Hear that sound? It’s the rustle of a hundred thousand shirt sleeves being rolled up in Japan as the Far Eastern mega-tech-corps prepare to unleash a flood of fuel cell products onto an unsuspecting world. Early next year, looks like.

First off the block may well be NEC and/or Toshiba who have both begun to show off suspiciously well built prototypes. When connected to a notebook, Toshiba’s direct methanol fuel cell (DMFC), featured above, ‘can generate power to operate the computer for about five hours using 50cc of methanol with 90% concentration or higher and about 10 hours using 100cc of methanol of the same concentration.’

Still a tad bulky though, ain’t they?