NTT develops mobile-phone hydrogen fuel cell
Nippon Telegraph and Telephone has developed a prototype fuel cell that it hopes to commercialise within three years at a size small enough to fit inside mobile phones and other portable consumer electronics devices.
The prototype works by combining hydrogen with oxygen, generating electricity and water. It is more powerful than the DMFCs (direct methanol fuel cells) currently being developed by many companies, said a spokesperson.
The power density of the NTT cell, which is a measure of the amount of power it can generate relative to its size, is up to 200mWpcm2 (milliwatts per square centimetre). When the fuel cell is commercialised, it will be able provide a third-generation mobile phone that uses 2.5W of power with about nine hours of talk time, the spokesperson said.
In contrast, a DMFC developed by NEC last year offered a power density of 70mWpm2. NTT calculates that to match the size of lithium ion batteries used in mobile phones, a fuel cell must have a power density of about 160mWpcm2 or more, he said.
"DMFCs can't do it. There isn't enough power," Akiyama said.
