Originally published March 16 2005
Millennium Cell is working to create an 8-hour laptop battery that uses hydrogen as fuel
by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, NaturalNews Editor
New Jersey's Millennium Cell is working to create a fuel cell battery for laptops that will allow a user to work for eight hours without a charge. The fuel cells they are working on mix hydrogen with oxygen to create electricity, with water vapor as the only byproduct. Though their current fuel cells only run for three hours, about the same life as one charge on a standard battery, they are hoping that they will eventually bring the time up to eight hours.
A small New Jersey company is working on a hydrogen-fueled battery that it hopes will eventually provide eight hours of power for laptop computers.
At Intel's Developer Forum in San Francisco on Tuesday, Millennium Cell demonstrated an IBM ThinkPad running on a prototype of the battery.
Many companies are looking for ways to boost the longevity of laptop batteries, including a slew of start-ups that Intel has invested in.
And big laptop makers like Toshiba, NEC and others are working on fuel cell technology, mostly based on methanol.
Canon recently presented a paper at a symposium in Japan discussing a prototype of a hydrogen-powered micro fuel cell for video cameras and other devices.
In its current state, the Millennium Cell battery looks a bit like a science project.
In the future, the fuel cell would be designed inside the laptop's casing.
A cartridge a little larger than a cassette tape provides the fuel and is attached to the laptop by a thin tube.
The battery works by initially storing sodium borohydride as a solution in the cartridge.
This solution passes through a fuel pump and moves into a catalyst chamber, which triggers a reaction.
Water is a byproduct of this reaction, but the water leaves the fuel cell as a vapor, said Adam Briggs, a Millennium senior vice president.
For now, the possibility of a hydrogen-fueled laptop battery is still at least two years off.
Millennium, based in Eatontown, N.J., came to Intel's conference to make contacts with personal computer makers who might want to incorporate the technology into future laptop designs.
``If we can keep the cost south of $75 in terms of cost to the manufacturers, we should be in pretty good shape,'' Briggs said.
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