Rechargeable Lithium Ion batteries are the batteries most commonly used by mobile devices. The life of this kind of batteries is short, normally only a few hours of operating time.
Battery technology will not significantly improve unless and until manufacturers begin to switch to fuel cells, which is unlikely in the near future.
A fuel cell is a device that converts the chemical energy from a fuel into electricity through a chemical reaction with oxygen or another oxidizing agent.Hydrogen is the most common fuel, but hydrocarbons such as natural gas and alcohols like methanol are sometimes used. |
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| Fuel cells are different from batteries in that they require a constant source of fuel and oxygen to run, but they can produce electricity continually for as long as these inputs are supplied. Since the fuel cell relies on chemical energy rather than combustion, emissions would be much lower than emissions from the cleanest existing fuel combustion processes. |