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> There's a massive business opportunity for someone willing to produce low density batteries for home use. Can you explain why, please? I'm genuinely interest

by joss82 4y ago

> There's a massive business opportunity for someone willing to produce low density batteries for home use. Can you explain why, please? I'm genuinely interested. I don't understand how this would be anything other than rich prepper niche market. Installing batteries in all homes is going to be more expensive than grid storage, since you will need to pay more in total installation costs rather than installing ginormous grid batteries (or reversible dams, where feasible) in bulk.

highwaylights 4y ago
My thinking on this is that if you don't need to pack the energy storage into a small volume (like in a vehicle), and if weight is less critically important (as it'll occupy space in e.g. a garage), it opens up a lot more options for storage medium (as an example, iron-flow packs). At scale the costs could come down quite substantially given that the basic chemistry is iron, salt, water and little else - at which point it's a substantial financial boon to the customer given that they could see an up to 50% reduction in their energy costs (going by tariffs in my own region) to compensate.
- aembleton 4y ago
  Couldn't the grid install these somewhere for less than every home doing their own installation? The net effect would be the same but might be cheaper overall.
  - joss82 4y ago
    My point exactly. Iron flow sounds great though. Thanks for mentioning, I'll look into it.
  - freemint 4y ago
    It could and it might even be more efficient. That doesn't mean home installation is not a huge market though. It also has access to different capital.
    - highwaylights 4y ago
      > It also has access to different capital This is what I think the real benefit is, and also why I think we'll see both. I don't see the political will or financial commitment materialising for large scale energy storage in the short term because it's an upfront cost to a taxpayer whichever way you slice it. Individuals are free to self-fund their own battery pack installations though, and can then decide if the upfront cost is worth the reduction in rates to shift energy usage to non-peak times. Once that sufficiently takes off it becomes easier to sell the public at large on the idea, and will also drive down costs, at which point I could see wide-scale grid storage becoming thing. At that point, renewables are scalable to almost 100% of energy usage (assuming vehicles and industry transition away from combustion machinery).

by joss82 4y ago

highwaylights 4y ago

My thinking on this is that if you don't need to pack the energy storage into a small volume (like in a vehicle), and if weight is less critically important (as it'll occupy space in e.g. a garage), it opens up a lot more options for storage medium (as an example, iron-flow packs). At scale the costs could come down quite substantially given that the basic chemistry is iron, salt, water and little else - at which point it's a substantial financial boon to the customer given that they could see an up to 50% reduction in their energy costs (going by tariffs in my own region) to compensate.

aembleton 4y ago
Couldn't the grid install these somewhere for less than every home doing their own installation? The net effect would be the same but might be cheaper overall.
- joss82 4y ago
  My point exactly. Iron flow sounds great though. Thanks for mentioning, I'll look into it.
- freemint 4y ago
  It could and it might even be more efficient. That doesn't mean home installation is not a huge market though. It also has access to different capital.
  - highwaylights 4y ago
    > It also has access to different capital This is what I think the real benefit is, and also why I think we'll see both. I don't see the political will or financial commitment materialising for large scale energy storage in the short term because it's an upfront cost to a taxpayer whichever way you slice it. Individuals are free to self-fund their own battery pack installations though, and can then decide if the upfront cost is worth the reduction in rates to shift energy usage to non-peak times. Once that sufficiently takes off it becomes easier to sell the public at large on the idea, and will also drive down costs, at which point I could see wide-scale grid storage becoming thing. At that point, renewables are scalable to almost 100% of energy usage (assuming vehicles and industry transition away from combustion machinery).