Lilliputian Systems Inc. has landed $28 million to advance commercialization of its miniature fuel cells for what's so far proven to be a tough market for the technology — consumer electronics. New investors Stata Venture Partners and Altira Group LLC joined previous investors Kleiner Perkins Caufield Byers, Atlas Venture, Fairhaven Capital and Rockport Capital, the company reported Thursday. Lilliputian has previously raised more than $60 million, according to the company's Web site. Lilliputian also added a new CEO on Thursday — Ray Stata, founder of Stata Venture Partners and co-founder of Analog Devices, the company said Thursday. The seven-year old, Wilmington, Mass.-based startup says its ceramic solid-oxide fuel cells can pack up to 10 times the energy of a similarly sized battery at much lower weight. Beyond that, the secretive Massachusetts Institute of Technology spinout last month revealed some more details on how it intends to sell its products. The company hopes to sell its fuel cell chargers for about $200, then sell disposable butane cartridges for $1 to $3 each, according to this March 19 report from Technology Review, a MIT publication. Each cartridge could recharge an iPhone 16 to 20 times, and will be sealed, making them acceptable for use on airplanes (see Will Micro Fuel Cells Fly High?)  Lilliputian is now testing prototypes and "signing commercialization agreements with select customers," according to the company's Web site. Fuel cells have found their place in certain niche markets, such as military uses and for forklifts (see Uncle Sam Wants Portable Fuel Cells). But they haven't been widely adopted for consumer electronics, where rechargeable batteries remain dominant. MTI MicroFuel Cells is working on miniature fuel cells for GPS devices and digital cameras (see Fueling More Flash). But parent company Mechanical Technology Inc. told investors last week that it may run out of money after April if it can't raise additional financing.

Medis Technologies in February came out with a fuel cell to power cellphones, flashlights and other small electronics, bit it can't be refilled and costs $35 to $50 for 40 hours of power. Medis hopes to bring a refillable cell to market in the next 12 to 18 months.

Toshiba has been on the forefront of fuel cells for portable electronics for years, and said in January it plans to release a methanol-based fuel cell battery charger by the end of March. Fuel cells for cellphones and computers could come in the next 12 months or so, it said.

Brent Constantz, CEO of green cement company Calera, forwarded us a document from one of his scientific advisers today that partly explains what they are doing and to further respond to criticism from Ken Caldeira. It's still vague, it's one they showed to BusinessWeek where the story broke, but good to have on the record. The document was prepared by J.R. O'Neil, Professor Emeritus, Department of Geological Science at the University of Michigan. There is clearly no love lost here. "In essence, Caldeira goofed up big time and should have known better," O'Neil wrote. The story has no legs." Caldeira, however, is not some random Internet crank. He's a climate scientist at the Carnegie Institute of Washington, which is at Stanford. He says it doesn't add up and the selective secrecy of the company (we sequester carbon dioxide but won't completely explain how) is misleading the public. O'Neil essentially says that Caldera is pumping carbon dioxide from smokestacks into treated seawater to produce solid carbonates out of the magnesium and calcium found inside seawater. These carbonates, such as calcium carbonate (CO3) can be used in cement production. In the process, the solids in the seawater react with the carbon dioxide, typically a very low energy molecule: "because the pH of the seawater (normally around 8) has been raised to the point where CO3 is the dominant and stable species of dissolved carbonate. Alkaline solutions like this are very effective sinks for gaseous CO2. Calera's methods for making seawater appropriately alkaline are proprietary, but it can be done simply by the addition of a base like sodium hydroxide." In a patent application bearing Constantz's name that emerged earlier this year, the application discussed running the process with pH 10 or 11 seawater. "Above pH 10.33, greater than 90% of the carbonate is in the form of carbonate ion, and no CO.sub.2 is released during the precipitation of calcium carbonate," the application states. Caldeira's reply? Sodium hydroxide is somewhat rare, so that won't work. The company could also be using magnesium hydroxide, but that actually might just involve taking magnesium carbonate, transforming it into hydroxide, and then back to magnesium carbonate. In other words, no gain. Then there is the theory touted earlier by some sources that there could be a biological mechanism turning carbon dioxide into carbonates. Coral do this. But that would involve tightly controlling pH balances and massive ponds. As a side note, some of the argument might also be wrapped up in business model nuances. What if Calera is really just doing a version of carbon sequestration? The carbonate plan is very similar to the business plan of Carbon Sciences. But Carbon Sciences' business plan relies on carbon taxes. Calera's public interviews have made it seem a bit "cake and eat it too." Calera and its investors have also strongly indicated that they won't be forwarding any more information. Constantz, who came to prominence years ago with bone treatments, is also said to be quite secretive.

Electric cars. Are there more articles than cars? It's a valid question. I'm going to guess that the articles outnumber the cars, but it's closer than you think. In all, there are approximately 40,000 all-electric vehicles in the U.S., according to John Addison, author and editor of the Clean Fleet Report. Most of these are not sports cars, he said. Most are low-speed vehicles capped at 25 to 35 miles per hour that tool around on military bases, university campuses, and retirement homes. Vendors include Chrysler, Zenn Motor Company. The U.S. Army has a program to obtain 4,000 neighborhood electric vehicles over the next three years. They will not be used in tactical situations, which really cuts down the opportunity to make a comedy staring Jack Black as the hapless green advocate in the military. Call it Private Green. (That's all it takes to be a producer, people.) But it is expected to cut down on gasoline consumption.

An oil and gas exploration startup backed by VC heavyweight Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers may be on the verge of going belly-up, according to a report from PEHub. Terralliance, which raised $295 from Kleiner and other investors to back its oil and gas exploration software development, is reported to have fired its founding CEO and four-fifths of its staff and closed offices as it seeks to restructure a sizable debt load. PEHub reports that Kleiner Perkins — which has emerged as a prominent investor in greentech companies of late — invested $10 million in Terralliance in 2004, another $35 million in 2005 and then a piece of a $250 million round in 2006. Other investors in the 2006 round included Goldman Sachs, DAG Ventures and Dubai-based Ithmar, PEHub reported. But since then the company fired founding CEO Erland Olson, who was described as spending like a "drunken sailor" by sources quoted by PEHub, after investors were shocked by a recent audit. The Newport Beach, Calif.-based company claims on its Web site — which otherwise lacks any details or contact information — that its technology has "already achieved exploration success rates dramatically above the industry norm." Terralliance is not listed at Kleiner Perkins' Web site's list of portfolio companies, but is noted on the Web page of partner Joseph Lacob as a company that has received investment from the firm. Fortune magazine quoted Lacob in 2008 as saying that Terralliance planned to use its software to drill for oil and gas itself. The company had drilled about 100 wells around the world and was looking for $1 billion in new financing at the time, Lacob told Fortune.