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CO2 batteries that store grid energy take off globally

spectrum.ieee.org

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Re: CO2 batteries that store grid energy take off globally

#161

Post by bickfordb »

namibj wrote: post #65
TrainedMonkey wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

AFAIK cost here counts only the manufacturing side. While your conclusion that in the long run economies of scale will prevail, the lifetime costs are probably more than 30%. For example I expect recycling costs to be significantly worse for the Li-Ion.

Grid scale LFP with once daily cycling lasts 30 years before the cells are degraded enough to think about recycling. And those are very low maintenance over that time. You're probably mostly going to swap voltage regulators and their fans, perhaps bypass the occasional bad cell by turning the current to zero, unscrewing the links from the adjacent cells to the bad cell, and screwing in a fresh link with the connect l…

Also: From what I understand the LFP battery degradation is essentially corrosion that is removed by recycling and you can retrieve 99% of the essential LFP elements and make it into a new battery. So economically we only need to extract the LFP related materials for each human user almost once, instead of oil over and over again.

Re: CO2 batteries that store grid energy take off globally

#162

Post by alextingle »

gpm wrote: post #152
B1FF_PSUVM wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> big yikes for something coming out of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers. Besides the unit flub, there's an unpleasant smell of sales flyer to the whole piece. Hard data spread all over, but couldn't find efficiency figures. Casual smears such as "even the best new grid-scale storage systems on the market—mainly lithium-ion batteries—provide only about 4 to 8 hours of storage" (huh, what, why?).…

> provide only about 4 to 8 hours of storage" (huh, what, why?) Because the most efficient way to make money with a lithium ion battery (or rather the marginal opportunity after the higher return ones like putting it in a car are taken) is to charge it in the few hours of when electricity is cheapest and discharge it when it is most expensive, every single day, and those windows generally aren't more than 8 hours lon…

It ought to be cheaper at scale. Batteries' cost scales linearly with storage capacity. Cost for a plant like this scales linearly with the storage rate - the compressor and turbine are the expensive part, while the pressure vessels and gas bags are relatively cheap.

The bigger you build it, the less it costs per MWh of storage.

Re: CO2 batteries that store grid energy take off globally

#163

Post by aaa_aaa »

B1FF_PSUVM wrote: post #115
nayuki wrote: post #109

> The tried-and-true grid-scale storage option—pumped hydro [--> https://spectrum.ieee.org/a-big-hydro-project-in-big-sky-cou... ], in which water is pumped between reservoirs at different elevations—lasts for decades and can store thousands of megawatts for days. > Media reports show renderings of domes but give widely varying storage capacities [--> https://www.bloominglobal.com/media/detail/worlds-largest-co... ]—…

> big yikes for something coming out of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers. Besides the unit flub, there's an unpleasant smell of sales flyer to the whole piece. Hard data spread all over, but couldn't find efficiency figures. Casual smears such as "even the best new grid-scale storage systems on the market—mainly lithium-ion batteries—provide only about 4 to 8 hours of storage" (huh, what, why?).…

Because CO2 is a magic word. It can open free money doors. Or at least it used to.

Re: CO2 batteries that store grid energy take off globally

#164

Post by skissane »

lostlogin wrote: post #156
selcuka wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

True. Otherwise we would be using square meters for measuring gas mileage instead of miles-per-gallon (or litres-per-km) [1]. [1] https://what-if.xkcd.com/11/

> miles-per-gallon (or litres-per-km) [1]. The UK is metric except for distance and beer. So the disgusting ‘miles-per-litre’ is presumably needed too.

Also the UK gallon is different from the US gallon. And the same applies to all the other non-metric fluid measurements such as pints and fluid ounces. Historically the UK gallon was used throughout the former British Empire (Australia, Canada, India, Ireland, Malaysia, New Zealand, South Africa, etc). By contrast, almost nobody ever officially used the US gallon except for the US (and a small handful of highly US-influenced countries such as Liberia).

Re: CO2 batteries that store grid energy take off globally

#165

Post by thekoma »

nayuki wrote: post #109

> The tried-and-true grid-scale storage option—pumped hydro [--> https://spectrum.ieee.org/a-big-hydro-project-in-big-sky-cou... ], in which water is pumped between reservoirs at different elevations—lasts for decades and can store thousands of megawatts for days. > Media reports show renderings of domes but give widely varying storage capacities [--> https://www.bloominglobal.com/media/detail/worlds-largest-co... ]—…

Power plants are often described in terms of (max) power output, i.e., contribution to the grid. So, I can see how it might confuse a writer to then also talk about storage inadvertently.

But also, the second paragraph already describes the 100 MWh vs MW nuance.

Re: CO2 batteries that store grid energy take off globally

#166

Post by pfdietz »

kumarvvr wrote: post #133
pfdietz wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Utility-scale Li-ion batteries are good for an order of magnitude more than that. "LFP chemistry offers a considerably longer cycle life than other lithium-ion chemistries. Under most conditions, it supports more than 3,000 cycles; under optimal conditions, more than 10,000 cycles." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithium_iron_phosphate_battery...

https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1149/1945-7111/abae37/... This is the paper that claims 10,000 cycles under optimal conditions. But if you read it, they measure Equivalent Full Cycles, and it seems that implies 10000 cycles at partial discharge, not full discharge. The paper calculates everything at nominal discharge upto 80%. Meaning, the installed capacity has to be 25% more than paper value, leading to incre…

3000 is still 3x your number.

In evaluating the importance of this, you need to consider not only the time value of money, but also what one might call the "time value of technology". Does it make sense to make the technology long lived when it's improving so quickly? Or do you just replace it in a decade when things are much cheaper? Was "this PC will last 20 years!" ever a selling point?

When evaluating these technologies, you have to look at not just what they cost now, but how rapidly the cost is improving. Batteries are likely improving more quickly than turbines and heat exchangers.

Re: CO2 batteries that store grid energy take off globally

#168

Post by calmbonsai »

nayuki wrote: post #109

> The tried-and-true grid-scale storage option—pumped hydro [--> https://spectrum.ieee.org/a-big-hydro-project-in-big-sky-cou... ], in which water is pumped between reservoirs at different elevations—lasts for decades and can store thousands of megawatts for days. > Media reports show renderings of domes but give widely varying storage capacities [--> https://www.bloominglobal.com/media/detail/worlds-largest-co... ]—…

I'm old enough to remember when IEEE Spectrum was a respected technical publication.

Re: CO2 batteries that store grid energy take off globally

#169

Post by cloverich »

mannyv wrote: post #137

I have two solar panels that can generate around 960w/hr. Both panels cost around $400 ($200x2). Cheap. Storing that energy is quite expensive. an Anker Solix 3800, which is around 3.8kwh, costs $2400 USD. To store 10kwh would cost $7200 USD (which gets us more than 10kwh). If that cost asymmetry can come down then it becomes feasible to use solar power to provide cheap/local electricity in poor countries at a house…

Wait that Anker Solix 3800 costs more than my 84kwh battery containing _car_ (3.8 kwh x 22 batteries)? Something not right.

Re: CO2 batteries that store grid energy take off globally

#170

Post by coryrc »

cornstalks wrote: post #150
mannyv wrote: post #137

I have two solar panels that can generate around 960w/hr. Both panels cost around $400 ($200x2). Cheap. Storing that energy is quite expensive. an Anker Solix 3800, which is around 3.8kwh, costs $2400 USD. To store 10kwh would cost $7200 USD (which gets us more than 10kwh). If that cost asymmetry can come down then it becomes feasible to use solar power to provide cheap/local electricity in poor countries at a house…

There are way cheaper options than the Anker Solix 3800. Here are some options, in no particular order: - $3,300: 10 kWh with 2x EG4 WallMount Indoor 100Ah. - $3,110: 14 kWh with 1x WallMount Indoor 280Ah. - $2,690: 10 kWh with 1x Deye RW F10.2 B - Will Prowse's YouTube channel has reviewed several battery builds that are >10 kWh and near $2,000, but they're DIY assembly.

And still much more than the cost of the solar panels, which was GP's point.
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