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"Semi Solid" batteries may be the answer
- Thread starter tdelta1000
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- Batteries
I guess this is good news. If there was a way to recharge the used liquid in the battery while at home then only need new 'fuel' when you were traveling, that would be ideal. Otherwise, having to go to a fueling station every 100-200 miles would take away one of the great aspects on an electric car. You charge at home most of the time.
shark2k
Member
Wouldn't the "Cambridge Crude" be able to reused though, unlike gasoline? It could just be recharged and then used in a different battery. I think that was the impression I got when I read the article yesterday.
-Shark2k
-Shark2k
The answer to what?
I don't think we need a fundamentally new technology, I think the batteries we have now are completely sufficient to replace gasoline.
What we need are economies of scale: millions of EVs, a minor improvement in the cost of the batteries and a minor improvement in the energy density.
Tesla already believes that they can make a 56kWhr Roadster battery for less than $12k by 2016.
When a 300 mile battery is $10k that means you can make a 150 mile range battery for ( less than ) $5k
Doubling the energy density of the Model S 300 mile pack lets you easily make a 500+ mile car in that form factor.
A 150 mile battery for $5k makes an EV that is superior to any ICE car in its price range. Likewise a 300mile battery at $10k.
If the problem you want to solve is convenience - existing fast charger technology is sufficient, we just need them installed in a couple thousand locations in the U.S. Economies of scale again should make those cost less than $10k each, the device isn't really very complicated.
Its an investment of only tens of millions of dollars to cover the entire country.
If you drive so much that you use it ten times per year, you've still wasted less time if you filled up your gas tank at a gas station every time it was low. One 45 minute stop in the middle of your 500 mile drive is not significanly less convenient than filling up with gas.
A station that lets you exchange your electrolyte has got to be a couple orders of magnitude more complicated than a fast charger.
If we eventually had those in addition to fast chargers that would be a fine incremental improvement, but I think we will find them completely unnecessary if we can get a network of fast chargers installed.
I don't think we need a fundamentally new technology, I think the batteries we have now are completely sufficient to replace gasoline.
What we need are economies of scale: millions of EVs, a minor improvement in the cost of the batteries and a minor improvement in the energy density.
Tesla already believes that they can make a 56kWhr Roadster battery for less than $12k by 2016.
When a 300 mile battery is $10k that means you can make a 150 mile range battery for ( less than ) $5k
Doubling the energy density of the Model S 300 mile pack lets you easily make a 500+ mile car in that form factor.
A 150 mile battery for $5k makes an EV that is superior to any ICE car in its price range. Likewise a 300mile battery at $10k.
If the problem you want to solve is convenience - existing fast charger technology is sufficient, we just need them installed in a couple thousand locations in the U.S. Economies of scale again should make those cost less than $10k each, the device isn't really very complicated.
Its an investment of only tens of millions of dollars to cover the entire country.
If you drive so much that you use it ten times per year, you've still wasted less time if you filled up your gas tank at a gas station every time it was low. One 45 minute stop in the middle of your 500 mile drive is not significanly less convenient than filling up with gas.
A station that lets you exchange your electrolyte has got to be a couple orders of magnitude more complicated than a fast charger.
If we eventually had those in addition to fast chargers that would be a fine incremental improvement, but I think we will find them completely unnecessary if we can get a network of fast chargers installed.
There's mention of just swapping a charged tank for a discharged one, which would be at least as simple as a fast charger, and an order of magnitude faster.
SByer
'08 #383
I dismissed the refueling part as funding hype. The interesting claim to me was that of power density. Now, the swapping thing may be interesting for applications where the power requirement are too crazy for fast charging - like long haul trucking (please back up slowly to the nuclear reactor...). But I agree, for passenger cars, we're already beyond where batteries are good enough with current fast charging solutions to need something so complicated as swapping goo (which certainly won't be as fast as filling up with gas, either).
Hello Fellow Innovators.
We have driven semi cross country for over 2 million miles. Have read about all kinds of ways to generate electricity from every day motions and actions, such as from a revolving door in a busy city department store; from the constant push and pull of walking people over city sidewalks.
With as many revolutions that our semi truck generates with its 5 axles and 18 wheels, it is in the realm of possibility that a semi can be generating a lot of the energy it uses if these revolvings could be redirected to work within some kind of electric motor format and high efficiency batteries.
I am getting into tech territory here, so help me out. I know that others have been able to convert movement into usable and storeable energy and we are sitting on a potential that is just begging to be used. Solar panels on top of a semi trailer could be another concurrent system to generate electricity. Semi's use electricity for small fridges, computers, cb, music and lighting.
Another idea I have is to generate power to somehow make ice. With enough ice created, and with enough insulation, one could use a low voltage fan blowing across the ice at night (yes of course only in the summer) and have this cold air cool the semi sleeper at night, rather than burning diesel for 10 hours.
Mother Earth News 20 years ago had articles on creating a huge block of ice to be stored in the basement and used in the summer. I can't remember the process, it could have been just letting winter do it's job, but nevertheless, the idea has stayed with me.
Being this is a site interested in green power, have I piqued anyone's interest?
Thanks
Sam
We have driven semi cross country for over 2 million miles. Have read about all kinds of ways to generate electricity from every day motions and actions, such as from a revolving door in a busy city department store; from the constant push and pull of walking people over city sidewalks.
With as many revolutions that our semi truck generates with its 5 axles and 18 wheels, it is in the realm of possibility that a semi can be generating a lot of the energy it uses if these revolvings could be redirected to work within some kind of electric motor format and high efficiency batteries.
I am getting into tech territory here, so help me out. I know that others have been able to convert movement into usable and storeable energy and we are sitting on a potential that is just begging to be used. Solar panels on top of a semi trailer could be another concurrent system to generate electricity. Semi's use electricity for small fridges, computers, cb, music and lighting.
Another idea I have is to generate power to somehow make ice. With enough ice created, and with enough insulation, one could use a low voltage fan blowing across the ice at night (yes of course only in the summer) and have this cold air cool the semi sleeper at night, rather than burning diesel for 10 hours.
Mother Earth News 20 years ago had articles on creating a huge block of ice to be stored in the basement and used in the summer. I can't remember the process, it could have been just letting winter do it's job, but nevertheless, the idea has stayed with me.
Being this is a site interested in green power, have I piqued anyone's interest?
Thanks
Sam
No interest from me. Using your wheels to generate electricity increases the load on the truck's engine, by pretty much the same amount as running the generator off it. It is not free power. You will pay more for fuel.
Well, you certainly piqued the interest of Mr J.P. Morgan who, in the years before the invention of air conditioning, hauled* huge slabs of ice from lakes in upstate New York to his mansion at 225 Madison Avenue. But he was smarter than Mother Earth News, and correctly emplaced the ice in the attic, so that the dense, cooled air flowed down through the mansion, thus cooling it. I'm sure that Messrs. Vanderbilt, Whitney and others did the same.
*Actually, I rather suspect he was not the one doing the hauling, but I'm guessing here....
brucet999
Active Member
I think he was referring to a diesel/electric drive system that would enable regen to replace the Jake Brake system used presently for diesel engine braking. Would save wear on brake components and reduce fuel consumption. Question is, would diesel/electric drive efficiency losses be comparable to diesel/multi-gear transmission drive losses?
My guess is no.
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