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>Also electric cars will create very large storage capcities for energy in the next decade. Chem engineer here, battery technology doesnt seem to be a guarante

>Also electric cars will create very large storage capcities for energy in the next decade. Chem engineer here, battery technology doesnt seem to be a guarantee to improve. Batteries are limited by the physics of our universe. The chemistry between two chemicals will not change, and it feels like we have exhausted every option. This is a non trivial problem and I am unsure if I expect a solution.

_Codemonkeyism 8y ago
I do agree. In 2 decades there will be hundreds of millions of electric cars in the world which currently do not exist. This is a huge increase in battery power even with battery technology not changing in the next 2 decades.
Zealotux 8y ago
I'm curious of what your opinion of hydrogen is, I know that it's still very expensive because of energy lost during the conversions. Do you think it has a viable future when it comes to energy storage?
greglindahl 8y ago
The actual track record of battery improvement is pretty incredible, especially the recent fall in prices.
ben_w 8y ago
I expect minimal (or even zero) energy density improvements. However, I do expect cost improvements. Even if the cost to make a battery is constant when measured in joules, PV is getting cheaper and can supply more joules for less money.
- genericid 8y ago
  Is energy density even important for grid storage? France is larger and less mobile than a car or a computer.
  - toomuchtodo 8y ago
    It is not important. As you mentioned, plenty of space.
  - ben_w 8y ago
    Not at all. Even in cars, further density improvements are not needed, as the limitation to general adoption is cost rather than range or performance. In restrospect I ought to have mentioned that in my previous comment…
    - mrep 8y ago
      Density + charging speed are definitely important but I do agree that cost is without a doubt the biggest problem. For some people, gas will still be preferable until electric charging speed is close to gas AND speedy charging units are as available as gas stations AND batteries match the range of gas tanks (my new subaru gets like 500 miles on a full tank when driving on the interstate which is super convenient and good luck getting long distance rural drivers to switch without the 3 problems I cited). It's too far out to say if electric cars/dynamic grid/renewable energy will revolunatize our planets energy usage since we are very entrenched in the current system (and anyone claiming anything beyond 5 years underestimates how fast shit changes IMO) but I am seriously excited about these changes with how much the economics have been improving for a clean energy society.
      - ben_w 8y ago
        I’m a lot more pessimistic than you about the rate of change. I recently went through Eureka (California) and most of the cafes and restaurants there did not accept Apple Pay, contactless payment, or even chip and pin payment. Eventually we found a place that did accept Apple Pay so we could eat. While Apple Pay itself is only about four years old, contactless payment has been fairly standard in the UK for about 10 years, and chip and pin is over 20 years old.
mrep 8y ago
I'm no electrical engineer, but I think we can do some napkin math. 80khw battery in an average model s * 300000000 million cars / (3,911,000,000,000 kwh energy use in the in all of 2015 [2] / 365 days per year) = 2.239 times as much storage in cars on the road versus energy usage which seems pretty doable. Also, it also gets better because as car batteries age and their storage / weight goes down, you can replace them with new ones and put the old ones in grid storage locations where weight / storage does not matter and run them till they are literally dead. [1]: about a little less than 1 per person (just rough estimating here) [2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_electricity_consumption https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_electrici...
- mrep 8y ago
  2 big variables I forgot about. 1. We need to eventually switch our winter gas heaters to electric which while helping balance summer vs winter electric usage, electric heating isn't as efficient and we have to increase the outside air a lot more in the winter than we have to cool it in the summer (for most people at least). 2. I forgot to add in the extra electric demand needed to power the cars which is currently powered by oil.
  - icebraining 8y ago
    Electric heat pumps are quite efficient, AFAIK.
    - mrep 8y ago
      I heard that a long time ago and thinking back on it, I think it was due to the fact that most electricity comes from burning other stuff so the overall efficiency of burning something to make electricity (definitely not 100%), then transporting over lines to your house, then converting that into heat to warm your home is less efficient than just burning it at your house and using the heat directly.
    - amluto 8y ago
      For swimming pools, which are admittedly a special case, heat pumps are already cheaper to operate than gas heaters in most of the country. (They’re special for several reasons. A big one is that they have huge thermal mass, so your heat pump can operate at whatever time of day you want. This means you can optimize for electric rates vs outdoor temperature. Heat pumps, unlike gas boilers, are considerably more efficient when it’s warm out.)
psergeant 8y ago
> Batteries are limited by the physics of our universe Right, but our ingenuity and understanding of the physics may well not be perfect. Didn’t Moore’s law continue on well past it’s sell-by-date?
- mitchty 8y ago
  > Right, but our ingenuity and understanding of the physics may well not be perfect. Our understanding of gravity is pretty much the same as Newton's in how we can utilize it. We know its not perfect but that doesn't change the reality. And ironically, battery chemistry is better understood than gravity.
  - psergeant 8y ago
    > Our understanding of gravity is pretty much the same as Newton's in how we can utilize it I suspect anyone from Newton’s day would be surprised to see an A380.
PuffinBlue 8y ago
Battery technology might not be a limitless path, but wouldn't super-capacitors have more potential? The ability to store large amounts of power very very quickly and for a decent amount of time could be an important addition to energy management, if such capacitors could be commercially viable and practical.
- teraflop 8y ago
  Supercapacitors are already commercially viable. I have one in my cheap dashcam because it withstands high temperatures better than a battery. The only problem is that their energy density is 1-2 orders of magnitude worse than lithium-ion batteries.
  - PuffinBlue 8y ago
    Ah yes, I actually have one in my dashcam too! Oops. As you can see this is an area I don't know much about. I was more thinking along the lines of larger 'industrial' scale capacitors, but I'm not sure if there are fundamental barriers physical that can't be overcome to make such devices a sensible route to pursue?
w1 8y ago
One energy storage method that's relatively cheap, efficient, and scalable is pumped-storage hydroelectricity. There's a 3 GW plant in Virginia that's been in operation since the 80s[1]! There is ultimately minimal need for FF peakers, or large rare-earth batteries, if governments can execute projects like this. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bath_County_Pumped_Storage_Station https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bath_County_Pumped_Storage_Sta...
- mrep 8y ago
  Yeah, but like most renewable energy, you need the right place to currently make it economical.

_Codemonkeyism 8y ago

I do agree. In 2 decades there will be hundreds of millions of electric cars in the world which currently do not exist. This is a huge increase in battery power even with battery technology not changing in the next 2 decades.

Zealotux 8y ago

I'm curious of what your opinion of hydrogen is, I know that it's still very expensive because of energy lost during the conversions. Do you think it has a viable future when it comes to energy storage?

greglindahl 8y ago

The actual track record of battery improvement is pretty incredible, especially the recent fall in prices.

ben_w 8y ago

I expect minimal (or even zero) energy density improvements. However, I do expect cost improvements. Even if the cost to make a battery is constant when measured in joules, PV is getting cheaper and can supply more joules for less money.

genericid 8y ago
Is energy density even important for grid storage? France is larger and less mobile than a car or a computer.
- toomuchtodo 8y ago
  It is not important. As you mentioned, plenty of space.
- ben_w 8y ago
  Not at all. Even in cars, further density improvements are not needed, as the limitation to general adoption is cost rather than range or performance. In restrospect I ought to have mentioned that in my previous comment…
  - mrep 8y ago
    Density + charging speed are definitely important but I do agree that cost is without a doubt the biggest problem. For some people, gas will still be preferable until electric charging speed is close to gas AND speedy charging units are as available as gas stations AND batteries match the range of gas tanks (my new subaru gets like 500 miles on a full tank when driving on the interstate which is super convenient and good luck getting long distance rural drivers to switch without the 3 problems I cited). It's too far out to say if electric cars/dynamic grid/renewable energy will revolunatize our planets energy usage since we are very entrenched in the current system (and anyone claiming anything beyond 5 years underestimates how fast shit changes IMO) but I am seriously excited about these changes with how much the economics have been improving for a clean energy society.
    - ben_w 8y ago
      I’m a lot more pessimistic than you about the rate of change. I recently went through Eureka (California) and most of the cafes and restaurants there did not accept Apple Pay, contactless payment, or even chip and pin payment. Eventually we found a place that did accept Apple Pay so we could eat. While Apple Pay itself is only about four years old, contactless payment has been fairly standard in the UK for about 10 years, and chip and pin is over 20 years old.

mrep 8y ago

I'm no electrical engineer, but I think we can do some napkin math. 80khw battery in an average model s * 300000000 million cars / (3,911,000,000,000 kwh energy use in the in all of 2015 [2] / 365 days per year) = 2.239 times as much storage in cars on the road versus energy usage which seems pretty doable. Also, it also gets better because as car batteries age and their storage / weight goes down, you can replace them with new ones and put the old ones in grid storage locations where weight / storage does not matter and run them till they are literally dead. [1]: about a little less than 1 per person (just rough estimating here) [2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_electricity_consumption https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_electrici...

mrep 8y ago
2 big variables I forgot about. 1. We need to eventually switch our winter gas heaters to electric which while helping balance summer vs winter electric usage, electric heating isn't as efficient and we have to increase the outside air a lot more in the winter than we have to cool it in the summer (for most people at least). 2. I forgot to add in the extra electric demand needed to power the cars which is currently powered by oil.
- icebraining 8y ago
  Electric heat pumps are quite efficient, AFAIK.
  - mrep 8y ago
    I heard that a long time ago and thinking back on it, I think it was due to the fact that most electricity comes from burning other stuff so the overall efficiency of burning something to make electricity (definitely not 100%), then transporting over lines to your house, then converting that into heat to warm your home is less efficient than just burning it at your house and using the heat directly.
  - amluto 8y ago
    For swimming pools, which are admittedly a special case, heat pumps are already cheaper to operate than gas heaters in most of the country. (They’re special for several reasons. A big one is that they have huge thermal mass, so your heat pump can operate at whatever time of day you want. This means you can optimize for electric rates vs outdoor temperature. Heat pumps, unlike gas boilers, are considerably more efficient when it’s warm out.)

psergeant 8y ago

> Batteries are limited by the physics of our universe Right, but our ingenuity and understanding of the physics may well not be perfect. Didn’t Moore’s law continue on well past it’s sell-by-date?

mitchty 8y ago
> Right, but our ingenuity and understanding of the physics may well not be perfect. Our understanding of gravity is pretty much the same as Newton's in how we can utilize it. We know its not perfect but that doesn't change the reality. And ironically, battery chemistry is better understood than gravity.
- psergeant 8y ago
  > Our understanding of gravity is pretty much the same as Newton's in how we can utilize it I suspect anyone from Newton’s day would be surprised to see an A380.

PuffinBlue 8y ago

Battery technology might not be a limitless path, but wouldn't super-capacitors have more potential? The ability to store large amounts of power very very quickly and for a decent amount of time could be an important addition to energy management, if such capacitors could be commercially viable and practical.

teraflop 8y ago
Supercapacitors are already commercially viable. I have one in my cheap dashcam because it withstands high temperatures better than a battery. The only problem is that their energy density is 1-2 orders of magnitude worse than lithium-ion batteries.
- PuffinBlue 8y ago
  Ah yes, I actually have one in my dashcam too! Oops. As you can see this is an area I don't know much about. I was more thinking along the lines of larger 'industrial' scale capacitors, but I'm not sure if there are fundamental barriers physical that can't be overcome to make such devices a sensible route to pursue?

w1 8y ago

One energy storage method that's relatively cheap, efficient, and scalable is pumped-storage hydroelectricity. There's a 3 GW plant in Virginia that's been in operation since the 80s[1]! There is ultimately minimal need for FF peakers, or large rare-earth batteries, if governments can execute projects like this. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bath_County_Pumped_Storage_Station https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bath_County_Pumped_Storage_Sta...

mrep 8y ago
Yeah, but like most renewable energy, you need the right place to currently make it economical.