5 ms·

Stationary systems for grid scale storage have amazing options - e.g. Form Energy - that needn't rely on power density benefits of Lithium chemistries. I would

Stationary systems for grid scale storage have amazing options - e.g. Form Energy - that needn't rely on power density benefits of Lithium chemistries. I wouldn't be surprised to see this sector dominate the GWh/yr chart in the next 6 years.

bryanlarsen 3y ago
It's difficult to see any of the alternatives displacing batteries for short-term storage. Batteries aren't a good fit for long-term storage, which is where alternatives should be competitive. But that market is essentially 0 right now.
- smaudet 3y ago
  Batteries (High capacity chemical) are terrible for long term storage, namely they are toxic: https://www.mountsinai.org/health-library/poison/dry-cell-battery-poisoning https://www.mountsinai.org/health-library/poison/dry-cell-ba... https://medlineplus.gov/ency/article/002805.htm https://medlineplus.gov/ency/article/002805.htm https://batteryuniversity.com/article/bu-703-health-concerns-with-batteries https://batteryuniversity.com/article/bu-703-health-concerns... And cannot always be easily recycled: https://www.epa.gov/system/files/documents/2023-09/Lithium-Ion-Batteries-Fact-Sheet-8-2023.pdf https://www.epa.gov/system/files/documents/2023-09/Lithium-I... In addition to general concerns about chemical availability, and processing issues. E.g. Demand expected to outstrip supply as soon as next year: https://www.spglobal.com/commodityinsights/en/market-insights/latest-news/metals/012622-infographic-the-lithium-deficit-road-map-will-future-supply-meet-demand https://www.spglobal.com/commodityinsights/en/market-insight...
  - lukan 3y ago
    "Batteries are terrible for long term storage, namely they are toxic" Only some are toxic. But can you name the poison or danger with saltwater batteries? https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sodium-ion_battery https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sodium-ion_battery
    - smaudet 3y ago
      Yes, there are excellent non-"battery" technologies. I'm explicitly talking about the high capacity chemical batteries everyone's crazy for these days.
      - lukan 3y ago
        Sodium ion batteries are chemical and can have as much capacity as you like. They just need a bit more space, but not too much more, as they are already used in cheaper electric cars. "Chinese automaker Yiwei debuted the first sodium-ion battery-powered car in 2023. It uses JAC Group’s UE module technology, which is similar to CATL's cell-to-pack design.[82] The car has a 23.2 kWh battery pack with a CLTC range of 230 kilometres (140 mi)." And for grid storage, "slightly bigger size" really doesn't matter.
      - cbmuser 3y ago
        A nuclear reaction has a factor of one million more energy per Mol as compared to chemical reactions. Why would want to build an enery system on low-energy-density technology? That would be equivalent to using relays for building computers in 2024.
  - NotSammyHagar 3y ago
    There's also various schemes to use gravity. Pump water uphill above a dam when power demand is low like at night, also I have read speculation of trying to do this in some underground mine or something so it doesn't evaporate.
    - cbmuser 3y ago
      That has even a worse energy density and thus requires a lot of space. We have nuclear energy, we don’t need to use technology from the medieval ages.
- NotSammyHagar 3y ago
  There are lots of companies trying to build out different kinds of flow batteries for storage. Think of a shipping container filled with some substance that stores charge and just sits there, waiting for you to use it, grid storage. But they all seem like research projects. https://news.mit.edu/2023/flow-batteries-grid-scale-energy-storage-0407 https://news.mit.edu/2023/flow-batteries-grid-scale-energy-s...
  - panick21_ 3y ago
    There have already been some flow battery startups going bust since that started. But there are many battery companies for gird batteries. Flow is just one type and one that seems far less poplar now-days. They were all the hype like 10-15 years ago. The problem is the Li-commodity race has already beaten most of those designs. You need to use very, very cheap materials. Form Energy considered some flow designs but rejected them. That's why Form Energy are going to things like Iron batteries, because Li batteries will never reach those numbers. But very few of those alternative have had any real commercial success yet.
- Phenomenit 3y ago
  What is the use case of long term storage in batteries? As some kind of reserve?
  - NotSammyHagar 3y ago
    Depends on what long term means. But batteries are used for power grid storage. Tesla is selling huge numbers of tesla megapacks (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tesla_Megapack https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tesla_Megapack) often used to replace peaker plants. Peaker plants are power plants sitting there ready to turn on during peak power usage. I think they used to be often coal, which took a while to start up and produced lots of pollution, but then more recently natural gas plants start up faster and have much lower emissions. So during an evening power usage peak, or during really cold or hot times when power demand is high, the grid can tap that power source. Now you can replace those plants with a bunch of batteries that are ready in milliseconds to provide additional power, and then you can charge them if they get used up at night when electric usage is low.
    - Phenomenit 3y ago
      Yeah, I think my question was a bit fuzzy, what is the definition of long term? Batteries are excellent for short term storage, days or weeks but they don’t have the same storage performance as fossil fuels of where talking months and years.
  - mbgerring 3y ago
    “Long term” in industry parlance means “greater than 8 hours”
scythe 3y ago
Does a battery with low cycle efficiency actually beat hydrogen for seasonal storage? The major problem with hydrogen is the fuel cell efficiency. Electrolysis is above 80%, but fuel cells are barely at 60% and it gets lower when you try to make the design more practical (lower temperature, less platinum). So batteries just have to hit 50% to compete. But that 50% includes both inherent cycle efficiency and self-discharge and Form Energy isn't putting their numbers up front, as far as I can see. More importantly, seasonal storage is heavily concerned with heating, and the conversion of hydrogen to heat is a different matter. The batteries have heat pumps going for them, but you can make a gas-powered heat pump too. So rather than the fuel cell efficiency you look at the CoP difference between electric and gas heat pumps. The latter have received little attention, but could see a surge of interest if green hydrogen becomes more popular (and easier to transport). But here we exhaust my understanding of the situation.
- panick21_ 3y ago
  Efficiency is just one of many issues for hydrogen. Storage is another issue. How fast you can dispatch convert in either direction. I don't think seasonal storage will ever be thing. Having storage for a few days or weeks is practical. Non of the technologies we are talking about will work for seasonal.
panick21_ 3y ago
Form Energy has made a huge amount of marketing before they had proven anything and claimed to have a product very fast. They have not build a single large better ever. Maybe not exactly the best example. Most of the non Li-Battery grid cell systems have not yet proven much. Many of the first generation of such system went bust. And many of the others have taken a long time and are still not deployed. So far the successful grid battery companies are mostly repackaging other cells.

bryanlarsen 3y ago

It's difficult to see any of the alternatives displacing batteries for short-term storage. Batteries aren't a good fit for long-term storage, which is where alternatives should be competitive. But that market is essentially 0 right now.

smaudet 3y ago
Batteries (High capacity chemical) are terrible for long term storage, namely they are toxic: https://www.mountsinai.org/health-library/poison/dry-cell-battery-poisoning https://www.mountsinai.org/health-library/poison/dry-cell-ba... https://medlineplus.gov/ency/article/002805.htm https://medlineplus.gov/ency/article/002805.htm https://batteryuniversity.com/article/bu-703-health-concerns-with-batteries https://batteryuniversity.com/article/bu-703-health-concerns... And cannot always be easily recycled: https://www.epa.gov/system/files/documents/2023-09/Lithium-Ion-Batteries-Fact-Sheet-8-2023.pdf https://www.epa.gov/system/files/documents/2023-09/Lithium-I... In addition to general concerns about chemical availability, and processing issues. E.g. Demand expected to outstrip supply as soon as next year: https://www.spglobal.com/commodityinsights/en/market-insights/latest-news/metals/012622-infographic-the-lithium-deficit-road-map-will-future-supply-meet-demand https://www.spglobal.com/commodityinsights/en/market-insight...
- lukan 3y ago
  "Batteries are terrible for long term storage, namely they are toxic" Only some are toxic. But can you name the poison or danger with saltwater batteries? https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sodium-ion_battery https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sodium-ion_battery
  - smaudet 3y ago
    Yes, there are excellent non-"battery" technologies. I'm explicitly talking about the high capacity chemical batteries everyone's crazy for these days.
    - lukan 3y ago
      Sodium ion batteries are chemical and can have as much capacity as you like. They just need a bit more space, but not too much more, as they are already used in cheaper electric cars. "Chinese automaker Yiwei debuted the first sodium-ion battery-powered car in 2023. It uses JAC Group’s UE module technology, which is similar to CATL's cell-to-pack design.[82] The car has a 23.2 kWh battery pack with a CLTC range of 230 kilometres (140 mi)." And for grid storage, "slightly bigger size" really doesn't matter.
    - cbmuser 3y ago
      A nuclear reaction has a factor of one million more energy per Mol as compared to chemical reactions. Why would want to build an enery system on low-energy-density technology? That would be equivalent to using relays for building computers in 2024.
- NotSammyHagar 3y ago
  There's also various schemes to use gravity. Pump water uphill above a dam when power demand is low like at night, also I have read speculation of trying to do this in some underground mine or something so it doesn't evaporate.
  - cbmuser 3y ago
    That has even a worse energy density and thus requires a lot of space. We have nuclear energy, we don’t need to use technology from the medieval ages.
NotSammyHagar 3y ago
There are lots of companies trying to build out different kinds of flow batteries for storage. Think of a shipping container filled with some substance that stores charge and just sits there, waiting for you to use it, grid storage. But they all seem like research projects. https://news.mit.edu/2023/flow-batteries-grid-scale-energy-storage-0407 https://news.mit.edu/2023/flow-batteries-grid-scale-energy-s...
- panick21_ 3y ago
  There have already been some flow battery startups going bust since that started. But there are many battery companies for gird batteries. Flow is just one type and one that seems far less poplar now-days. They were all the hype like 10-15 years ago. The problem is the Li-commodity race has already beaten most of those designs. You need to use very, very cheap materials. Form Energy considered some flow designs but rejected them. That's why Form Energy are going to things like Iron batteries, because Li batteries will never reach those numbers. But very few of those alternative have had any real commercial success yet.
Phenomenit 3y ago
What is the use case of long term storage in batteries? As some kind of reserve?
- NotSammyHagar 3y ago
  Depends on what long term means. But batteries are used for power grid storage. Tesla is selling huge numbers of tesla megapacks (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tesla_Megapack https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tesla_Megapack) often used to replace peaker plants. Peaker plants are power plants sitting there ready to turn on during peak power usage. I think they used to be often coal, which took a while to start up and produced lots of pollution, but then more recently natural gas plants start up faster and have much lower emissions. So during an evening power usage peak, or during really cold or hot times when power demand is high, the grid can tap that power source. Now you can replace those plants with a bunch of batteries that are ready in milliseconds to provide additional power, and then you can charge them if they get used up at night when electric usage is low.
  - Phenomenit 3y ago
    Yeah, I think my question was a bit fuzzy, what is the definition of long term? Batteries are excellent for short term storage, days or weeks but they don’t have the same storage performance as fossil fuels of where talking months and years.
- mbgerring 3y ago
  “Long term” in industry parlance means “greater than 8 hours”

scythe 3y ago

Does a battery with low cycle efficiency actually beat hydrogen for seasonal storage? The major problem with hydrogen is the fuel cell efficiency. Electrolysis is above 80%, but fuel cells are barely at 60% and it gets lower when you try to make the design more practical (lower temperature, less platinum). So batteries just have to hit 50% to compete. But that 50% includes both inherent cycle efficiency and self-discharge and Form Energy isn't putting their numbers up front, as far as I can see. More importantly, seasonal storage is heavily concerned with heating, and the conversion of hydrogen to heat is a different matter. The batteries have heat pumps going for them, but you can make a gas-powered heat pump too. So rather than the fuel cell efficiency you look at the CoP difference between electric and gas heat pumps. The latter have received little attention, but could see a surge of interest if green hydrogen becomes more popular (and easier to transport). But here we exhaust my understanding of the situation.

panick21_ 3y ago
Efficiency is just one of many issues for hydrogen. Storage is another issue. How fast you can dispatch convert in either direction. I don't think seasonal storage will ever be thing. Having storage for a few days or weeks is practical. Non of the technologies we are talking about will work for seasonal.

panick21_ 3y ago

Form Energy has made a huge amount of marketing before they had proven anything and claimed to have a product very fast. They have not build a single large better ever. Maybe not exactly the best example. Most of the non Li-Battery grid cell systems have not yet proven much. Many of the first generation of such system went bust. And many of the others have taken a long time and are still not deployed. So far the successful grid battery companies are mostly repackaging other cells.