Panasonic Battery Could Power House for 1 Week

[jawshoeaw]

[citation][nom]loomis86[/nom]Nuclear is the cleanest, but coal is still the cheapest. It will remain so until the day that natural gas beats coal as the cheapest. Nuclear will likely never be the cheapest. The future is methane, ammonia, urea, hydrogen peroxide, cyanogen, hydrazine, hydrogen, and acetylene...imo. Wind/solar are dead ends for all but small handheld devices and some minor houshold appliances.[/citation]
Dude, all those fuels you listed currently come from hydrocarbon sources, or are hydrocarbons themselves.

Wind and Solar can already replace all global residential electric needs (thermal solar, not photovoltaic), and at a price that competes with nuclear, and really with coal if you consider the environmental costs associated with coal (and I'm not talking about greenhouse gasses).

You combine improvements in efficiency of everything from lighting to transportation, and wind/solar is ALREADY available for the same price. The US in particular has huge swaths of land that have uninterrupted sunlight and/or wind. We need infrastructure improvements (but we need those anyway) and we need to silence the whining, blocking eco-nuts and NIMBYers who will block anything and everything.

Nukes, IMHO, are a waste of money. The projects are always overrun with corruption, it's too dangerous to secure, and the waste is always hanging around, ya know?

 

[razor512]

li-ion batteries suck for these applications. they don't last long enough and are very expensive. and theres no way to make a li-ion battery last extremely long, if any of you have takes chemistry you will understand why this chemical reaction eventually fails.

they need to use a battery that does not rely on this chemical reaction.

 

[frenchieonlyone]

Lets wait until 2030 and we should be able to get nuclear power plants without renewable energy; in the meantime anything that will replace coal and oil is more than welcome so that we can lower our dependence on oil.

 

[frenchieonlyone]

Lets wait until 2030 and we should be able to get nuclear power plants without renewable energy; in the meantime anything that will replace coal and oil is more than welcome so that we can lower our dependence on oil.

 

[frenchieonlyone]

Lets wait until 2030 and we should be able to get nuclear power plants without renewable energy; in the meantime anything that will replace coal and oil is more than welcome so that we can lower our dependence on oil.

 

[bayouboy]

[citation][nom]jawshoeaw[/nom]You combine improvements in efficiency of everything from lighting to transportation, and wind/solar is ALREADY available for the same price.[/citation]

Same price as nuclear? Ummm, no. Yes, I understand that the US has not built a NPP in over 30 years, but most likely you are looking at a cost of around $6,000-7,000 per KW for nuclear while wind is around $10,000 per KW and solar is $15,000+ per KW. And only one of those options is a 24/7 power source that has the ability to change output on demand. That is not the same price. That is not even close. Do you just pull that statement out of your arse?

Coal puts power on the grid for less than $0.06 per KWh. Sorry to burst your bubble, but that is cheap. It freaking damn cheap. They also cost $750 per KW to build too.

[citation][nom]jawshoeaw[/nom]Wind and Solar can already replace all global residential electric needs (thermal solar, not photovoltaic), and at a price that competes with nuclear, and really with coal if you consider the environmental costs associated with coal (and I'm not talking about greenhouse gasses).[/citation]

So, let me get this strait. I use solar thermal heating to heat my house and water. Which I bet it works great in the summer, but it won't work here in Montana in the winter. Hell I haven't even seen the sun in the last 7 days! And all my power needs are supplied by wind? How? I don't have enough wind where I live in the woods. This is fantasy!

[citation][nom]jawshoeaw[/nom]The US in particular has huge swaths of land that have uninterrupted sunlight and/or wind.[/citation]

At this point, I don't know whether you are a troll or have no understanding of how reality works. I have never lived anywhere on this planet that had sunlight 24/7 or wind for that matter.

Ok, joking aside, I know you didn't mean 24/7. However, you argument fails pretty hard, not Titanic hard, but close.

 

[tmc]

Devil's advocate here... let's say this is a great breakthrough in storage technology. We're still a long ways for energy PRODUCTION technologies that replace your power company as a source of energy-- at which point, would you really need storage technology if you can porduce dirt cheap, clean power on-demand?

All technologies from wind, solar, nuclear, coal, whatever have benefits and costs.. mainly the greed of corporations will make this commodity a cash cow no matter how dirt cheap it is for THEM.. you will pay a higher and higher cost for energy-- you could even take that to the bank.. but they'll charge you 100% interest because the bankers screw you also.

I want what was promised back 3-4 years ago when developments for hydrogen as fuel (delivered via natural gas lines) was on a fast track of about 10 feet, then sputtered out. Next up, $5 GASOLINE, mortgage crisis & bailout galore.. anything for the consumer? yeah.. no jobs. I want what you all want, and that is for the consumer to be back in the driver's seat, and yes we should produce these products at home instead of china, but get real.. you have to charge a fair price for them, even if that means undercutting chinese import prices and go bankrupt trying to compete. Eventually (decades, I know, but you have to start somewhere) there will be critical mass and the Chinese will realize the playing field's been leveled and they will have to help create more jobs in the USA besides retail / export of products.

BTW, if Sanyo can make this.. where are my 10,000mah AA rechargeable batteries. No doubt they're holiding out on these good advancements until the world economy gets better.

 

[dj1001]

these batteries are a major advancement

they are able to pump over 100 amps in just one cell

 

[dj1001]

Don't doubt these batteries.

just one little cell can pump out 100 amps and a little over 3 volts

and each cell is only about 4 in. tall and 1 in. diameter

 

[RevolutionRed]

Just FYI, a typical home uses LESS (in terms wattage at any given moment) energy than a vehicle, so it would easier to power a home with batteries than a vehicle. Case in point, Cell Phone Towers that are located in remote areas (i.e. the tops of mountains so that you decent reception) often have battery banks for backup in case of loss of power, and they are using a lot more power than a typical home. Granted, the can have generators as backup as well, and some simply run off generators 24/7. So this does not seem far-fetched to me at all. The battery bank may be large, but so is the one in the Chevy Volt.

I also agree with the other posters in that Nuclear is the way to go in the US, but the public has such a negative perception of it that I don't think it will happen any time soon.

I agree that batteries have just as much potential for pollution as any other source, but I think it's as good as any other stop-gap measure we have, and at the moment, every solution we have is a stop-gap measure. I don't know where true energy independence will come from, or if it ever will, but we've got to do SOMETHING to curb our appetite for fossil fuels.

 

[darzil]

The big issue with Nuclear power (for me, though the pollution of a bad accident is always huge too, as are the risks associated with the waste) is that Uranium is a limited resource. At current usage, we apparently have around 130 years supply of Coal, and 100 of Uranium.

It can't be equated with renewable power generation that will not run out. If Fusion was ever made to work it'd be a good option (could generate power for millenia with the ocean's supply of Deuterium), but Fission isn't all that good.

 

[lumpy]

What about Crysis?

 

[brendano257]

Somehow it looks to me like a large casing filled with hundreds of AA batteries...not new tech to me =P

/sarcasm

It would be interesting to see if this will eventually replace generators for power outages and such. It was a very bad 1.5 weeks without power in New England last year.

 

[cyber_jockey]

If its that good why houses and not cellphones ?

 

[blackened144]

[citation][nom]jaybus[/nom]Nuclear power stations[/citation]
Good luck getting one of those built in the US.

 

[dj1001]

[citation][nom]cyber_jockey[/nom]If its that good why houses and not cellphones ?[/citation]


they do use them in cell phones

look at the battery in you phone if it says li-ion then it uses the same chemestry as these batteries

 

[joebob2000]

[citation][nom]schizz69[/nom]Ever heard of hydro-electric, something that we use lots of in NZ... could be used a lot more in the states mind you.[/citation]

Ever heard of the idea that hydroelectric efficacy is derived from water flow times *elevation* to arrive at total output? Most of the US does not have sufficient elevation change to support hydro power. Those areas that do have pretty much all exploited hydro power to it's fullest given the limits imposed by restrictions on environmental devastation...

 

[Pailin]

Man, I gotta say that I can't wait to grab one of these to stick in my T-Rex 600 electric remote controlled heli

At the moment I only get about 7 mins fly time and each lipo costs about £200 >_

 

[markabee]

Even in the US, a major issue is PEAK load. You have to build the power plants and distribution to meet peak. Most of the PEAKing plants are very dirty - diesel, etc. Powerlines soak up more energy during peaks. Using batteries at homes and businesses to smooth out peaks, shift demand to off peak (nights), can save $billions and reduce pollution.