Voller's "ABC" fuel cell charger, with USB

Sure, Voller's fuel cell-based Automatic Battery Charger (ABC, isn't that clever?) can power your iPod for a whole week of tunes, but you've got to ask yourself: "can my playlists take that kind of heat?" Remember, there's only so much James Blunt the world can take, and he's quickly reaching his quota. Luckily, the ABC can handle some much more reasonable tasks, since in addition to a USB port, it can pump power through a cigarette-lighter socket and a regular ol' wall socket. The device runs on hydrogen stored in a Polymer Electrolyte Membrane fuel cell, stored in a removable tank. Not quite the pinnacle of fuel cell tech, and a far cry from efforts of those like Toshiba who are trying to squeeze this power source into a laptop, but its clean energy and quite plentiful, so we can't complain.

[daniel @ Jul 4th 2006 12:28PM]

nice!!

any word on price?

[Phillip Lamb @ Jul 4th 2006 12:38PM]

*its == it's

;)

[Lance Lavery @ Jul 4th 2006 1:11PM]

It's right around $7,000 and only includes 1 cartridge.

[Jonathan Kressaty @ Jul 4th 2006 1:12PM]

Yeah, you can yours for just under $8000 (without shipping) in the U.S.

http://www.fuelcellstore.com/cgi-bin/fuelweb/view=Item/cat=/product=1080

That makes me feel better about spending $30 dollars on that iPod wall charger.

[** Hello Moto ** @ Jul 4th 2006 1:49PM]

Ahhh! Expensive and huge. I don't know why you would ever want osmething like this other hten to just move the tech along for smaller uses.

[Tom W @ Jul 4th 2006 1:52PM]

Sorry Jonathan Kressaty, but this will probably make you feel worse about spending $30 on that iPod wall charger:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000167V46/104-2789979-0855921?v=glance&n=172282

[Karel Jansens @ Jul 4th 2006 2:33PM]

"Clean energy"??? WTF??? And where do you dunceheads think the hydrogen for the gizmo comes from? From the Clean Energy Elves?

[someone @ Jul 4th 2006 2:51PM]

I saw this about six months ago during a fuel cell presentation

[Tom W @ Jul 4th 2006 2:51PM]

Here is a clean technique for hydrogen generation:

http://www.isracast.com/tech_news/090905_tech.htm

[Bugblatter @ Jul 4th 2006 3:49PM]

Interesting, but not all that clean if in extracting the zinc they're producing carbon monoxide. Gotta love the way they call it a "minor byproduct" ;-)

Probably still a big improvement on the old method though.

[Karel Jansens @ Jul 4th 2006 4:19PM]

Just about every week someone comes up with a new, "revolutionary" way to produce hydrogen cleanly. And just about every week it is pointed out that using petroleum is still the only viable way to get hydrogen.

Besides, producing the hydrogen is only part of the energy equation. How about cooling, compressing and transporting the stuff? Some calculations show that as much as 90% of all the energy required for a hydrogen economy goes to those "losses".

Let's face it, hydrogen is not a new, clean energy source; it's just a different kind of electrical wiring...

[David R. Marlborough @ Jul 4th 2006 4:21PM]

I think the main reason for the introduction of a product such as this one is to say, "hey, look at what we can build!" Its more an effort to push the technology along rather than to grab a standard to which all others will have to conform to. The unit itself is rather large and expensive, much like the first satellite phones.

Obviously, watching Toshiba's work is way more exciting in that they are not only working on size (smaller and smaller) but complete integration into a laptop computer, making the powering of a computer with clean energy resources a true reality rather than a conceptual ideal.

[AlanAudio @ Jul 4th 2006 5:11PM]

For those who are unaware of what's going on in other parts of the world, Iceland is drilingl into extremely hot rocks to extract vast amounts of thermal energy for hydrogen production. The first commercial hydrogen filling station for vehicles opened three years ago in Iceland, others are planned to open in Europe.

Iceland is planning on producing such a large amount of hydrogen that they will not only be able to run all of their vehicles on hydrogen, but there will be a large surplus, which they intend to export in tankers - much like oil is currently transported.

Read more about it here
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/4846574.stm

The stuff about hydrogen is half way down,

[Nukes and Candy @ Jul 4th 2006 5:51PM]

"The device runs on hydrogen stored in a Polymer Electrolyte Membrane fuel cell"

...insane on the membrane?

...no?

..ok a more serious note: cool, If only it were pocket size.

( _ /)
(O.O)
( >0

[Guruboy @ Jul 4th 2006 11:11PM]

Holy crap you guys think every technology started out as a well-priced consumer product? Your jaw would drop if you saw the prices of the first Walkmans, cell phones, DVD players...um COMPUTERS? New technology is new. Just because it isn't available to the (apparently extremely close-minded) consumers of the world doesn't mean it's bad. Once companies with vision like Toshiba get this technology into a consumer product with a reasonable price, I'd like to see what you anti-fuel cell goons have to say.

[baaadandy @ Jul 5th 2006 1:01AM]

Wrong, Phillip.

its = possessive

it's = it is

[Kibiyama @ Jul 5th 2006 5:24AM]

Wrong, baaadandy.

They meant to use the contraction "it's", but they put "its".

On-topic: I'm still waiting for cold fusion chargers.

[Tim Brown @ Jul 5th 2006 7:06AM]

> "Who's James Blunt?"

You dont want to know!!!!

[TH @ Jul 5th 2006 8:33AM]

While I somewhat agree with Karel in that hydrogen is over-hyped, I still think it is the way to the future. Let's face the facts: oil is going to get much more expensive and then we will run out of it. We need other ways to power vehicles, warm houses and power our equipment. While much of hydrogen today is produced using fossile fuels, there's no need to do so, as Iceland's example (among others) shows. Hydrogen is a "vehicle": the trick is to get the power from where it is produced (be that a hydropower plant, nuclear plant, geothermal powerstation or an array of dwarfs rubbing cats against pieces of carpet) to where it is needed. You can't carry electricity in a bucket, but you can carry hydrogen - although admittedly you need a special bucket.

Not everything can be hooked to the electricity grid, so other methods of delivery are needed. Batteries have limited lifespans and are heavy. They also need recharging. Fuel cells might be the answer, or at least an improvement: they just need to get smaller, cheaper and more efficient. As Voller ABC shows, the answer might be a combination of batteries and fuel cells, to combine the good sides of the two.

Sure, hydrogen delivery is expensive and energy-consuming. But so is delivering oil and petrol. But once the delivery system is in place, the cost and the energy needed per unit served will drastically drop, and obtaining hydrogen will become more convenient for the end users. Just like the network of gas stations today, we will hopefully have a network of hydrogen stations in the future. Or, hydrogen could be delivered at the gas stations just like propane or barbecue coal and other types of fuels are even today.

What Voller have done is to make a product that uses this technology and works, while being portable and simple enough for any consumer to operate. It's expensive and not terribly efficient, the pumps make a lot of noise, but I believe that just like the first mass-marketed solar panels, these will find a niche: people who find them useful already as they are, and will pioneer the technology and then feed money and experience to the companies developing new, better versions.

As I see it, the hydrogen economy as a model can work, and can improve the state of the environment once it has reached a large enough penetration. The point is, if you switch to hydrogen, you can at least in theory push your carbon emissions to zero, while that's not even theoretically possible with oil or other fossile fuels. This might be a long way away, and the steps along the way can be small, but at least there is a goal.

Fuel cells are quickly getting more and more common, and as Toshiba has showed they are catching up on batteries and will then overtake. This technology is not yet for everyone, but already as it is, Voller's ABC could be very handy at summer cottages, holiday homes, boats, caravans etc. where you don't have access to power grids, and batteries would be too bulky. And for things like lighthouses, weather stations, traffic controls etc. they can drastically reduce the need for maintenance, battery changing etc.

There is a lot of basic research going on in this field and new techniques and materials are in the pipeline. As the fuel cell products out there are pioneers, I think they must be judged in relation to the bigger picture, rather than from the immediate, narrow point of view of usability/design/price, as we do with the 43256876th portable mp3 player that comes out.