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CES: Tiny Fuel Cell is Supposed to Charge a Cell Phone for Two Weeks (Video)
Many of us have plug-in external batteries of one sort to recharge our smart phones when we're away from power outlets. Or we have gigantic aftermarket batteries that make our phones so fat they barely fit in our pockets. So there is this company, Lilliputian Power Systems, that is just starting to market a tiny, butane-powered fuel cell they call the Nectar that plugs into your cell phone (or whatever) through a USB port and supposedly charges it for up to two weeks. That's a lot better than an add-on battery. It looks expensive, although the power "pods" aren't too pricey at $19.99 for two. But wait a minute: Why aren't fuel cells, not internal combustion engines, the "range extenders" in plug-in hybrid cars? A decade back, fuel cells were going to revolutionize our power delivery and consumption systems. A cell phone charger is cute, but is that really all we can get fuel cells to do?
We'll all eventually have cheap fuel cell chargers, but not for about another 20 years or so when the developers are sure they wont get patent-trolled for releasing a product.
Sometimes it's a heat issue, sometimes it's weight, sometimes its some other physics law.
excitingthingstodo.blogspot.com
To answer the question of "Why aren't fuel cells, not internal combustion engines, the "range extenders" in plug-in hybrid cars?" posed in the TFS...
In this case, the fuel cell is powered by butane. Butane is not readily available, in pure form, in large, easily transferable quantities all over the world. Gasoline, however, is. I understand that butane itself isn't rare, but the ability to get a fair quantity of it safely into my vehicle in a few minutes is.
"Many of us have plug-in external batteries of one sort to recharge our smart phones when we're away from power outlets."
You mean your iPhones not Smartphones.
We with real Smartphones just switch the internal battery with one of our dozen full ones.
Depending on the cost, this might make a nifty power supply for Raspberry Pi or Arduino based robots.
"A dead battery means important missed calls and emails, no GPS when you’re lost, no e-reader on your train ride, no communication in an emergency, and an overall feeling of dread and anxiety."
Yes, they actually say that. May I be the first to recommend spending less on fancing charging gadgets and more on anxiolytic lifestyle aids, like benzodiazepines or heavy drinking?
So, that means I should be able to go down to the tobacco shop, get a can of compressed lighter fluid, and refill the charger on the cheap, right?
No? You're telling me I have to go buy proprietary cartridges that will, without doubt, cost far more than a can of commercial butane?
Yea, you can shove that over-priced, over-hyped bullshit right where the sun don't shine, Bucko.
An enigma, wrapped in a riddle, shrouded in bacon and cheese
The actual small print: $19.99 is for the power cells. The charger that the cells and your phone plug in to doesn't even have a price listed yet, which probably means it costs hundreds. Oh, and it's also not available yet, and pre-orders are sold out.
Slashdot fact-checking fails again. Great job, guys!
Ask those guys who make the TSA body scanners.
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I have a 1500mAh battery pack module with a full-sized USB port and a power-pin-only 5-pin USB micro cable, 4" long, in my jacket pocket at all times. So it's a reserve battery for any device and it'll charge 1 phone or 1/4 of 1 tablet or some portion of a GPS unit but so what? On the other side, it has a solar panel and a charging indicator, that's what! Take that, pocket full of unstable, flammable gas. So solar panel vs butane....yeah, I'll stick with my solution, thanks. In direct sunlight, it doesn't take real long to recharge the entire battery pack either. Yeah, I'm out of luck at night but considering I can get 21 days of idle runtime on my Samsung R640 on one charge from this reserve battery, I think I can find some sunlight after depleting it.
I believe I heard this Nectar device exceeds $300, or so they stated at CES. Mine cost $17 and it's from Scosche, which makes decent products.
And to answer the question in the article:
"Why aren't fuel cells, not internal combustion engines, the "range extenders" in plug-in hybrid cars?
It's because electric cars use a *lot* of power - this is the same reason electric cars don't come with solar panels on the roof so you never need to charge them - it takes a lot of energy to charge an electric car.
Since the power cells cost $20, they must contain more than fuel, they probably include some consumable electrodes or membranes.
The fuel cells are are rated to produce 55Wh (with 2.5W maximum draw).
A Nissan Leaf goes 73 miles on its 24KWh battery pack - so that's 328 Watt-Hours per mile.
It would take about 6 of these $20 power cells to power your car for one mile or $120 (though you may need 150 of these chargers in parallel to generate enough power).
Even if you assume a 90% drop in price when scaling this up to car size, that's still $12 per mile.
I've seen refrigerator-sized, $20,000 natural gas fuel cells for powering (and heating) your home, but if you're going to power your car from natural gas, why not just make it a hybrid that uses an natural gas powered engine instead of an electric car that has a bulky and expensive natural gas powered fuel cell?
nah, they are probably playing the "Razor Scam". Sell you the main product for cheap, break-even, or even at-a-loss, then gouge you with the consumables it uses all the time, at a great markup. See also "printer ink cartridge scam".
So I'd expect the gadget itself to sell reasonable, but then these "pods" will go for $10 ea, and contain about a nickel's worth of hydrogen. And maybe a DRM chip to prevent you from refilling it.
A "solution good for the consumer" would be rechargeable pods, that you can simply fill to the line with water and then plug into the wall, where they split some water and generate some hydrogen to recharge themselves. (and either store the oxygen in the cell too, or maybe vent it outside, or pressurize some O2 cylinders you can sell back to your local airgas co?) Though they'd take awhile to recharge. I suppose it may generate O2 slowly enough to not be a hazard.
The only non-cheap part of the system is the membrane for the cell or the catalyst for the recharger.
Maybe I'm just being pessimistic about it. But I think the biggest challenge in fuel-cell technology right now is the big players in the market that will find serious new competition in fuel cells. Look at the rechargeable battery industry. When you threaten to dump a new product on the market with a much higher energy density and lower cost than the alternative they're offering, they tend to freak out. I haven't seen any public account of pressure and sabotage from those groups on fuel cell tech, but I'd expect it's happening, on a significant scale, even if out of the current public eye.
That reminds me, I recall reading a year or so ago that someone came up with a way to convert natural gas to H and 2O in the cell, and that made it powerable directly from natural gas. Imagine that, a computer that runs on a little cylinder like a 20gram CO2 from your pellet gun, full of natural gas. Fuel cells are cool. Wish we used them more.
I work for the Department of Redundancy Department.
Well they have competition with a similar setup, but it uses hydrogen, not butane.
http://www.horizonfuelcell.com/store/minipak.htm
But looks like you'll also need a refiller, but depending on the life of it all, it might pay for itself vs. buying these butane ones.
http://www.horizonfuelcell.com/store/hydrofill.htm