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Cheaper Battery Is Unveiled as a Step to a Carbon-Free Grid

54 points by prostoalex 8y ago

jpm_sd 8y ago
Wikipedia says round trip efficiency on rechargeable zinc-air cells is very low (~50%). Doesn't sound too promising for grid scale storage. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zinc%E2%80%93air_battery#Secondary_(rechargeable) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zinc%E2%80%93air_battery#Secon...
- nielsbot 8y ago
  Does that matter if there is surplus power during charging times?
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
  - greglindahl 8y ago
    It does affect the economics. A lot of pumped water storage facilities only have a 50% efficiency, and they make sense from an economic standpoint.
- woodandsteel 8y ago
  The company says the batteries can be used in autos, which would seem to indicate they hve solved that problem. But who knows until we get some independent testing.
  - Retric 8y ago
    50% effecency could work with cars as it would still cost vastly less than gasoline. You could also have a hybrid system with a high cost high efficiency daily battery and a cheaper extended range one.
    - infogulch 8y ago
      The issue with cars is less efficiency, but more energy density. Li-ion is just at the point where it's energy dense enough to use in cars, and e.g. Tesla vehicles are considered very heavy. Any new battery tech needs to be at least as energy dense as li-ion if it's going to work in vehicles.
    - DuskStar 8y ago
      Except low efficiency tends to mean poor charging due to cooling issues. Much easier to shove 100kW into a battery when you don't have to worry about dissipating 50kW of heat...
      - Retric 8y ago
        Depends on how hot the battery can get. Normal cars already dissipate 50+kW of heat as gasoline engines are well under 40% efficient.
- pjc50 8y ago
  "as low as" 50%. NantEnergy ought to provide numbers but they're not turning up readily in searches.
woodandsteel 8y ago
So what is the technology here? The wikipedia article on zinc-air batteries says a rechargable one would have some great advantages, but also they have some major problems, like degrading over time and the number of recharge cycles. That the company has been selling such batteries for a number of years and now is announcing it is going to go big time would seem to indicate it has figured out how to solve these problems, but how does it do it? I looked at the company's web site and it doesn't give any specifics. Though I did read somewhere that it has been granted over a hundred patents, so maybe they give some idea of what they are doing.
boyter 8y ago
Bring it to Australia. Solar is growing at a massive rate, gas is expensive, electricity is expensive, and anyone with solar will have the ability and be prepared to spend to get a decent battery. Assuming this does hit the magical $3000 for 7 kWh of storage installed price point I can see it being installed all over. At that point its not a 10+ year proposition to get your money back but more like 5. Heck I would like to have one as my solar system currently exports 2/3's of the power it produces and I would love to have a battery system.
- prostoalex 8y ago
  I was doing a touristy Hunter Valley Wine Country tour a few months back, and the bus driver mentioned how Tesla Powerwall and solar panels were taking over in that area, due to the relative remoteness of the area and feebleness of the grid.
- reitzensteinm 8y ago
  Right now they're basically a hack to achieve net metering, which means that the grid maintenance and capital costs of the grid's power production will fall disproportionately on users not able to afford the systems. There'll eventually be a correction as storage ramps up (and this makes the payback calculations unreliable). Either connection fees will make up a significantly higher percentage of a bill, or owners of the systems will need to pay for power like commercial properties do with dynamic pricing.
  - coding123 8y ago
    I think he's talking about OFF grid.
Animats 8y ago
They claim about 100 installations, but aren't selling any batteries as product. So it works, but is it cost effective?
DubiousPusher 8y ago
I know HN doesn't react well to soley critical comments but does anyone else get a Pons and Fleischmann vibe outta this article?
- greglindahl 8y ago
  Well, the article quotes an expert who says LiIon costs "$300 to $400 a KWh", while mentioning that Tesla expects to cross the $100 threshold this year. And it doesn't say anything about how many charge cycles zinc-air can do, or how efficient it is at round-tripping electricity. So I'd mostly get a "terrible reporting" vibe from the article. Of course the company will say great things about its very promising technology. It's up to the reporter to not publish the press release.
emnipetro 8y ago
At this level, you may be damaging your battery if you regularly run it dry. Lithium batteries can actually die permanently if drained below a certain point. https://www.hptechnicalsupportphonenumbersusa.com/ https://www.hptechnicalsupportphonenumbersusa.com/
skc 8y ago
No talk about battery lifetime? How many discharge cycles are we talking here?
agumonkey 8y ago
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OcGWbt1mcrc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OcGWbt1mcrc
olliej 8y ago
I hate doing this kind of comment, but given the unending stream of "this battery solves everything" articles, so does this article provide actual numbers, compared to batteries in production, or development batteries at similar levels of development? Or more specifically, what are the answers to these questions: 1. What is the charge/discharge efficiency? This seems to be something lots of the "next generation batteries" in articles are bad at (compared to current commercial batteries) 2. What is the cycle lifetime? 3. What is the power density? For 2 and 3 there was an article on HN last week I think that was using a gravity potential "battery" that was carbon neutral (and based on super simple physics) simply by using an electric motor to lift weight, and then discharge by doing the reverse. [edit: Using the power of wikipedia it seems like power density is high, but it also says they're not rechargeable. But also that they are. So can someone who actually knows the chemistry of batteries give a summary?]
- solarkraft 8y ago
  Thanks for more eloquently saying what I think every time I see a "battery breakthrough"-post. Virtually none of them are actually viable.

54 points by prostoalex 8y ago

Wikipedia says round trip efficiency on rechargeable zinc-air cells is very low (~50%). Doesn't sound too promising for grid scale storage. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zinc%E2%80%93air_battery#Secondary_(rechargeable) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zinc%E2%80%93air_battery#Secon...

nielsbot 8y ago
Does that matter if there is surplus power during charging times?
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- greglindahl 8y ago
  It does affect the economics. A lot of pumped water storage facilities only have a 50% efficiency, and they make sense from an economic standpoint.
woodandsteel 8y ago
The company says the batteries can be used in autos, which would seem to indicate they hve solved that problem. But who knows until we get some independent testing.
- Retric 8y ago
  50% effecency could work with cars as it would still cost vastly less than gasoline. You could also have a hybrid system with a high cost high efficiency daily battery and a cheaper extended range one.
  - infogulch 8y ago
    The issue with cars is less efficiency, but more energy density. Li-ion is just at the point where it's energy dense enough to use in cars, and e.g. Tesla vehicles are considered very heavy. Any new battery tech needs to be at least as energy dense as li-ion if it's going to work in vehicles.
  - DuskStar 8y ago
    Except low efficiency tends to mean poor charging due to cooling issues. Much easier to shove 100kW into a battery when you don't have to worry about dissipating 50kW of heat...
    - Retric 8y ago
      Depends on how hot the battery can get. Normal cars already dissipate 50+kW of heat as gasoline engines are well under 40% efficient.
pjc50 8y ago
"as low as" 50%. NantEnergy ought to provide numbers but they're not turning up readily in searches.

woodandsteel 8y ago

So what is the technology here? The wikipedia article on zinc-air batteries says a rechargable one would have some great advantages, but also they have some major problems, like degrading over time and the number of recharge cycles. That the company has been selling such batteries for a number of years and now is announcing it is going to go big time would seem to indicate it has figured out how to solve these problems, but how does it do it? I looked at the company's web site and it doesn't give any specifics. Though I did read somewhere that it has been granted over a hundred patents, so maybe they give some idea of what they are doing.

boyter 8y ago

Bring it to Australia. Solar is growing at a massive rate, gas is expensive, electricity is expensive, and anyone with solar will have the ability and be prepared to spend to get a decent battery. Assuming this does hit the magical $3000 for 7 kWh of storage installed price point I can see it being installed all over. At that point its not a 10+ year proposition to get your money back but more like 5. Heck I would like to have one as my solar system currently exports 2/3's of the power it produces and I would love to have a battery system.

prostoalex 8y ago
I was doing a touristy Hunter Valley Wine Country tour a few months back, and the bus driver mentioned how Tesla Powerwall and solar panels were taking over in that area, due to the relative remoteness of the area and feebleness of the grid.
reitzensteinm 8y ago
Right now they're basically a hack to achieve net metering, which means that the grid maintenance and capital costs of the grid's power production will fall disproportionately on users not able to afford the systems. There'll eventually be a correction as storage ramps up (and this makes the payback calculations unreliable). Either connection fees will make up a significantly higher percentage of a bill, or owners of the systems will need to pay for power like commercial properties do with dynamic pricing.
- coding123 8y ago
  I think he's talking about OFF grid.

Animats 8y ago

They claim about 100 installations, but aren't selling any batteries as product. So it works, but is it cost effective?

DubiousPusher 8y ago

I know HN doesn't react well to soley critical comments but does anyone else get a Pons and Fleischmann vibe outta this article?

greglindahl 8y ago
Well, the article quotes an expert who says LiIon costs "$300 to $400 a KWh", while mentioning that Tesla expects to cross the $100 threshold this year. And it doesn't say anything about how many charge cycles zinc-air can do, or how efficient it is at round-tripping electricity. So I'd mostly get a "terrible reporting" vibe from the article. Of course the company will say great things about its very promising technology. It's up to the reporter to not publish the press release.

emnipetro 8y ago

At this level, you may be damaging your battery if you regularly run it dry. Lithium batteries can actually die permanently if drained below a certain point. https://www.hptechnicalsupportphonenumbersusa.com/ https://www.hptechnicalsupportphonenumbersusa.com/

skc 8y ago

No talk about battery lifetime? How many discharge cycles are we talking here?

agumonkey 8y ago

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OcGWbt1mcrc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OcGWbt1mcrc

olliej 8y ago

I hate doing this kind of comment, but given the unending stream of "this battery solves everything" articles, so does this article provide actual numbers, compared to batteries in production, or development batteries at similar levels of development? Or more specifically, what are the answers to these questions: 1. What is the charge/discharge efficiency? This seems to be something lots of the "next generation batteries" in articles are bad at (compared to current commercial batteries) 2. What is the cycle lifetime? 3. What is the power density? For 2 and 3 there was an article on HN last week I think that was using a gravity potential "battery" that was carbon neutral (and based on super simple physics) simply by using an electric motor to lift weight, and then discharge by doing the reverse. [edit: Using the power of wikipedia it seems like power density is high, but it also says they're not rechargeable. But also that they are. So can someone who actually knows the chemistry of batteries give a summary?]

solarkraft 8y ago
Thanks for more eloquently saying what I think every time I see a "battery breakthrough"-post. Virtually none of them are actually viable.