Batteries and New Battery Technologies

I was recently researching for information on a rumored hot new battery product, and in doing so I looked thru the offerings on several of the boat related forums. I was somewhat disappointed in the scope of the information I found on these boating forums, and the fact that much of the information was so scattered thruout the forums. This has prompted me to start this new subject thread devoted to the subject of the BATTERY, both existing ones and new technologies, as we require in the marine industry.

I must admit there was another impetus for my starting this new thread, a really excellent article in the recent Feb/March '08 issue of Professional Boatbuilder by Nigel Calder. The article is entitled "Breakthrough" and should be available at the ProBoat website by clicking 'view digital issues', then Feb/Mar, and use the navagation arrows at the top of the page to go to the table of contents find 'Breakthrough', then click it.

You won't regret it​

He is always so comprehensive in his contributions to electrical subjects, as you might already be aware of from his series of articles on a related subject matter, Diesel-Electric Propulsion.

I might suggest that as we add a specific new battery discussion to this thread, either thru cross-references to other discussions already posted on this forum, or from outside sources, that you 'title' the posting with the battery type discussed, ie, Li-Ion, lead acid, etc…..(just a suggestion).

Li-Ion Electrode Problems & Material

Be careful, not all Li-Ion batteries are the same.

...from Altairnano website
New anode material
The principal advance that Altairnano has made is in the optimization of nano-structured lithium titanate spinel oxide (LTO) electrode materials that replace the graphite electrode materials found in negative electrodes of current Li-Ion batteries. So far these have been combined with positive electrodes from common lithium ion batteries.


Faster recharging and discharging
An electrode made with nanomaterials does not react with the electrolytes used in most lithium ion systems. No reaction means that no Solid Electrolyte Interphase (SEI) barrier is formed around the electrode, making it easier for lithium ions to reach the surface of the electrode. And, with a nano-structured component, there’s more surface area available to the ions—up to 100 times more surface area than with conventional, graphite electrodes.

The nanomaterials facilitate access to the active sites required for battery operation. What’s more, the small size of the materials dramatically reduces the distance from the surface to the sites—all of which helps accelerate recharging and discharging.


Longer battery life
The mechanical stress and strain caused by ions entering and exiting electrodes reduces the life of a battery. We offer zero-strain materials that change little with ion movement, enhancing battery calendar and cycle life.


Operation in extreme temperature conditions
If a battery has a SEI barrier, it can’t be charged at temperatures below 32° Fahrenheit. The pores in the barrier close, eliminating access to the active sites. An electrode with our nanomaterials will not form a SEI barrier, allowing it to safely operate down to -30°C. Even at this low temperature nearly 90% of room temperature charge retention is realized from Altairnano’s nano lithium titanium oxide cells at 2C rates. Traditional Li-Ion technology possesses virtually no charging capabilities at this low temperature.

High operating temperature tests on Altairnano based cells have been conducted at 65°C where we have demonstrated 9C 90% charge retention.


Ultra-safe characteristics
Altairnano has performed “hot box” exercises on our batteries at temperatures up to 240°C — which is more than 100°C above the temperature at which graphite-based batteries can explode — with zero explosions or safety concerns. In addition, we’ve performed high-rate overcharge, puncture, crush, drop and other comparative tests alongside a wide range of graphite-based battery cells with, again, no malfunctions, explosions or safety concerns exhibited by the nano-structured Altairnano nLTO cells. In comparison, the graphite cells, put to the same tests, routinely smoked, caught fire and exploded.

Super New Battery Technology?

...portion of a letter I wrote to Nigel Calder

I absolutely love your articles on the diesel-electric subject, and now batteries. Your thorough analysis of the subject makes for wonderful reference material

This is another subject that has gained lots of attention lately; all this new battery technology. I’ve long been interested in alternative fueled cars and electric ones in particular. I’ve followed this ‘super flywheel’ energy storage technology for years believing that one day we would see this hi-density storage come into being. I even suggested a super flywheel storage unit in place of the conventional yacht’s aux generator on a catamaran design I had published in 1974. And I was pushing for some development activity on this subject for alternative-fueled autos while I was working in SE Asia.

Alas, it now appears as though these new-tech batteries might supersede the flywheel concepts. So it was with great interest that I read your latest article “Breakthrough” in ProBoat. I had recently become aware of the new anode technology for lithium-ion batteries by Altairnano, and planned on trying to find time to read more about the various new battery technologies as a possible investment potential.

With those thoughts in mind, I now how have a question I wish to ask you. Are you familiar with some super new battery technology on the immediate horizon?? I am being bombarded with several investor newsletters touting this new ‘forever battery’ technology that’s due very soon, and from a small company (?). I’ve attached a portion of some of this solicitation. Do you know anything of this technology, and/or whatever company?

I’ve added these new postings to the forum discussions in hopes condensing a lot of the scattered battery discussions into one central discussion thread. And I started each with a reference to your fine article. Please add anything you would like to these discussions.

Anyone know of this?

Flywheel Energy Storage, again

This method of energy storage keeps popping back into my mind.

Some quoted excerpts from a few of my previous postings:

Flywheel energy storage is a more efficient, pollution-free solution to chemical batteries. Total recharge can be accomplished in about 15 minutes at any rate of energy draw or frequency yielding a cycle life of over 100,000 charges, or 30 years, with no deterioration in performance.
http://boatdesign.net/forums/showpost.php?p=88966&postcount=195
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So far no big auto manufacturer has picked up the option to incorporate Bitterly's design into their models. Meanwhile, there is considerable interest in Bitterly's flywheels powering satellites in space and trains in Germany. He also has a static model in the works that could be used as a back-up power generator. In the event of a power failure, it could assume the load within nanoseconds, thus preventing valuable computer data from being lost.

How long do Bitterly's flywheel systems last? He has designed the system to survive at least 10,000 run-and-recharge cycles. Under normal conditions, that would mean a life of 27 years -- and that's only a lower limit. flywheel systems last? He has designed the system to survive at least 10,000 run-and-recharge cycles. Under normal conditions, that would mean a life of 27 years -- and that's only a lower limit.
http://boatdesign.net/forums/showpost.php?p=88967&postcount=196
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Cause of Death: Major car manufacturers' rejection of new, flywheel-based engine technology

In August 1996, brothers Benjamin and Harold Rosen summoned a throng of journalists and auto executives to the remote Mojave Desert, in California. The founders of Rosen Motors had spent three years developing a hybrid electric vehicle. Now they were ready to debut their version of the car of the future. As the road test began, the spectators craned their necks in anticipation.

With their company entering a costly crash-testing phase, and with automakers in Detroit and overseas unwilling to bankroll it, the Rosens decided to call it quits, putting their 70 employees out of work. Reinventing the automobile turns out to be as difficult as it sounds--even for Ben Rosen.
http://boatdesign.net/forums/showpost.php?p=88974&postcount=198
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Energy stowage densities on the order of 10 to 20 times that of the very best batteries last time I checked....and that was some time ago.
http://boatdesign.net/forums/showpost.php?p=89605&postcount=206

Limits in the Chemical Nature of Batteries

...in relation to the 'energy density' subject I mentioned above, I found this quote by some analyst...I can't remember where

The Limits of Nature
In technological terms, there is a natural limit on the amount of energy per gram that can be stored in a battery. This limit is defined by the size of the chemical materials employed and the strength with which they bind their electrons. The targeted use of innovative chemical elements could enable, at most, a tenfold increase in this limit relative to today’s lithium ion cells.

However, hundredfold or greater improvements are not possible due to the laws of nature. Higher energy density can be achieved in nuclear batteries, which derive their power from the radioactive decay of isotopes. As a result, nuclear batteries can constantly emit energy for up to 20 years. This principle has long been recognized and was already applied in the 1950s and 60s in satellite technology. In this area too, nanotechnology has paved the way for some remarkable advances.

Consequently, the more widespread use of such energy storage devices across a range of applications is becoming more tangible.

'Forever Battery'

Well it's happening again, my being bombarded by this 'Forever Battery' claim. So I googled it and this time finally found something other than a few Chinese battery companies calling themselves 'forever battery'
http://stockideas.org/content/view/1602/87/
http://www.untappedwealthonline.com/battery-e2a.html
http://oneguysinvestments.com/gumshoe/comments.php?DiscussionID=900
The Most Startling Innovation In 208 Years Is About to Be Unleashed On the Market…
"I believe the company I reveal in my latest research report could easily make those gains pale by comparison. And I’d like to rush it to you now. It’s called “The Forever Battery: Making Today’s Batteries Obsolete… And Its Investors Wildly Wealthy”. And it’s yours FREE when you subscribe to Untapped Wealth. "
Tim Fields
Editor, Untapped Wealth
Trinity Investment Research

Gumshoe reply:I think this is xdsl, anybody get this?

Those are all some pretty startling praises, so I went to visit the new website for XDSL, mPhase Technologies
http://biz.yahoo.com/iw/080326/0379601
http://www.mphasetech.com/

They have some sort of 'coming out party' this coming 3Apr. As I look thru a lot of there info, I see their claims for extremely long (forever) shelf life, but I don't see rechargeable, and a few other factors. Am I missing something about this 'great' new battery??

Flywheel Stabilizer

I believe someone already has one of these stabilizers...forget the nname at the moment

Forever Battery Hoax??

I raised a few questions about these inflated claims, and I think I was correct in doing so. I don't see any 'fantastic technology' here other than self-life. And in doing a little more research I found the some of the principles of this firm have been involved in some questionable SEC activity in the past. This might even be a 'pump and dump' stock situation (I say maybe as I do not know, just saw such a reference). Then again maybe they just hold a small piece of the bigger battery puzzle and need to self promote to find partners. Too bad we have this sort of activity on our stock market at a time we really need this new innovative work & investment in battery technologies.

UltraCapacitors as Batteries of the Future

Think Different - Alternative Energy Engineering
Written by Greg Allen
Monday, 21 April 2008

Ultra-capacitors are also called Super-Capacitors – they are the new emerging energy storage technology. Currently they are being used for applications such as DC motor drives, UPS systems, and electric vehicles

Let’s go back to 1993 when United States President Bill Clinton challenged US automakers to “Think Different”: President Clinton was surrounded by the CEO’s of General Motors, Chrysler, and Ford and he said that the US Government was going to help build cars with better fuel efficiency. He said that their research would lead to production of prototypes vehicles capable of up to three times greater fuel efficiency, for example, “radical new concepts such as fuel cells and advanced energy storage systems such as ultracapacitors, to produce more fuel-efficient cars that are affordable, meet or exceed current safety standards and retain the performance and comfort available today.”

TODAY.. Five years after President Clinton’s announcement, ultracapacitors are becoming more mainstream as engineers are now taking a second look at alternative energy engineering. Ultracapacitors outperform batteries in several key parameters such as power density, cycle life and temperature sensitivity.

Many Utltracapacitor designs are also more efficient and can be manufactured more environmentally safe relative to the metals in lead-acid or nickel-cadmium batteries.

So… If you are an engineer and would like some assistance integrating an ultracapacitor, please drop me an email. I will find you the expert in this industry to assist.

Let’s think different!
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I just happened across this interesting website that is devoted to the subject of ultracapacitors

Ultracapacitors.org
http://www.ultracapacitors.org/index.php

This EEStor group really appears to be moving right along with a production plant in building.

Also found this discussion of interest:
Carbon Aerogel & Ultracapacitors

Lots of Discussions Here

Technology Review

http://www.technologyreview.com/read_article.aspx?ch=specialsections&sc=batteries&id=20090&a=

http://www.technologyreview.com/read_article.aspx?ch=specialsections&sc=batteries&id=18086&a=

Fully Utilize Our National Labs and DARPA

He could just go to our National Research Labs, and emphasize the need to work on this problem. Or go to DARPA and hitch onto all of that brain power and money that chases around for advanced weapons systems.

More SuperCapacitors & Carbon Aerogel

I]...ran across this recently[/I]
http://www.rise.org.au/info/Tech/scap/index.html


What are Supercapacitors?
With characteristics of both batteries and capacitors, supercapacitors (also called electrochemical capacitors or ultracapacitors) could be used by utilities to regulate power quality. A capacitor is a device that stores energy in the electric field created between a pair of conductors on which electric charges of equal magnitude, but opposite sign, have been placed. A supercapacitor is an electrochemical capacitor that has an unusually large amount of energy storage capability relative to its size, when compared to common capacitors. These are of particular interest in automotive applications for hybrid vehicles and as supplemental storage for battery electric vehicles, as well as power electronics applications such as in wind turbines.


Figure 1 Photo of a bank of Maxwell PowerCache Ultacapacitors under a cars bonnet (Photo copyright Metric Mind).


Capacitors are electronic devices that that can provide enormous amounts of power, but only store very small amounts of energy. Alternatively, batteries can store large amounts of energy, but provide relatively low power outputs. Supercapacitors can provide both higher power outputs and store lots of energy.


Supercapacitor Technology
When a supercapacitor is charged, the energy is stored as a charge or concentration of electrons on the surface of a material. This means a supercapacitor is capable of very fast charges and discharges which can achieve a very large number of cycles without degradation, even at 100% depth of discharge (DOD). Capacitors are made from various materials in many ways, from multilayer ceramics, ceramic disc, multilayer polyester film, tubular ceramic, axial and radial polystyrene, to carbon nanotubes (Wikipedia, 2006a).

Supercapacitors found their first application in military projects such as starting the engines of battle tanks and submarines or replacing batteries in missiles. Common applications today include starting diesel trucks and railroad locomotives, actuators, and in electric/hybrid-electric vehicles for transient load levelling and regenerating the energy of braking. NASA has used 30 large supercapacitors in its turbo-electric city bus (EERE, 2006).

Carbon nanotubes and polymers, or carbon aerogels, are practical for supercapacitor designs. Carbon nanotubes have excellent nanoporosity properties, allowing tiny spaces for the polymer to sit in the tube and act as a dielectric. Polymers have a redox (reduction-oxidation) storage mechanism along with a high surface area. MIT's Laboratory of Electromagnetic and Electronic Systems (LEES) is researching using carbon nanotubes (LEES, 2006).

Supercapacitors are also being made of carbon aerogel. Carbon aerogel is a unique material providing extremely high surface area of about 400-1000 m2/g. Capacitances of up to 104F/g and 77 F/cm3 have been achieved. Some corporations, such as Cooper Electronic Technologies, are already producing aerogel-based supercapacitors. Their maximum voltage is 2.5V, but they can achieve an energy density of 325 kJ/kg (disputed as 10.6 kJ/kg, see Discussion), which is about 70% of that provided by the state-of-the-art lithium polymer batteries. Power densities achieved are even higher, up to 20 kW/kg, orders of magnitude higher than what Li-poly offers. Small aerogel supercapacitors are being used as backup batteries in microelectronics, but applications for electric vehicles are increasing (Wikipedia, 2006b).



Figure 2 Superconductors. Courtesy of Harald Sattler’s Modellbau und Elektronik Supercapacitor


Supercapacitor Applications
The newly developed Honda Fuel Cell Stack and ultra-capacitor combine to power the motor, with onboard high-pressure hydrogen tanks for fuel storage for the new Honda FCX hydrogen fuel cell car. The fuel cell vehicle is powered by an electric motor running on electricity generated by a fuel stack which uses hydrogen as its energy source. Considering factors such as energy efficiency during power generation and driving, overall system weight, and packaging efficiency, Honda has equipped the FCX with a system that combines a fuel cell stack and ultra-capacitor (see Figure 1) with onboard high-pressure hydrogen tanks (Honda Worldwide, 2006).

Renewable energy technologies feature in the applications for supercapacitors with Alain Riedo, vice president and general manager of Maxwell’s Swiss subsidiary, Maxwell Technologies SA, said that Enercon currently uses BOOSTCAP® ultracapacitors (see Figure 3) for backup energy storage and power delivery in wind turbine models ranging in output from 300 kW to 6 MW. “In addition to being one of the world’s largest wind turbine producers, Enercon is recognized as a leading innovator in the design and manufacture of megawatt class turbines,” Riedo said. “To optimize energy output and enhance system reliability and longevity, each of Enercon’s turbines’ three blades has an independent braking and pitch adjustment mechanism with backup power to ensure continuous operation in the event of a power failure. Each turbine incorporates from 200 to 700 BOOSTCAP ultracapacitors for backup power.” (Maxwell Technologies, 2006).

Ulrich Neundlinger, Enercon’s managing director of switching units, said that the company is expanding its use of ultracapacitors for blade pitch system backup power after initial deployments confirmed their significant advantages over traditional battery solutions. “Ultracapacitors enabled us to overcome a number of battery-related design challenges, including poor low temperature performance and limited operational life,” Neundlinger said. “Maxwell’s products emerged as the clear choice for this application on the basis of their robust construction, long operating life and cost-effectiveness. Wind turbine operators need low-maintenance systems that operate reliably for many years, and BOOSTCAP products have proven that they can help us to continue to meet our customers’ expectations.” (Maxwell Technologies, 2006).


...and in consideration of our enviroment;

...note that the majority of the 'materials' utilized in this battery technology is CARBON...the single most abundant material on earth, and the universe..right??

What's New

I was wondering what new developments might have occurred with these technologies. Regrettably I've been away from the forums for awhile.

So what's new??

Yachts in 2015

I made a visit to that discussion you mentioned, What will Yachts/Yachting Look Like 2015, and I made a contribution posting.

It does appear as though there are a few contributors to that subject thread that are dead set against battery energy storage concept. Regrettably I don't have enough time to debate the subject at the moment. Besides there are many raging arguments on this subject all over the INTERNET.

One positive development??
Sec Gates yesterday put forth a bold proposition that we should cut out some of the wastefulness in defense spending so that we might better look at really productive items, both militarily, and otherwise.

I've long thought, and expressed the idea, that if we only put a small portion of that brain power and money we spend on developing new weapons to work inventing new technologies (energy storage, energy grids, alternative powered auto, etc) that might really be a positive economic product, we would be far better off. These new technologies could both reduce our oil imports, and be technologies we could sell around the world.

Lets hope the Congress does not let the military-industrial complex lobby away all of Gates' excellent summations...an informed and patriotic gentleman.....and it won't just be the lobbist, the each Congressman wants to keep all that defense spending PORK in his/her districts