A feasibility study on direct methanol fuel cells for laptop computers based on a cost comparison with lithium-ion batteries

This paper compares the total cost of direct methanol fuel cell (DMFC) and lithium (Li)-ion battery systems when applied as the power supply for laptop computers in the Korean environment. The average power output and operational time of the laptop computers were assumed to be 20 W and 3000 h, respectively. Considering the status of their technologies and with certain conditions assumed, the total costs were calculated to be US$140 for the Li-ion battery and US$362 for DMFC. The manufacturing costs of the DMFC and Li-ion battery systems were calculated to be $16.65 W−1 and $0.77 W h−1, and the energy consumption costs to be $0.00051 W h−1 and $0.00032 W h−1, respectively. The higher fuel consumption cost of the DMFC system was due to the methanol (MeOH) crossover loss. Therefore, the requirements for DMFCs to be able to compete with Li-ion batteries in terms of energy cost include reducing the crossover level to at an order magnitude of −9 and the MeOH price to under $0.5 kg−1. Under these conditions, if the DMFC manufacturing cost could be reduced to $6.30 W−1, then the DMFC system would become at least as competitive as the Li-ion battery system for powering laptop computers in Korea.