Beyond batteries: laptops to be powered by solar power, micro fuel cells

Solar cells are seeing a major breakthrough with the ability to print flexible sheets of solar panel material that can be folded like maps or wrapped around other objects (like your notebook). No longer will solar technology be large, heavy and clunky.

Micro fuel cells are also seeing technology breakthroughs even before first-generation fuel cells have appeared on the market. Compared to batteries, micro fuel cells offer extraordinary advantages: 1/20th the weight while delivering as much as ten times the power.

So which technology is better? Solar power wins this designation, since it's free, renewable and clean. But solar power isn't always available, especially if you're working indoors or during evening hours. Micro fuel cells offer portable power anytime, anywhere, albeit at a fixed price per watt: the more power you use, the more you have to pay.

In the end, a hybrid approach seems to be the best: charge your notebook computer with free sunlight when available, but run on fuel cells the rest of the time. Of course, having both power systems in a notebook computer will increase the base cost of the unit, so that's yet another cost penalty for upgrading to modern power technology. But if you're like most notebook computer users, you'll appreciate the 10 - 12 hours of uninterrupted notebook uptime, even if it costs you 25% more than today's notebook computers.

• The low-battery bleep that ends your cellphone conversation in midsentence or sends you scrambling with your laptop for an outlet could soon be history, thanks to breakthroughs in fuel cells and solar energy.
• Mobile devices are growing ever more power-hungry, even as conventional battery capacity hits its limits, said Sara Bradford, a San Antonio-based industry analyst with the research company Frost & Sullivan.
• One solution to this problem is a new breed of solar cells with "the potential to keep a battery charged up so that the consumer may not ever have to plug it in," Bradford said.
• While solar chargers on the market today are bulkier than the cellphones and personal digital assistants (PDAs) they charge, Konarka's first retail product, likely out next year, will be a foldable charger about the size and weight of a laminated pocket map, said Daniel McGahn, the company's executive vice president and chief marketing officer.
• But while solar cells may extend battery life for today's gadgets, tomorrow's power guzzlers will need more energy than batteries can provide.
• Fuel cells work by attracting a fuel --- in this case, methanol --- to an electrically charged membrane where it reacts with a catalyst to release power in the form of electrons.
• Fuel cells will provide many times more power than batteries of equivalent volume and can completely eliminate the need to plug in, said Chris Dyer, an entrepreneur who is also editor of the Journal of Power Sources, a scholarly publication.
• Its Mobion micro fuel cell uses a special membrane that recycles waste water, allowing the manufacturer to pack pure methanol, and thus more power, into its fuel cartridges.