What is claimed is:
1. An optical connector comprising:
an optical element for photoelectric conversion;
a drive circuit for driving said optical element;
detecting means for detecting the state of an input signal; and
control means for controlling the power supply to said drive circuit in accordance with the result of detection by said detecting means;
wherein when said detecting means detects that said input signal is not present, said control means cuts off or suppresses the power supply to said drive circuit.
2. The optical connector of claim 1, which is an optical connector mounted in an optical transmitting gear to transmit an input electric signal after conversion to an optical signal, and wherein said optical element is a light emitting element and said detecting means detects the state of the input electric signal fed thereto as said input signal.
3. The optical connector of claim 1, which is an optical connector mounted in an optical receiving gear to output an input optical signal after conversion to an electric signal, and wherein said optical element is a light receiving element for converting the input optical signal thereto to an electric signal and said detecting means detects the state of the electric signal fed thereto from said light receiving element.
4. The optical connector of claim 2, further comprising an external terminal for outputting said result of detection as a detection signal.
The claims below are in addition to those above.
All refrences to claim(s) which appear below refer to the numbering after this setence.
1. A fuel cell system comprising:
a fuel cell configured to generate electric power using a fuel;
a fuel processor configured to generate the fuel from a power generation material and supply the fuel to said fuel cell;
composition-related information acquiring means configured to acquire composition-related information related to the composition of the power generation material except information directly representing the composition of the material; and
storage means configured to store a table or a map which represents a correspondence between the composition-related information and control parameters of said fuel cell system which are related to the composition of the power generation material;
control parameter setting means configured to set control parameters for said fuel cell system based on comparison between the composition-related information acquired by the composition-related information acquiring means, and the table or the map, the control parameters being related to the composition of the power generation material.
2. The fuel cell system according to claim 1, wherein said control parameter setting means identifies and sets the control parameters based on the acquired composition-related information and the table or the map which represents the correspondence between the composition-related information and the control parameters.
3. The fuel cell system according to claim 1, wherein said composition-related information is information related to a power generation material supplier.
4. The fuel cell system according to claim 1, wherein said composition-related information is location information.
5. The fuel cell system according to claim 4, wherein the location information comprises telephone numbers containing at least area codes, and the table represents a correspondence between the control parameters and the telephone numbers in the supply areas of the power generation material.
6-11. (canceled)
12. The fuel cell system according to claim 1, wherein said control parameter setting means sets a control parameter related to a supply amount of water to said fuel processor based on the composition-related information acquired by the composition-related information acquiring means.
13. The fuel cell system according to claim 12, wherein the control parameters are a ratio of the supply amount of water to said fuel processor to a supply amount of the power generation material to said fuel processor.
14. The fuel cell system according to claim 13, wherein said control parameter setting means sets the control parameters such that the number of water molecules in the water supplied to said fuel processor is 2 or more per 1 carbon atom in the power generation material supplied to said fuel processor.
15. The fuel cell system according to claim 1, wherein said control parameter setting means sets a control parameter for calculating a hydrogen amount in the fuel supplied to said fuel processor based on the composition-related information acquired by the composition-related information acquiring means.
16. The fuel cell system according to claim 15, wherein said fuel cell system controls an amount of power generation such that an amount of hydrogen consumed by said fuel cell becomes equal to or less than the amount of hydrogen in the fuel calculated based on the control parameters set by said control parameter setting means.
17. The fuel cell system according to claim 15, wherein said fuel cell system controls the supply amount of the power generation material and a supply amount of the water such that the amount of hydrogen in the fuel calculated based on the control parameters set by said control parameter setting means becomes equal to or greater than an amount of hydrogen consumed by said fuel cell.
18. The fuel cell system according to claim 1, further comprising a combustor to which a remaining fuel that has not been consumed by said fuel cell is supplied, and a combustion air supply device configured to supply air to said combustor, and wherein
said control parameter setting means sets a control parameter related to a supply amount of air to said combustor.
19. The fuel cell system according to claim 18, wherein said control parameter setting means sets the control parameters such that a ratio of a supply amount of combustion air to a theoretical air amount necessary for completely combusting a combustible gas in the remaining fuel discharged from said fuel cell becomes 1 or greater.
20. The fuel cell system according to claim 1, wherein the composition-related information comprises location information or information related to a supplier of the power generation material.
21. The fuel cell system according to claim 1, further comprising:
display means configured to display the composition-related information, and the composition-related information acquiring means is an information input device with which specified composition-related information is selected from the composition-related information displayed on the display means and is input.