Aluminum-Ion Battery Claimed to Charge 60 Times Faster, Hold 3X the Energy (forbes.com) 298
Graphene aluminum-ion battery cells from Brisbane-based Graphene Manufacturing Group "are claimed to charge up to 60 times faster than the best lithium-ion cells and hold three time the energy of the best aluminum-based cells," writes a transportation correspondent for Forbes:
They are also safer, with no upper Ampere limit to cause spontaneous overheating, more sustainable and easier to recycle, thanks to their stable base materials. Testing also shows the coin-cell validation batteries also last three times longer than lithium-ion versions.
GMG plans to bring graphene aluminum-ion coin cells to market late this year or early next year, with automotive pouch cells planned to roll out in early 2024.
Based on breakthrough technology from the University of Queensland's Australian Institute for Bioengineering and Nanotechnology, the battery cells use nanotechnology to insert aluminum atoms inside tiny perforations in graphene planes... GMG Managing Director Craig Nicol insisted that while his company's cells were not the only graphene aluminum-ion cells under development, they were easily the strongest, most reliable and fastest charging. "It charges so fast it's basically a super capacitor," Nicol claimed. "It charges a coin cell in less than 10 seconds." The new battery cells are claimed to deliver far more power density than current lithium-ion batteries, without the cooling, heating or rare-earth problems they face....
Aluminum-ion technology has intrinsic advantages and disadvantages over the preeminent lithium-ion battery technology being used in almost every EV today. When a cell recharges, aluminum ions return to the negative electrode and can exchange three electrons per ion instead of lithium's speed limit of just one. There is also a massive geopolitical, cost, environmental and recycling advantage from using aluminum-ion cells, because they use hardly any exotic materials. "It's basically aluminum foil, aluminum chloride (the precursor to aluminum and it can be recycled), ionic liquid and urea," Nicol said.
GMG plans to bring graphene aluminum-ion coin cells to market late this year or early next year, with automotive pouch cells planned to roll out in early 2024.
Based on breakthrough technology from the University of Queensland's Australian Institute for Bioengineering and Nanotechnology, the battery cells use nanotechnology to insert aluminum atoms inside tiny perforations in graphene planes... GMG Managing Director Craig Nicol insisted that while his company's cells were not the only graphene aluminum-ion cells under development, they were easily the strongest, most reliable and fastest charging. "It charges so fast it's basically a super capacitor," Nicol claimed. "It charges a coin cell in less than 10 seconds." The new battery cells are claimed to deliver far more power density than current lithium-ion batteries, without the cooling, heating or rare-earth problems they face....
Aluminum-ion technology has intrinsic advantages and disadvantages over the preeminent lithium-ion battery technology being used in almost every EV today. When a cell recharges, aluminum ions return to the negative electrode and can exchange three electrons per ion instead of lithium's speed limit of just one. There is also a massive geopolitical, cost, environmental and recycling advantage from using aluminum-ion cells, because they use hardly any exotic materials. "It's basically aluminum foil, aluminum chloride (the precursor to aluminum and it can be recycled), ionic liquid and urea," Nicol said.
Game changer for EV's (Score:5, Insightful)
If it doesn't turn out to be vaporware.
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Depends on what the ramifications of dumping entire stored capacity catastrophically.
If such a discharge is relatively safe given its nature, like it is unlikely to cause explosions, then it might simply be a case of designing a housing for the battery that ensures that it fails-safe. Something that will shunt in a safe fashion after breakers for the rest of the electrical system are tripped.
Re:Game changer for EV's (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Game changer for EV's (Score:5, Interesting)
Re: Game changer for EV's (Score:2)
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Fuses work great in most applications. But I'm curious if they'd work with a capacitive discharge just as well, since that's much more like a bolt of lightning than a fire hose. I've discharged large caps (many years ago when I worked on old CRTs), and am skeptical.
Larger currents can actually be better. (Score:3)
If it goes through your head or chest even a small current is bad and so even small capacitors (much less supercaps or batteries) at high voltages can be deadly.
Interestingly, a stronger jolt CAN be better than a weaker one in that case. The main way a shock kills is by causing ventricular fibrillation - a condition where a patch of the heart stops beating and a wave of contraction, instead of running down the heart from top to bottom, runs around the stopped spot. This makes the heart vibrate rapidly in
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Re:Game changer for EV's (Score:4, Insightful)
Depends on what the ramifications of dumping entire stored capacity catastrophically.
Measured in watts. Get the picture?
It doesn't matter what the specific technology is; dumping the entire stored capacity of electrical charge either does useful work (e.g., explodes) or else creates that much heat.
Re: Game changer for EV's (Score:3)
This would be great for a âoefilterâ for the main battery, to dump brake energy into, right?
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>> 250KW of energy storage
Arent you confusing power and energy ?
Re:Game changer for EV's (Score:5, Informative)
"Basically a supercapacitor", not "essentially". This is clearly poetic license. An aluminum-ion battery is not a capacitor because it stores energy chemically rather than electrostatically.
You should already be worried about catastrophic discharge of batteries when damaged, this is common, it's called thermal runaway. You can also get catastrophic discharge not due to damage - try dropping a wrench across the terminals of a car battery.
Re:Game changer for EV's (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Game changer for EV's (Score:5, Funny)
Re: Game changer for EV's (Score:4, Informative)
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The aluminum burns, is what happens.
You've got aluminum and carbon. Burning away the internal short is burning aluminum. And the carbon will conduct that heat, and increase the resistance in the surrounding area.
Re: Game changer for EV's (Score:3)
Re:Game changer for EV's (Score:5, Interesting)
Successive, each generation of cars and the used fuel tanks managed to be less prone to spontaneous fires when the tank leaked and a spark ignited the fuel. In the case of the aluminum-graphene-capacitor, I guess, compartimentalization will help a great deal. E.g. distributing the storage into hundreds and thousands of very small cells with non-conductive, not flammable walls between the cells.
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Successive, each generation of cars and the used fuel tanks managed to be less prone to spontaneous fires when the tank leaked and a spark ignited the fuel. =
Yeah, the younglings here on /. don't remember it-- probably don't even believe it-- but I'm old enough to remember when it wasn't particularly uncommon to see a car at the side of the highway with the engine on fire.
Re:Game changer for EV's (Score:4, Informative)
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"The article describes it as being essentially a giant capacitor..."
No it doesn't. The charge rates are compared to a supercapacitor, not all aspects of the device.
"...this gives me concern about the protections that would need to be in place to ensure that the 'battery' doesn't dump its entire stored capacity catastrophically when damaged. Presumably this would be worked out prior to it being used in transportation (static deployments, like being used to store energy for EV chargers when demand is low so
Re: Game changer for EV's (Score:5, Insightful)
I find it so annoying that "game changing" green tech is announced and then you never hear about it again. I'm sure some advances are real but don't advance for practical reasons.
I would be interested in reading a retrospective analysis looking at previously announced advances and seeing how they proceeded.
I would also be interested in finding out how funding changes things. The Bush administration heavily funded hydrogen technology. The Obama administration yanked much of the funding. Did that help kill hydrogen.
And what about the fundamental questions:
- How do people who do not have a garage or their own parking spot charge their automobiles? Are they going to be expected to wait a long time?
- Will electric charging ever become as quick as refueling an internal combustion engine?
- Will electric vehicles get a real work range of over 500 miles?
- How do we charge taxes without tracking a vehicle with a GPS while avoiding deadbeats? Right now too many people simply drive uninsured and I'm afraid that privacy respecting taxation would potentially allow people to get away without paying. Currently people cannot avoid the gas tax.
Re: Game changer for EV's (Score:5, Interesting)
Actually some of it does come into fruition. However within the 3-5+ years for it to be available and affordable to consumers, there is a lot of other technologies that have done incremental improvements during that time, so these big numbers in improvement that we see, will just be a small incremental upgrade by the time it is released.
Your fundamental questions, are just business opportunities,
- How do people who do not have a garage or their own parking spot charge their automobiles? Many parking spots, can be upgraded to be charging, you can probably make the city some extra money doing that too. Replace parking meters with charging spots, where they will pay for parking time and charging.
- Are they going to be expected to wait a long time? While charging current electric cars normally have the onboard car computer navigate to a charger every couple of hours, where you can charge for 10-20 minutes and continue on (as charging from a lower percentage takes less time) We just need to rethink rest stops in general, to be a destination where people may sit down to eat, have a play ground for kids, and nice rest rooms.
- Will electric charging ever become as quick as refueling an internal combustion engine? A change in behavior will make this a non-issue. Most people can charge over night at their home, and the before mentioned charging spots for apartments and city streets can charge your car at night, so you leave every day with a full charge. So for most drivers, you are not going once a week and fuel up, but have enough charge every day for your normal activities.
- Will electric vehicles get a real work range of over 500 miles? 500 miles is 10 hours of constant driving, which is not recommended or safe. This is not real work, even for Americans, is is just torture. While there are some new EV with a 500 mile range, expected in a year or two, still the 300+ mile range is good for most conditions, for real work.
- How do we charge taxes without tracking a vehicle with a GPS while avoiding deadbeats? Toll roads, Public Charging spots, that you have to pay for, Sales tax on the rest stop areas, registration, plate, and inspection charges... I also find the laws around dealing with uninsured drivers to be stupid, if they are uninsured, and they caused the accident, they have to pay, the cost of the repair, where they may need to get out a loan, and or have their pay garnished. Fuel tax was suppose to a Sin Tax, in which it was to encourage people to lessen their behavior, this issue around fuel taxes, is part of a bigger problem, of fines and corrective taxing, are being used a part of their budget, vs something outside that.
Back of the envelope (Score:2)
The issue is the charger would have to be around 700 kw. On a 480 service, that is roughly 1500 amps. So a commercial charging station (highway rest stops
Re:Back of the envelope (Score:5, Informative)
Teslas take 8-12 hours to charge from dead.
Tesla can charge from 0% to 80% in around 45 minutes. Charging to 100% takes about 1 hour and 15 mins.
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If the cord weighs 36 lbs, but it's supported at one end, then the person using it does not actually need to lift 36 lbs. Admittedly, it's not rigid, so you can't actually treat it like a lever, but it still has an effect on how much the person manipulating it needs to lift, even if it's just a loose cable. Most likely, it would not be just a loose cable though. If it's that heavy, it would probably be supported from above by a sliding pulley on a swing arm that counterbalances the weight. If you wanted to
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The reason for a 500 mile range in my view is several fold. Firstly it takes away the range anxiety because almost nobody drives that sort of distance in a day unless you are into tag team driving. However that is sufficiently rare that we don't need to consider it. So you can charge up overnight, drive all day and the charge up overnight. Rinse and repeat.
Secondly it means you still have good range when the car is 10 years old and the batteries are now at 80% of original capacity.
Thirdly right now the char
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A long time ago, I worked as a computer programmer, for a small company. We didn't have email, or even internet. We had reference books to look up language commands, and we talked to other coders for any help or assistance.
Today I don't have any reference books, and I do a lot of searches online for additional information. Programming Languages and IDE, no longer come with large books, and even with Help documentation as part of the install. We are expected to go online and get the material. Programmi
Re: Game changer for EV's (Score:4, Insightful)
If there is a wider adoption of EV, Your Landlord may want to put one in, as to keep competitive. Like those landlords of yesteryear that had to upgrade their homes with Plumbing, Electricity, Cable TV, Internet... I use to be a landlord of an old 19th century home. they are big holes in the foundation to accommodate basic plumbing, and electrical. But if I were to sell that Apartment without running water, electrical (even if legal) I would have a hard time finding a buyer and renter.
The same thing with on street parking, your local government, may want public charging to be placed in these spots (they can charge for them too).
The Charger for your home, is fairly darn cheap, because one comes with your car (Almost any model), they often can plug into a standard plug, or to a Dryer Outlet for faster charging. This is a type of electrical work that most people can do by themselves, and it is rather cheap for an electrician do this, The cost of getting added would be cheaper than paying gas every week.
Today adoption is around 2%, so go ahead and get an ICE Car for you next car if the infrastructure isn't quite ready for you (Gas stations will not be closing down any time soon). But don't go all Stupid, and fight against the creating a new infrastructure for a different way of life.
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2. Yes, EV capable of charging as fast refueling a car within the next 10-20 years. It’s finding fast chargers available that is the problem, even today.
3. Yes, we will have some EVs with over 500 mile range within the next several years
4. Toll roads
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Batteries have Many Parameters (Score:3)
I find it so annoying that "game changing" green tech is announced and then you never hear about it again.
That's because batteries have many parameters that have to all be as good as or better than the ones they replace. This battery charges faster and stores more energy...but how many times can you charge it before its capacity degrades? How much power can it provide? etc. Any one of these parameters can render it unpractical. This battery seems to have a lot of things that make it better but if you can only charge it 100 times or you can only drain it at a trickle etc. you will probably never hear of this on
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I find it so annoying that "game changing" green tech is announced and then you never hear about it again
There is a lot of tech sitting inside of university research labs and some commercial labs as well. The problem with a lot of this stuff is that none of it translates to scaled manufacturing. You have scientists that are working hard and going through multiple iterations of a piece of technology (sometimes by hand) till they get something that works.
Another way of looking at this is "bespoke tech." Instead of building a one of kind yacht or a one of a kind 100 million dollar hypercar; they're building a one
It depends on the price (Score:2)
Wh/$ is what matters most. Specific energy (Wh/kg) is less important for EVs. Many are sold with smaller packs, not because there's a lack of space, but because batteries are expensive.
Even if this is too expensive for general purpose EVs, there are plenty of other applications if it works out. Aircraft, spacecraft, and quads all want maximum Wh/kg, and it's worth the price. There are experimental buses running on supercapacitors which charge at each stop. This might make it so they can rapid-charge on
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Next up, the thermite battery (Score:5, Funny)
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Relevant xkcd:
https://xkcd.com/678/ [xkcd.com]
Slashdot has been filled with stories of "revolutionary" new battery tech for the last 20 years, and most of those haven't panned out yet. I'll believe it when I can actually purchase one in a form factor that's useful.
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In reality, I don't expect this miracle technology to make it into cons
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Or not. Notice that the comparisons they make are to two different items. So, they could have announced something that's much faster charging than a slow-charging battery, and it holds much more energy than a battery that doesn't hold all that much energy....
Not, mind you, that I suspect that the comparisons were intended to make this new thing look good without an actual requirement that it IS good....
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There are literally hundreds of startups working on aluminium battery technology right now. Even if this one turns out to not live up to its promise, someone is going to deliver, or one of the big companies in the battery/EV space will buy a bunch of them that are close, and make them work together to make the final step.
Re:Game changer for EV's (Score:5, Insightful)
Not at all. Al is still far heavier than Li, just look at your friendly periodic table. The main reason Li-ion is used as a chemistry in applications like EV is weight. Li-ion battery is very light specifically because it's main component, Lithium is very light. It's number three element on periodic table.
Aluminium is number 13. So we're looking at atomic mass of 6,941 for Lithium and 26,982 for Aluminium. That's why they compare energy density of their battery to the "to the best currently existing aluminium based battery" rather than technology actually in use in automotive right now: NMC 6:1:1 lithium-ion battery. Because even with aluminium graphene binding three electrons for each single electron bound by a lithium-ion, the atomic weight is significantly higher than 3x. And due to extra weight needed to make Al based batteries work, even in this theoretical best case scenario they're talking about with their advertised numbers for capacity of their battery, it's about two thirds of li-ion batteries currently in operation.
Second part that they don't talk about in this marketing blip is downsides. Really, they mention that "there are intrinsic disadvantages"
>Aluminum-ion technology has intrinsic advantages and disadvantages over the preeminent lithium-ion battery technology being used in almost every EV today.
and then they go on to talk about all the advantages and not a word is said about disadvantages. That's a big red flag for any "new, revolutionary tech" announcement. What are the downsides in addition to being significantly heavier for same capacity as lithium-ion? Does it have a problem holding a charge for a meaningful period of time? Is this "plasma graphene lattice" for a single battery pack more costly to make than a typical home in Manhattan even in the best case scenario? Is this something you can make in a lab and not scalable to mass production at all?
Completely irrelevant computation (Score:4, Informative)
The lithium content in a battery is small, a single-digits weight fraction. For the weight per watt hours factor the cathode is the determining factor.
I 100% believe this is not just more battery hype (Score:5, Funny)
Because it's a company from Brisbane. We're all very honest here. We never exaggerate or overplay things. That would be un-Australian.
Sounds cool, but... (Score:2)
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Battery technology has been improving about 10% a year for the last 50 years or so.
Re:Sounds cool, but... (Score:5, Insightful)
For my car this new tech won't change anything as my BE cars is already a zero compromise solution for me. There is nothing about that new generation of battery which would affect the way I use my car. On the other hand I am in the market for a BE motorcycle and the range on them is currently a bit limited, so they would benefit such a jump in battery performance.
There is one group of user this battery tech should be perfect for. They are the ones for whom there currently exist no workable BEV solution. It is a wee bit hard to work out where they are from. It seems like they live in the USA but I am not sure where. There are some clues. It is a super high density location as there is no off street parking for anyone. I am inferring the streets are made from unobtainum, or there is no electricity, because it is absolutely 100% impossible that anyone could ever at anytime in the future install street side charging. Now for some reason even though it is such a high density place that no off street charging exists these people drive 500+ miles a day (this is how we know they are in the USA, it should be 800km+). So they can only fill at a gas stations. Therefore they also need to charge at superchargers. I'm not quite sure that happens if they have to wait more than 3 minutes to charge their cars but apparently waiting 15 minutes would be impossible. Maybe they have a rare medical disease? These people remain a bit of a mystery to me, so many unanswered questions, but there is a lot of them judging by their posts on social media. This battery should be perfect for them, they will be able to charge quicker then they gas up their ICEVs and travel further on a charge than they can on a tank of gas. Every cars using such batteries will of course have to cost less that the cheapest ICEV currently on sale because if it cost a single cent more then nobody will ever be able to afford one.
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Sure, but you've simply said the "dominant" tech. I presume by "dominant" you mean "most deployed in actual car batteries".
It's going to take many years, likely at least a decade, for a new tech to go from nothing to out-producing current lithium ion batteries by volume.
Re: Sounds cool, but... (Score:2)
Unless there is some event that causes a disruptive market force like EVs suddenly becoming more than just a niche for rich environmentalists, causing a demand spike resulting in Peak Lithium.
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Unless there is some event that causes a disruptive market force like EVs suddenly becoming more than just a niche for rich environmentalists
Lol, did you just crawl out from a rock you crawled under in ca. 2015? EVs haven't been that niche for years.
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You're likely right, and I'll add it won't use lithium or any other rare material, plenty of alternatives in works. They don't have the spectacular performance of thing claimed in this article but as good or better than lithium ion which is good enough.
3x the energy density (Score:3, Insightful)
"three time the energy of the best aluminium-based cells"?
How does an aluminium based cell compare to lithium ion? How does this new cell compare to existing lithium ion?
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charge up to 60 times faster than the best lithium-ion cells and hold three time the energy
Re:3x the energy density (Score:5, Informative)
"The graphene aluminum-ion battery cells from the Brisbane-based Graphene Manufacturing Group (GMG) are claimed to charge up to 60 times faster than the best lithium-ion cells and hold three time the energy of the best aluminum-based cells."
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I noticed that too. The article doesn't help clear it up, either.
It does say at one point in the article that it holds 3x the energy of lion, but it's unclear which is what they intended.
Re:3x the energy density (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:3x the energy density (Score:4, Funny)
Re:3x the energy density (Score:5, Funny)
It does say at one point in the article that it holds 3x the energy of lion
That’s a lot of roar power.
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"Stanford’s natural graphite aluminum-ion technology delivers 68.7 Watt-hours per kilogram and 41.2 Watts per kilogram, while its graphite-foam bumps up to 3000Wh/kg."
I mean, it's right there in the article, right below the picture of the guys holding up a cell.
So what are the disadvantages? (Score:5, Interesting)
Aluminum-ion technology has intrinsic advantages and disadvantages over the preeminent lithium-ion battery technology being used in almost every EV today.
They said all the advantages, but I missed the disadvantages. They say it's more dense, lighter, cheaper, faster, cooler, more recyclable and made of more accessible materials. It seems too good to be true. I hope it's half as good as they say. If it lasts longer than Lithium Ion, it could be extremely revolutionary for many industries, from personal electronics to green energy.
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If all other things are equal, if it can charge akin to refueling a gas-powered vehicle at a service station, in only a few minutes, that would be a game changer. Being able to recharge in a few minutes instead of a half-hour would mean people could drive it like they do a conventional gas-powered car, and recharging infrastructure built throughout the country could potentially serve more customers in a given amount of time, provided they can handle the current-draw.
Super duper fast DC charging (Score:2)
Fast charging as it exists today, let along charging several times faster requires substantial electric "gear." It needs to supply a lot more power than the electric service in your house running a dryer and the A/C at the same time.
Does anyone have a cost comparison on a gas station pump that refuels a car in 5 minutes, that is, if there isn't a rude person who leaves to car at the pump without moving it to a parking space to shop in the Mini Mart? A DC fast-charging station may be proportionately mor
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Fast charging as it exists today, let along charging several times faster requires substantial electric "gear." It needs to supply a lot more power than the electric service in your house running a dryer and the A/C at the same time.
This has to be one of the major caveats of the EV revolution. If we're ultimately talking about replacing all diesel and petrol vehicles with EVs then that's a massive amount of energy to be supplied to charging stations. Considering that today's supply grids already seem to be at breaking point just handling what we need to run our businesses and homes, it doesn't bode well for having to build out those same networks with 3-5 times more capacity.
Re:Super duper fast DC charging (Score:5, Informative)
Indeed - I don't think people appreciate how fast gasoline pumps transfer energy. They pump around 0.1 gallons per second - which is about 3.4kW-hr/second gross, call it 0.7 kW-hr/second net at 20% thermal efficiency.
Basically this is 100kW-hr (net) in 140 seconds or so - so a little over 2 minutes to fill a 15 gallon tank.
To top up a 100kW-hr (net) tank in 2 minutes requires 60 minutes/hr / 2 minutes * 100 kW-hr = 3000 kW net.
Even if we could get batteries to accept power at 3 MW, that's going to be some impressive equipment.
It follows then that it's not the total grid capacity that will cause problems with mass EV adoption for fast charging; it's the instantaneous point-of-use power requirement. I can't see "EV stations" avoiding installing large battery / capacitor banks to draw average power from the grid but be able to deliver instantaneous 300kW+ (for 20 minute charges) to vehicles. I'm not entirely sure we'll see MW-level charging* for consumer vehicles, but that's what it would take to get to sub 10-minute charging times like we have for liquid-fueled vehicles.
I'm curious as to how the cost (dollars, space, and environmental impact) of such a battery bank compares to a buried fuel tank.
*Even if charging is 99% efficient, flowing 1MW this means dissipating 10kW as heat. Maybe heat water with it? Use a cogeneration plant to recover some of it? Hopefully that 10kW isn't into the battery itself but is mostly in the charging equipment...
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The energy requirements are a sobering thought. Everyone is praising EV's as the future, without considering where that power will come from. So, yes, it's great to have pollution free cars, but that just moves the issue to the source of the power. If we had sustainable clean energy, great, but we don't. We still generate too much power by way of coal, and not nearly enough from renewables. And with coal use being wound down, we aren't yet replacing it with enough other sources to handle the load that
New Problem (Score:3)
Basically this is 100kW-hr (net) in 140 seconds or so
That requires a cable that can transfer 3 MW of electrical power. That type of power creates a new problem: how do you lift the cable to plug in the car?
Re:Next Up... (Score:4, Interesting)
This is a science that we can't simply extrapolate and say "oh, it took us x years to get from -100 to -20, it will take us the same time to get from -20 to +60,at which point we'll be good for general-purpose applications..." because physics and super-conductivity don't work that way...
On the other hand, do we have to push charging to the limits of the material? A Tesla P100D currently has a claimed range of 295 miles from a 100kWH battery. If the claims of the OP are to be believe, the tripling in energy-density that could be achieved by a switch to an aluminum-ion battery would increase that range to 885 miles.
Do you really need to push to 900 miles of range in under 5 minutes? Probably not.
But suppose you were to be offered a Model S with a range of 750 miles [comfortably more than a similar-sized vehicle with a gasoline or diesel engine and conventional-sized fuel tank] that could be charged in say 10-15 minutes.
If this technology comes to market then we've reached a point where EVs can out-perform ICE-based vehicles.
Which just leaves us one significant problem to overcome... which is that today, our grid cannot support the levels of demand that would be required for wholesale switching to EVs.
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Don't forget to account for losses in conversion of gasoline to motion though, it's not nearly as efficient as an electric motor.
In any case the slower charging is not really an issue in practice. With a 250 mile real range car, not quite affordable in the mid-range segment, charging is mostly offset by human needs like eating and using the bathroom, and stretching your legs. To the extent that it isn't, well most people only occasionally drive those kinds of distances so it's probably not worth them spendi
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I already accounted for the ICE conversion losses - that's the gross vs. net value. I used 20% efficiency for ICE conversion (factor of 5), which is not too far off for modern ICEs.
I'm not sure how much "time saved not going to gas stations" is a meaningful metric. At least in my household, we tack those onto existing errand trips; I don't know many people that make trips only to refuel their vehicle.
Our refueling stops are maybe once a week in non-COVID times, so I suppose yes in total that's maybe 200 mi
Local capacity (Score:4, Interesting)
I have seen a figure of 4E12 automobile passenger miles in the US. For reasonably efficient EVs, that works out to about 1E12 annual kWHr in relation to total electric use of 4E12 kWHr.
Yes, complete electrification of transportation will be a sizeable increase in electric use, but it does not require increase by whole-number multiples in either generation or long-distance transmission capacity.
What it will require is a lot of electric "gear" -- feed lines, transformers, rectifiers, electronic controllers -- to have a fast DC-charging infrastructure to occupy to replace all of those gas pumps.
Apart from peak periods and the recent pipeline crisis, you can generally pull up to a gas station and not have to wait for a pump. My question is what will the electric DC fast charging station infrastructure need to look like when large numbers of cars are electric?
Think of it this way. EV proponents say, 30 minutes to fast charge, no big deal, you need to take rest breaks of that length anyway, and you can go into a restaurant as your car is plugged in. OK, how would this work if along busy Interstate Highway routes, people pulled up to a gas pump and kept the car parked there while they spent 30 minutes for a restaurant meal? So, we can recharge in 5 minutes? Then the cables, transformers, inverters and other electric gear have to be 6 times bigger than before?
Is the expectation that DC fast charging will be as convenient as pumping gas, which generally requires a large excess of gas pumps that one is available when you choose to stop for gas? Or will DC fast charging require some kind of reservation system to balance the availability of charging stands because they are too expensive to overbuild like we do with gas pumps?
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Generally, people aren't going long-haul with their gas station usage.
Generally, people will charge at home -- so for that medium-haul, they can charge before they leave (and charge when they get there) instead of stopping in the middle (because they didn't get gas on the way home from work yesterday)
There are trade-offs, and it's not a 1:1 mapping.
Re:Local capacity (Score:4, Informative)
OK. So you want to make a trip from SF to LA, for example. That's around 400 miles, so if you start driving with 100% charge then you'll need two charging stops (we're charging to ~60% with some safety buffer). Each of the charges will take about 20 minutes. So we're talking about 40 minutes of charging time for the LA-SF trip. A regular gasoline car would likely need one tank top-up for the same road trip, which works out to about 4 minutes at the pump. Ergo, you need about 10 times more fast DC charging spots than regular gas pumps.
This is actually already close to true for the I-5 corridor for the Tesla supercharges. There are total of 190 supercharging stalls between SF and LA, and a bit more if you do a quick detour.
Re: (Score:2)
This is informative.
Re: (Score:2)
Really Fast Charging is the headline for this battery, if in fact it works at scale (all they've built is some coin cells) with decent cycle life. The claims are very attractive.
As for charging, yes, the majority of current EV owners charge at home, at work, or both. Those are generally limited-power connections - anywhere from around 1kw (120V, 8-12A Level 1, 3-5 miles/charging hour for a 4 mi/kwh EV) to 7-9kw (40-50A 240V Level 2, 25-35 miles/charging hour for a 4 mi/kwh EV). Those setups won't change wit
Re: (Score:2)
They said all the advantages, but I missed the disadvantages.
Probably manufacturing complexity. "nanotech to insert atoms."
the big point, don't need lithium (Score:4, Interesting)
people keep whining about mineral shortages being deal breaker for EV, but the truth is there are many alternatives in the works that use common materials. Already Musk is saying they're going to get cobalt out of batteries, and going to iron rather than nickel cathodes. Now alternatives to lithium itself have been developed. There are zinc ion and sodium ion, and graphene batteries in the works.
Not quite a dupe (Score:5, Insightful)
Slashdot has let us know that aluminum batteries are just about to replace lithium ion, regularly, for more than a decade. Here’s one from 2015: https://hardware.slashdot.org/... [slashdot.org]
Re: (Score:2)
Probably a pump and dump scheme
Mass Produceable? (Score:4, Interesting)
Graphene and aluminum and abundant and inexpensive. How about the nanotechnology used to place the aluminum atoms in the graphene pouches? This sounds like it might be expensive and difficult to scale up for mass production.
Any info on that?
So we can finally have ray guns? (Score:2)
But wait..what about wireless charging in roads? (Score:2)
heh - commented a few days ago on that story that by the time that technology every came even close to being used, batteries would be so improved there'd be no need. Just wait a few days and a more compelling story comes along.
7000Wh/kg for graphite foam (Score:2)
The headliner to me would be the 7000Wh/kg, but for some reason that's not raised much. I'm don't know, is the graphite foam just a small part of the battery, so 7000Wh/kg for one component (e.g. cathode), and 160Wh/kg overall?
Re: (Score:2)
It's not 7000Wh/kg, it's 7000W/kg.
(See also https://www.graphene-info.com/... [graphene-info.com])
That means you can get a lot more power from a given weight of aluminum ion battery than you can from lithium ion, but the energy density at 160Wh/Kg is not as good as for instance Tesla batteries, at ~260Wh/Kg.
It's a shame - I got excited for a moment because a 3x energy density for batteries could entirely revolutionize general aviation.
Re: (Score:3)
It's a shame - I got excited for a moment because a 3x energy density for batteries could entirely revolutionize general aviation.
Aviation should use swap-able, air breathing batteries. Planes use the most energy reaching their desired altitude. With air breathing batteries the batteries are lightest during the accent. When in use they pull oxygen from the air and get heavier. So long as they do not get too heavy to land, it should work out great. You could even jettison the battery in the event of an emergency landing.
See here [wikipedia.org] for more information.
Sketchy Company (Score:2)
Unexpected benefit? (Score:2)
Does it mean that, if I forget to turn out the lights and run down the battery, I can piss into it and get enough for a few miles to the nearest charging station?
Claims good charge cycles (Score:2)
Heck even if you could get 200 cycles out of it, graphene and aluminum are fairly recyclable and easy to source. I'm a little skeptical on their charging cycle performance, I think they are quoting what the theoretical performance is.
“The real differentiator about these batteries is their very high power density of up to 7000 watts/kg, which endows them with a very high charge rate. Furthermore, graphene aluminium-ion batteries provide major benefits in terms of longer battery life (over 2000 charge /
What's the internal resistence of these? (Score:4, Interesting)
You need a low internal resistance for them to be useful in high current draw applications. Also, what's the physical density (not energy density) compared to lithium? Aluminum itself is about five times as dense as lithium. If the energy density is indeed three times lithium-ion then the actual mass will make the thing heavier than an equivalent capacity lithium cell and therefore a less useful EV power source. Faster charging is a benefit and abundance of raw materials is too. Then what is the lifespan of the cell? If it craps out after a few years and it costs a ton of money to replace, that too is not a good combination.
A satisfactory battery. (Score:2)
And now I know what kind of batteries Satisfactory uses.
Too late, China has stolen it already (Score:2)
Collaboration with China’s Dalian University of Technology... If the technology is real and viable, you can be sure China is ramping up their own copy now.
TANSTAFFL (Score:3)
OK, so it charges really fast. It doesn't overheat like lithium-ion. It lasts 3x longer than Li-Ion cells. It's easier (which implies cheaper) to recycle and uses common and less-toxic materials. Now here's the kicker according to the summary - it holds 3x the energy of OTHER ALUMINUM-BASED CELLS. But TFS is a little ambiguous about energy storage and power delivery. One can probably assume safely that it can deliver the power as fast as it can accept it. The linked article (buried way below the lede) suggests that energy storage is 3x Li-Ion, but no big headline is based on that leaving one to wonder. So ... it looks really really good (and TFA says it's only one of several aluminum-based cell programs that are in the running). But as with other miracle batteries, I want to see them working in sizes bigger than a coin cell first.
Re: (Score:2)
There's always a "but" with these announcements.
There is not a "but" here.
This new battery will be just one more of the countless graphene based products already on the market.
Re:And what's the "but"? (Score:4, Interesting)
There's always a "but" with these announcements.
The first "but" is that it only has 3x better capacity than the best aluminum cells.
ie. It only holds 160Wh/kg, compared to the current 250Wh/kg of Lithium. Your car will be 50% larger/heavier with these.
The second "but" is that having a fast-charging battery is one thing, having an electricity supply that can cope with that charge rate is another. To charge a 100kWh battery in a couple of minutes needs a 3MW charger, that's two orders of magnitude more than today's chargers can handle. Scaling that to a system where everybody drives electric cars is a big problem.