Fuel cell phones far from reality, says report
Published: 12 Sep 2003 09:14 BST
Firms that claim next year will see micro fuel cells become the next wave of long-lasting power for handhelds and mobile phones are fostering hype, according to technology research firm Allied Business Intelligence (ABI).
Issues such as water management, volumetric energy density, and complete packaging need to be resolved before widespread use of micro fuel cells can be realised by 2004, ABI director of energy research Atakan Ozbek said in the statement.
Micro fuel cells are miniature fuel cells that generate electricity through a chemical reaction between oxygen and a fuel such as hydrogen or methanol. The cells continue to produce electricity as long there is fuel.
Regulatory approval must be granted for final product designs for early niche markets, and these products must be deliverable through a small, established distribution network for micro fuel cells to gain wide scale use and acceptance, said the report.
Although three Japanese firms -- electronics giants Toshiba, NEC and wireless kingpin DoCoMo -- have announced plans to introduce micro fuel cells in 2004, Ozbek thinks that it is difficult to determine the true status of companies’ research in the field.
"In addition, the essential framework of codes and standards from the regulatory landscape is also largely incomplete," Ozbek said in the statement.
According to the study by ABI -- which assessed only high-end product segments such as wireless handsets, notebooks, digital cameras, PDAs and certain niche applications -- micro fuel cells will more likely be realised in the high-end products that have ample space, such as notebooks, and in specific niche markets, such as industrial mobile computing.
However, ABI expects the first 5,000 units of commercial micro fuel cell products in laptops and in niche markets to appear in 2004 to 2005, with global shipments to reach 200m units in 2011, said the statement.
Recently, NEC has unveiled a prototype notebook with a built-in fuel cell that can already operate for five hours on 300 cubic centimetres of methanol. The firm hopes it will be able to run for 40 hours in two years' time, reported news agency AFP.
In March this year, Toshiba unveiled a fuel cell prototype that it said has the potential to replace rechargeable batteries with clean-energy technology.
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