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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
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
DPReview has a pic of it.
b af uel.asp
http://www.dpreview.com/news/0406/04062401toshi
They do after all emit co2. I wonder if you can smell them?
o mp /co2.html
"Carbon dioxide is a colourless odourless gas"
http://www.ucc.ie/ucc/depts/chem/dolchem/html/c
"The universe seems neither benign nor hostile, merely indifferent." --Carl Sagan
It should makes you more than a little uncomfortable to know that many types of batteries have highly combustible and/or toxic and/or corrosive materials in them. Try opening a lithium-ion battery and putting the contents in a glass of water to see what happens... No, I just remembered, this is Slashdot so maybe someone will try this. Do NOT open any batteries, ever. The contents in most of them is more dangerous than methanol.
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...
Perhaps a RTFA is in order.
The tiny fuel cell uses 2cc of concentrated methanol to provide 20 hours of power at 100 milliwatts, max.
With regard to refilling. This will be done with a can of compressed methanol. Simply plug the can into the cell for a few seconds and you're good to go for another 20 hours. This process will be very similar to the way that butane cigarette lighters are refilled and have been for more than 30 years. Just for the record, butane is much more flamable/explosive than methanol. Yet, when last did you read of a can of butane or a refillable cigarette lighter exploding?
I assume these things are perfectly safe to use?
Perfectly safe? Sorry bubble boy, but even a padded chamber isn't perfectly safe.
These are reasonably safe, though. For any oxygen combustable fuel to flame you need the fuel in a gaseous or vaporized form within a sufficiently (but not too high) oxygen rich environment.
The small amount of fuel that's in this device would have to turn to gas and flame in the air. You wouldn't be able to fit enough air inside the canister and enable the methanol to turn to gas to cause an explosion. However the space is small enough that it isn't feasable until the canister is empty (only vapor remains). Even then oxygen isn't allowed in the canister. Even then they have overpressure vents which would, at most, cause this device to "vent with flame," as most manufacturers claim LI-ION device may due in the worst cases.
So - reasonably safe yes, perfectly safe, no. Safe enough to prevent multi-mullion dollar liability suits? You bet.
It's all about the bottom line.... Heh, heh, heh.
-Adam
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.
Why would it be pressurized? methanol exists as a liquid at standard temperature & pressure.
It would be like refilling a zippo, or a lawnmower, or a motorbike.. not like refilling propane or a butane lighter or anything like that.
Explosions are not a real hazard. Methanol is a liquid and the container is not pressurized. Making lightweight liquid-proof containers is not extremely challenging and furthermore, the amount of methanol can't be very large in a device that small. The worst-case scenario I can think of is that you might be able to break the methanol container and start a small fire.
The aim of science is not to open the door to infinite wisdom, but to set a limit to infinite error.
-Bertolt Brecht
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.
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!
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.
You might not have noticed, but fuelcells have been deployed in larger sizes for several years. And last year a small one was certified for airplane travel. So where does this persistent panic come from? Seems purely imaginary.
BTW, the Slashdot Oracle at page bottom-right currently sez:
"Imagination is the one weapon in the war against reality. -- Jules de Gaultier"
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make install -not war
Crispin