Fuel cell, also known as electrochemical generator, is a kind of cell that mainly uses oxygen or other oxidants to carry out oxidation-reduction reaction and convert chemical energy in fuel into electrical energy. It is the fourth generation technology after hydropower, thermal power and atomic power. Fuel cell is a new power source with a bright future. Generally, hydrogen, carbon, methanol, borohydride, gas or natural gas are used as the fuel, as the negative electrode, oxygen in the air is used as the positive electrode, and the active substances (fuel and oxidant) of fuel cell enter at the same time of reaction. Therefore, this kind of battery is actually just an energy conversion device, which can directly convert chemical energy into electrical energy in an electrochemical way without going through a thermal engine process, and is not limited by the Carnot cycle effect, so the energy conversion efficiency is high.

燃料電池，是一種主要通過(guò)氧或其他氧化劑進(jìn)行氧化還原反應(yīng)，把燃料中的化學(xué)能轉(zhuǎn)化成電能的電池，又稱(chēng)電化學(xué)發(fā)電器。它是繼水力發(fā)電、熱能發(fā)電和原子能發(fā)電之后的第四種發(fā)電技術(shù)。燃料電池是具有發(fā)展前途的新的動(dòng)力電源，一般以氫氣、碳、甲醇、硼氫化物、煤氣或天然氣為燃料，作為負(fù)極，用空氣中的氧氣作為正極，燃料電池的活性物質(zhì)（燃料和氧化劑）是在反應(yīng)的同時(shí)進(jìn)的入。因此，這類(lèi)電池實(shí)際上只是一個(gè)能量轉(zhuǎn)換裝置，等溫的按電化學(xué)方式，直接將化學(xué)能轉(zhuǎn)化為電能而不必經(jīng)過(guò)熱機(jī)過(guò)程，不受卡諾循環(huán)效應(yīng)的限制，因此能量轉(zhuǎn)化效率高。