I thought this was going to be one of those things like moon colonies or the home colonoscopy, and going to be here in just three to five years.

But no. It's finally happened. You can buy a portable fuel cell to run a phone.

T-Mobile has begun to offer the 24/7 Xtreme Portable Power Solution from Medis Technology to run its phones. The Home Shopping Network has a demo.

Fuel cells do have some advantages over batteries. First, they require very little recharge time. You just fill up the vessel with methanol or snap in a new fuel cartridge and you are set. There's no waiting around for batteries to charge. If you are a fashion photographer who doesn't want to lug around extra battery packs or you will be camping and need a phone, fuel cells make sense. The downside? You have to remember to carry around bottles of a substance that's somewhat similar to Ronson lighter fluid.

Technical details and consumer skepticism have hampered the rollout for years. Toshiba has been showing off fuel cell prototypes for phones and TVs since at least 2003. Earlier this year, PolyFuel, a membrane maker, bit the dust.

So let's salute progress where it occurs.

A spin-out from the University of California Berkeley is attempting to improve the economics and output of one of my favorite segments in the energy world: waste heat.

The company, called either Alphabet or ABC, is working on thermoelectric semiconductors that can convert heat into electrical power. Wrap this sort of material around a steam pipe in a factory and it could help generate electricity for on-site machinery, etc. Historically, researchers have used bismuth telluride to make thermoelectric semiconductors. Japan's Komatsu, for instance, showed off panels this year that can convert 7.2 percent of their waste heat into electricity, or 50 percent better than normal.

Newer companies like Alphabet are tinkering with things like silicon nanowires, which potentially can convert more power more economically. GMZ Energy, Promethean Power and Cypress Semiconductor are all also experimenting with thermoelectrics and various semi materials like gallium. GMZ and Cypress want to turn heat into power while Promethean converts electricity from PV panels directly into heat. Last year, we heard that UC Berkeley was contemplating spinning out this company and talking to TSMC about manufacturing issues.

Companies such as Recycled Energy Development (RED) and Ormat have successfully retrofitted factories to capture waste heat, but they largely rely on mechanical engineering. Heat is captured and then channeled into productive uses. One of RED's showcase projects coming next year is a system at West Virginia Alloys, a silicon manufacturer, that will generate 45 megawatts of electrical power from the waste heat generated by factory operations.  The company uses 120 megawatts right now: The waste heat system will effectively allow Alloys to recover about one-third of the power it now buys but wastes.

Replacing mechanical systems with semiconductors, potentially, will be the next wave for the industry.

Arun Majumdar, the Almy and Agnes Maynard professor of mechanical engineering at UC Berkeley, has pointed out that the U.S. consumes about 100 quads of energy a year and wastes around 55 to 60 quads, he said. A quad is a quadrillion BTUs. A BTU is equivalent to the energy produced by a match.

Cisco Systems, the router and networking king, has been significantly expanding its team charged with buying greentech companies, according to sources.

We've been waiting for Cisco to start opening the wallet any day now. Back in the '90s, the company treated the telecommunications industry like its own private version of the Home Shopping Network, snapping up companies like vegetable choppers and massage tables. Some startup CEOs even admitted they designed their company strictly to get bought by Cisco. Even more remarkable, Cisco was actually pretty good at integrating new technologies and employees into the corporate fold, particularly compared to companies like Intel.

Cisco began to actively pursue the green market in 2007 with a set of rousing speeches from CEO John "Are You Ready?" Chambers. The full strategy got fleshed out this January with the release of EnergyWise, a software layer designed to curb power consumption in PCs, networking equipment, phones and eventually buildings. After that, the compulsive shopping spree became only a matter of time. Cisco has already bought one outfit in building energy management.

Verdiem, which manages power in PCs and phones, could be one of the first buys. Verdiem is one of Cisco's partners in EnergyWise. Other potential targets include Hara, Adura Technologies, and anyone with the words "smart" or "grid" in their business plans. Silver Spring Networks, however, may not be in the hunt. The two see each other as rivals, some have said. Silver Spring has also scalped Judy Lin, one of Cisco's key employees.

The City of San Jose has granted eBay permission to install five fuel cells from Bloom Energy that will generate up to 500 kilowatts of power, according to the San Jose Business Journal.

That's a slight increase for eBay. Earlier, eBay was reported to be buying four 100-kilowatt units. So maybe the order was upped. (Bloom's fuel cells are 25-kilowatts each and you tie four together for 100 kilowatts.)

eBay and Bloom, of course, aren't commenting. Bloom's website is still the same smarmy blank it has been for months. It plays corporate/new age music and shows pictures of the urban skylines and the earth from outer space. If you want to know where and how the company has burned through hundreds of millions, it's a great metaphor.

In the meantime, here are some of the other Bloom deals out there:

• East Tennessee will be the location of a 100-kilowatt demonstration fuel cell developed by Bloom that could be a precursor to the potential siting of a manufacturing facility in Tennessee.

• Its first 100-kilowatt unit went to Google.

• The units run on natural gas which gives them about 48 percent efficiency overall. Smaller natural gas fuel cells are already being marketing in Japan.

• Some have said that Bloom is having production problems, but we can't confirm it.

• The San Francisco Airport is currently evaluating a Bloom Energy fuel-cell unit.

SunLink, a developer of solar panel mounting systems, said it plans to start supplying a rack designed specifically for Nanosolar's panels.

The two companies have been working together the past two years as beneficiaries of the Solar American Initiative program run by the U.S. Department of Energy. The DOE funds projects that it believes could make solar electricity competitive with conventional power by 2015.

Under the program, the San Jose, Calif.-based Nanosolar has received $20 million to work with partners on developing solar panels, inverters and mounting systems. Nanosolar and its partners, including SunLink, also contributed another $20 million to the pot for the project. 

San Rafael, Calif.-based SunLink, which recently settled a patent infringement lawsuit with SunPower, is developing a rack designed specifically to mount Nanosolar's panels on flat roofs, SunLink said.

SunLink said the mounting system requires a three-step process that cuts time and labor. The rack is lightweight and requires no penetration of the roof to stabilize the installation, the company added.

SunLink, which contracts with manufacturers in the United States to make its products, plans to start selling the racks in early 2010. The company declined to disclose its suppliers. 

Neither company is disclosing the financial terms of the supply agreement.

The launch of the mounting system would help Nanosolar market its panels, which use copper-indium-gallium-selenide (CIGS) to convert sunlight into electricity. The company hopes to sell the panels to builders of rooftop and ground-mounted systems. Its customers don't have to use SunLink's mounting systems, of course, if they have their own designs. 

The company has built a new panel factory and began mass production earlier this year, though it announced the start of an initial production back in December 2007.

In between, Nanosolar raised a $300 million equity round.

Engineering simple and sturdy mounting systems are critical for shaving installation costs. Another CIGS solar panel maker, Solyndra, has touted its own design as a money saver.

Applied Materials, which develops factory equipment for amorphous-silicon solar panels, also has its own mounting system design, which its customers could use for free. Applied's equipment could make panels that are as much as eight times the size of other companies' products, but it's received feedback from customers about the difficulties of finding suitable racks to mount the panels. 

U.S. Senator (R.-Alaska) Lisa Murkowski signaled on C-Span Sunday that she might go along with the climate change bill, as long as it includes provisions for expanding domestic oil drilling and nuclear energy.

"When you see changes to the land coming about ... what is causing the loss of the sea ice that adds to the erosion issues, yes, in Alaska we are seeing change," Murkowski told C-SPAN. "That's why I have been one of those Republicans who has stepped out front a little bit more on the issue of climate change."

She'd be the second. South Carolina's Lindsay Graham has already said he wants a climate change bill.

But is her price too high? It depends. Republicans have long wanted to open more parts of Alaska's north to drilling. Democrats are opposed. With current oil prices, it actually might be too expensive to drill up there anyway. But a concession given cannot be taken back so expect a heated debate. Some compromise on nuclear in some ways seems inevitable. Public opinion has warmed to nuclear and Energy Secretary Steve Chu and Steve Koonin, the DOE's chief scientist, have talked about the ability to nuclear to reduce coal dependence.

Last week the California Energy Commission held a hearing on a plan to implement energy efficiency standards in TV that would cut power consumption in TVs by 33 percent by 2011 and 49 percent by 2013.

It's been a hot-and-heated debate, and the two sides are no closer to agreement.

3M, though, says it can help. The company has come up with another optical film in its Vikuiti line of films that can reduce the power consumption of LCD TVs measuring 40-inches across or less by up to 32 percent without compromising brightness. (Brightness is a big issue. Some TV makers have come up with green settings for TVs that just turn down the lights and hence compromise viewing.) The company, along with others, has produced a number of films like this over the years but every bit helps.

The TV battle is an interesting one. The CEC says TV makers are complaining too loudly. Over 1,000 TVs already meet the standard. True, say TV makers. TVs in fact have been dropping drastically in power consumption – the story contains a number of interesting stats. Check out this video of a 32-inch Hitachi TV that consumes only 32 watts of power. There's no need to regulate us, they claim. If that's the case, the CEC responds, then this shouldn't be a burden.

EPRI says that nearly 30 billion kilowatt hours could be abated by 2030 by more energy efficient TVs and monitors.

The company will show off the film at a show later this month in Yokohama along with a film for 3D handhelds. 3D TV is coming, people, whether you like it or not. I just got back from Japan and saw high-quality 3D sets from Toshiba, Panasonic, Sharp, Sony and others. The first ones will be released early next year and the experience is far better than the old 3D. Some require content to be 3D-ized for them but others can render 2D video into 3D on their own.

Imagine it. Brideshead Revisited – in 3D!