything like that...
;)
That way i would only carry one bottle
i'm happy for your friends. i'm not saying it's the best time to buy any specific stock, or the best time to buy the companies in and related to fuel cells. I am taking the perspective of a person who is for the first time taking seriously the idea that fuel cells will become a dominant technology in the foreseeable future. If one came to that conclusion now, for the first time, and one wondered whether they should bet on that predicted future by taking a piece of a handful of fuel cell companies, they'd want to know whether at the current time, those companies are being highly appreciated by the market, at least with respect to recent history. In other words, you'd like to get a sense of whether you are currently a sheep running with or against the herd. Clearly, you generally want to be running against. I would argue that right now, the industry isn't seeing a lot of enthusiasm. However, I have made no argument about how much of that could be considered an expected correlation with broader market.
Whether one or more of today's fuel cell company's explode in value from today's prices, and becomes a leader in a huge industry, I can't say, and you can't either, but I do think that a diversified approach to companies in the industry is a good way to put your money where your predictions are about the near-ish term future of energy technology, and looking at the last handful of years, you could obviously have chosen a much worse time than now to get started.
no... in the end of the 20th century and into the 21st necessity is the mother of all wars.
I think our governments would rather fight a war than think seriously about removing the dependancy on fossil fuels. It keeps the separation between the "haves" and the "have-nots".
Now, what I've subjectively and non-empirically experienced is that on my first screen, an old CRT-thing, white on black was the only thing that worked, and I set my browser to override the color selection on all pages.
On my second screen, a notebook TFT, black on a pastel (say black on light yellow) was the way to go.
On my last two notebook screens (they've been of the same make) black on white works just fine; and the subpixel rendering makes white on black almost unworkable - that algo seems optimized for black on white. Or maybe it's just my screen, but pages with white on black are much harder to read.
So while I do understand the "I love white on black"-position, since I've been there, I'd rather want all web pages out there to be consistent. No one is going to change them all over at the same time.
How can one have missed the boat when the Ballard stocks are wallowing around their lowest price since over 5 years, around a 1/20th of their peak. They're priced with the recognition that Ballard failed to fulfil their promises and that profits and mass-production are still 20 years away if ever.
If you believe that on the contrary Ballard has a bright future then they're currently a _real_ cheap buy.
How (or why) did you even know about that site?
..........FULL STOP.
... Because im already in the process of patent a new technology, and im going to sue everybody on this subject.
Its about "holding any type of alcoholic derivate inside the human body, or any substance with alcohol added, while carrying any portable electronic device that could be powered with alcohol/methanol/etc."
Bill G. III
PD: Eh, Moe, pay me the pending licenses of your bar!!!
COOL. Now farts could be covered up with malfunctioning fuel cells. :P
"Oh Shit, my skin data bus running Windows crashed causing fuel cell explosion"
were the developers of the technology. Motorola designed circuitry to efficiently convert the low voltage output of the fuel cell to the voltages required to power electronic devices.
This fuel cell technology was the result of PUBLICLY-FUNDED research.
Pain is merely failure leaving the body
I am leading a group of engineers trying to harness the incredible power of stupidity. Did you know that some tv shows, commercials and press releases are a great untapped source of power?
This week's issue of EE-Times has a front page article about this type battery developed by MTI Micro of Albany, New York, USA.
The article mentions competitors developing this technology as Casio, Fujitsu, Hitachi, Medis Technologies, NEC, Samsung and Toshiba.
The article in your link says it was developed at Los Alamos National Labs. Motorola was working with them. Translate that as "providing monetary support fot the research project".
THere is an interesting article in EE-Times. There is also another article in EE Times for June 24. http://www.eetimes.com/showArticle.jhtml?articleID =22100684
a few weeks ago Stork aerospace announced a small fuel cell kindoff device that can run on various fuels.
Fuels like lighter gas and liquid, gasoline,diesel, lampoil but also solid fuels like stearine candles). It uses easy to replace cannisters that can be refilled instantly. The whole package can be made as small as a AA battery, but has significant better performance and can sustain itrs power longer.
It is smaller than the one presented by Thosiba.
Perhaps we can suggest to the Laser Monks that they branch out into fuel cell cartridge refilling.