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Can “second life” EV batteries work as grid-scale energy storage?

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Re: Can “second life” EV batteries work as grid-scale energy storage?

#51

Post by epistasis »

noosphr wrote: post #46
epistasis wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's currently no technological path for fusion to be cheaper than fission. It would require a technological breakthrough that we have not yet imagined. And already, solar plus storage is cheaper than new nuclear. And solar and storage are getting cheaper at a tremendous rate. It's hard to imagine a scenario where fusion could ever catch up to solar and storage technology. It may be useful in places with poor sola…

The low energy future that was envisioned is not happening. The AI arms race, which has become an actual arms race in the war in Ukraine, needs endless energy all times a day. China is already winning the AI cold war because it adds more capacity to its grid a year than Germany has in a century. If we keep going with agrarian methods of energy production don't be surprised that we suffer the same fate as the agrarian…

You have that exactly backwards: solar + storage is what will give us energy abundance at less money than we could ever imagine from nuclear fission or fusion.

China is winning the AI Cold war because it's adding solar, storage, and wind at orders of magnitude more than nuclear.

I'm not sure who's doing your supposed "envisioning" but there is no vision for cheap abundant energy from fusion. Solar and storage deliver it today, fusion only delivers it in sci fi books.

Nuclear is 20th century technology that does not fit with a highly automated future. With high levels of automation, construction is super expensive. You want to spend your expensive construction labor on building factories, not individual power generation sites.

Building factories for solar and storage lets them scale to a degree that nuclear could never scale. Nuclear has basically no way of catching up.

Re: Can “second life” EV batteries work as grid-scale energy storage?

#52

Post by duskwuff »

pinkgolem wrote: post #28
dukeofdoom wrote: post #25

Seems like the market is going the hybrid route. It's kind of easy to see why, best of both worlds. Some BYD hybrids have crazy ranges like 1500 km on a tank of gas. The more practical car is winning. They put in a much small battery in these for fast charge, and the daily commute range. And you have gas, for longer trips. Maybe smaller batteries would be better for grid-scale storage too. If they're lighter and easi…

i have heard that hybrid's have a maintanance problem? is not a concern, double the technologie in the same space?

Not that I'm aware of. I've heard that many hybrids actually require less maintenance - for instance, the car can use electric power for hard acceleration instead of stressing the engine, so oil tends to last longer, and regenerative braking causes the friction brakes to wear out more slowly.

Re: Can “second life” EV batteries work as grid-scale energy storage?

#53

Post by bryanlarsen »

cogman10 wrote: post #23
whatever1 wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We are only 5-6 years into the car ev market. Tesla model 3 started being sold in 2018 in meaningful numbers

Still have mine. Battery capacity is around 80% of the new capacity. I'm not planning on switching anytime soon as it's got plenty of range still. I'll probably swap the pack out when it hits 70% in the next 2 or 3 years.

It probably will take a lot longer than that to hit 70%. Degradation on Tesla batteries slows down considerably after it hits 85%.

there are exceptions, though.

Re: Can “second life” EV batteries work as grid-scale energy storage?

#54

Post by kieranmaine »

torginus wrote: post #31

Personally speaking, having just bought an Ioniq 5 and installing solar at home what I see as the near future improvement is adding V2L functionality, which I can hook up to the generator input of my solar inverter, essentially adding another 60kWh buffer to my grid storage. Considering how expensive residential batteries are and how quickly EVs depreciate, I think soon it'll be cheaper to get a used EV as a cheap so…

Very interesting - I did not know this was possible. A few questions:

1. Does the solar inverter do away with the need for a V2G or V2H unit?

2. What are the limitations vs a dedicated V2G/H unit?

3. Is generator input on your solar inverter a common feature across inverters?

Re: Can “second life” EV batteries work as grid-scale energy storage?

#55

Post by bryanlarsen »

iwanttocomment wrote: post #29

I've got a 13 year old EV and nobody has told me how to cash my EV in for reusable energy storage. (No, seriously, hit me up.)

Just sell it though normal channels. If your battery is with more than your car then there would be people making money on the arbitrage.

Re: Can “second life” EV batteries work as grid-scale energy storage?

#56

Post by pfdietz »

epistasis wrote: post #51
noosphr wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The low energy future that was envisioned is not happening. The AI arms race, which has become an actual arms race in the war in Ukraine, needs endless energy all times a day. China is already winning the AI cold war because it adds more capacity to its grid a year than Germany has in a century. If we keep going with agrarian methods of energy production don't be surprised that we suffer the same fate as the agrarian…

You have that exactly backwards: solar + storage is what will give us energy abundance at less money than we could ever imagine from nuclear fission or fusion. China is winning the AI Cold war because it's adding solar, storage, and wind at orders of magnitude more than nuclear. I'm not sure who's doing your supposed "envisioning" but there is no vision for cheap abundant energy from fusion. Solar and storage deliver…

> sci fi books

I blame these for the unquestioned belief that fusion is desirable. It's a trope because it enables stories to be told, and because readers became used to seeing, not because science fiction has a good track record on such things.

The fact that the volumetric power density of ARC is 40x worse than a PWR (and ITER, 400x worse!) should tell one that DT fusion at least is unlikely to be cheap.

With continued progress down the experience curve, PV will reach the point where resistive heat is cheaper than burning natural gas at the Henry Hub price (which doesn't include the cost of getting gas through pipelines and distribution to customers.) And remember cheap natural gas was what destroyed the last nuclear renaissance in the US.

Re: Can “second life” EV batteries work as grid-scale energy storage?

#57

Post by Sohcahtoa82 »

p0w3n3d wrote: post #18
bryanlarsen wrote: post #2

This is less useful than most people expected. Redwood has been struggling because the expected battery turnover is not occurring. EV batteries are lasting a long time, so they stay in the car are and not being recycled or reused in any quantity yet. If EV batteries last 20+ years in EV's, it'll be > 2040 before there are significant numbers of EV batteries available to recycle or reuse. https://www.geotab.com/blog/e…

Tesla batteries fail after 8 years at least from models up to 2014

[citation needed]

Re: Can “second life” EV batteries work as grid-scale energy storage?

#58

Post by formerly_proven »

MrRadar wrote: post #40
cogman10 wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'll defend the leaf a little. LiPo batteries were quiet expensive when it was initially released. NiMH was really the only option in town. And with a lower energy density battery that's also heavier, adding a cooling system would have also added a bunch of weight to the already heavy car with a barely usable range of 100 miles. Gen 2, however, had no excuses. They had every opportunity to add active cooling and they…

Every generation of the production Nissan Leaf has used lithium batteries. AFAIK no modern (~post-2000) mass-produced (>10k units sold) EV has ever used NiMH or lead-acid batteries. Edit: Checking Wikipedia to verify my information, I found out that Nissan actually sold a lithium-battery EV in 1997 to comply with the same 90s CARB zero-emissions vehicle mandate that gave us the GM EV-1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/…

EVs no, but I think some Toyota hybrids (which are of course not even PHEVs) still use NiMH. Toyota tends to be very tight-lipped about their batteries and their sizes (or rather, lack thereof).

Re: Can “second life” EV batteries work as grid-scale energy storage?

#59

Post by londons_explore »

wcfields wrote: post #37
cogman10 wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'll defend the leaf a little. LiPo batteries were quiet expensive when it was initially released. NiMH was really the only option in town. And with a lower energy density battery that's also heavier, adding a cooling system would have also added a bunch of weight to the already heavy car with a barely usable range of 100 miles. Gen 2, however, had no excuses. They had every opportunity to add active cooling and they…

On the used market you'll find absolutely cooked (literally) Leafs whose first life was in Arizona and barely have enough range to back out of the driveway.

I have a gen 1 leaf with a remaining range of about 500 yards if you drive gently...

I use it in my driveway to make it look to thieves like someone is home (round me, houses with no car get broken into).

Re: Can “second life” EV batteries work as grid-scale energy storage?

#60

Post by formerly_proven »

pfdietz wrote: post #56
epistasis wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You have that exactly backwards: solar + storage is what will give us energy abundance at less money than we could ever imagine from nuclear fission or fusion. China is winning the AI Cold war because it's adding solar, storage, and wind at orders of magnitude more than nuclear. I'm not sure who's doing your supposed "envisioning" but there is no vision for cheap abundant energy from fusion. Solar and storage deliver…

> sci fi books I blame these for the unquestioned belief that fusion is desirable. It's a trope because it enables stories to be told, and because readers became used to seeing, not because science fiction has a good track record on such things. The fact that the volumetric power density of ARC is 40x worse than a PWR (and ITER, 400x worse!) should tell one that DT fusion at least is unlikely to be cheap. With contin…

It's hard to imagine a form of energy production less desirable than fusion.

Okay, sure, burning lignite and using the exhaust as air heating in the children's hospital. You got me.

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