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What's preventing us from putting fuel cells in laptops and tablets soon? Is it just that today's fuel cell designs are physically bulky? Are we near theoretica
by jonmrodriguez 14y ago
What's preventing us from putting fuel cells in laptops and tablets soon? Is it just that today's fuel cell designs are physically bulky? Are we near theoretical limits on fuel cell miniaturization or is there still lots of headroom? What's the safest way to store the fuel? Are there too many downsides to making the fuel cell air-breathing (as opposed to the danger of storing oxygen)?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuel_cell http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuel_cell
Wikipedia says that fuel cells are typically "stacked" (placed in series) since each one only makes 0.7v, but if a new tablet is designed to save space by using only a single 0.7v cell and upregulating the voltage with a boost regulator, won't the total efficiency even with regulator losses still be far above li-ion?
- kalleboo 14y agoThere are a lot of fuel cells for sale in Japan right now for recharging a laptop, ipad or cell phone, but they charge lots for refills, so it's not an economical option.
- Breakthrough 14y agoIBM made a laptop some years back that was powered by a fuel cell combined with batteries. It ran off of methanol, and although it was kind of bulky, this was back in 2005. http://news.cnet.com/IBM-pours-a-shot-of-methanol-for-ThinkPads/2100-1044_3-5662616.html http://news.cnet.com/IBM-pours-a-shot-of-methanol-for-ThinkP...