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Battery made of aluminum, sulfur and salt proves fast, safe and low-cost

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Re: Battery made of aluminum, sulfur and salt proves fast, safe and low-cost

#31

Post by giantg2 »

noneeeed wrote: post #5

> The team says that this battery design would be best suited to the scale of a few dozen kilowatt-hours, like powering an individual home from renewable sources. I'm curious to know if this would also be suitable for grid-scale storage, it seems like an odd ommision in the article. The description certainly implies that this would be a good use but I wonder if there is an issue that I'm not seeing that would make th…

I think I'd have even bigger concerns about a battery hitting 230F as part of normal operation in my house. Maybe they can create a dual use as a preheater for the water heater or something.

Re: Battery made of aluminum, sulfur and salt proves fast, safe and low-cost

#32

Post by giantg2 »

comboy wrote: post #9
noneeeed wrote: post #5

> The team says that this battery design would be best suited to the scale of a few dozen kilowatt-hours, like powering an individual home from renewable sources. I'm curious to know if this would also be suitable for grid-scale storage, it seems like an odd ommision in the article. The description certainly implies that this would be a good use but I wonder if there is an issue that I'm not seeing that would make th…

> I've always been a bit uncomfortable about the idea of a large li-ion battery pack in my house So am I, but I think we're not different from people who are afraid of using planes. Yes, it's really bad when it happens, it just doesn't happen all that often and when it does it ends up in the news. Just like cars are more dangerous than planes even when you have li-ion battery it probably has very low impact on total…

I guess it depends on how hard it is to move. At least when GM tells people not to park their Bolt inside or near flammable stuff, they can move it. I image it would be difficult to do that with a battery pack whether connected to the wall or not.

Re: Battery made of aluminum, sulfur and salt proves fast, safe and low-cost

#33

Post by sdenton4 »

giantg2 wrote: post #29

"They can not only operate at high temperatures of up to 200 °C (392 °F) but they actually work better when hotter – at 110 °C (230 °F), the batteries charged 25 times faster than they did at 25 °C (77 °F). Importantly, the researchers say the battery doesn’t need any external energy to reach this elevated temperature – its usual cycle of charging and discharging is enough to keep it that warm." I feel like they're w…

Sounds like you could put them in a data center...

Re: Battery made of aluminum, sulfur and salt proves fast, safe and low-cost

#34

Post by denton-scratch »

TheLoafOfBread wrote: post #18

No information about energy density and vague information about "..the new battery cells can withstand hundreds of charge cycles, and charge very quickly..." So it does not have enough density and thus useless in BEVs and if amount of charge cycles is not counted in thousands, then it is kind of useless for renewable storage as well. But at least it is cheap.

The ingredients are cheap and common; just recycle them after a coupla hundred cycles. Maybe you could even refurbish these things at home. The article didn't mention any exotic or expensive materials or parts, so perhaps you could even build your own. Which wouldn't infringe any patents, as long as you didn't sell the thing.

Re: Battery made of aluminum, sulfur and salt proves fast, safe and low-cost

#35

Post by jessaustin »

giantg2 wrote: post #29

"They can not only operate at high temperatures of up to 200 °C (392 °F) but they actually work better when hotter – at 110 °C (230 °F), the batteries charged 25 times faster than they did at 25 °C (77 °F). Importantly, the researchers say the battery doesn’t need any external energy to reach this elevated temperature – its usual cycle of charging and discharging is enough to keep it that warm." I feel like they're w…

Internal combustion engines regularly get that hot. It isn't hot enough to damage any commonly used metals.

Re: Battery made of aluminum, sulfur and salt proves fast, safe and low-cost

#36

Post by basicplus2 »

tmikaeld wrote: post #8
moepstar wrote: post #4

...so it's probably huge then?

Maybe not THAT huge, just not, pocket sized. There's a hint here: "The cells would cost just one sixth of the price of a similar-sized lithium-ion cell."

So more expensive than lead acid? I think lead acid batteries are about 1 tenth the cost of lithium

Re: Battery made of aluminum, sulfur and salt proves fast, safe and low-cost

#37

Post by harvie »

Schroedingersat wrote: post #27
TheLoafOfBread wrote: post #18

No information about energy density and vague information about "..the new battery cells can withstand hundreds of charge cycles, and charge very quickly..." So it does not have enough density and thus useless in BEVs and if amount of charge cycles is not counted in thousands, then it is kind of useless for renewable storage as well. But at least it is cheap.

People with the paper quote 50mAh/g to 500mAh/g depending on charge rate for some reason (not discharge?). Which would give it slightly higher volumetric energy density but worse mass.

li-ion has 70-100mAh/g based on my estimation? so if they can do 200mAh/g that would be very nice, but what about the voltage, charge cycle lifespan and maximum discharge rate?

Re: Battery made of aluminum, sulfur and salt proves fast, safe and low-cost

#39

Post by giantg2 »

jessaustin wrote: post #35
giantg2 wrote: post #29

"They can not only operate at high temperatures of up to 200 °C (392 °F) but they actually work better when hotter – at 110 °C (230 °F), the batteries charged 25 times faster than they did at 25 °C (77 °F). Importantly, the researchers say the battery doesn’t need any external energy to reach this elevated temperature – its usual cycle of charging and discharging is enough to keep it that warm." I feel like they're w…

Internal combustion engines regularly get that hot. It isn't hot enough to damage any commonly used metals.

But do you want that in a phone, in your pocket? Or any other electrical device? Or producing that heat in your house?

Re: Battery made of aluminum, sulfur and salt proves fast, safe and low-cost

#40

Post by mensetmanusman »

jaybeavers wrote: post #21

At this point I strongly distrust any 'breakthrough' article about research at MIT. After hundreds of these, I'm fairly convinced that any time a grad student pours liquid into a beaker, MIT's marketing department is out publishing the fact that Flubber has just been invented and we're all going to be saved by bouncy flying automobiles. I mean, congrats on the great marketing department. But it's tiring to be disappo…

Views like this are common amongst STEM types, but they vastly underestimate the importance that science communication plays in getting the public on board with science funding.

These are articles for taxpayers, not for you.

A scientist who is also an effective communicator can be 10-100x more effective than one who only publishes in journals, because it can build consensus to fund large projects and get champions and stakeholders.

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