…for electric cars? This could be a game changer, if it’s for real.
30 thoughts on “Liquid Fuel”
It reminds me of the “capacitance gel” from the movie Demolition Man.
Odd, it reminded me of the three seashells…
It’s not a capacitance gel, it’s obviously a negatively charged viscous ectoplasm. In an accident it could spill and form a psychomagnetheric slimeflow with supernormal potential.
I’ll bet the first driver of one of these negatively charged ectoplasmicly propelled vehicles gets behind the wheel and starts blabbering “On a mountain of skulls, in the castle of pain, I sat on a throne of blood! What was will be! What is will be no more! Now is the season of evil!”
This is a bad, bad idea.
“…why are my drippings with goo?”
“Generally you don’t see that kind of behavior in a major appliance.
It could give the Energy Drink market a real jump-start!
Note this statement:
[[Perhaps even more importantly though, this technology can (supposedly) store 10x more electricity, at half the price of current conventional battery technology.]]]
This low cost if sustained when it goes commercial will lead to many applications beyond electric vehicles, especially in terms of renewable energy.
“It could give the Energy Drink market a real jump-start!
Brawndo! It gots what cars crave!
It’ll be interesting if they can make this work with a zinc slurry in a zinc/air cell. Zinc is cheap and the major problem with zinc/air batteries, dendrite formation during recharging, wouldn’t matter.
In other news, I note Bill Gates is funding the MIT molten metal battery startup. These batteries promise to provide lost cost energy storage for the power grid.
I wonder if there are any stumbling blocks such as the gel freezing in the winter?
I wonder if there are any stumbling blocks such as the gel freezing in the winter?
They could use a non-aqueous carrier liquid, or add components to lower the freezing point. The fluid could even be modified according to the season.
BTW, one significant advantage of their scheme over conventional batteries is safety: the anolyte/catholyte are largely stored separately, rather than having the two reactants layered in close proximity as in conventional batteries.
I hope this works. Two approximations to remember for electric vehicles:
Tesla’s “fast” charger (the 240Vac hardwired one) transfers energy at about a megajoule per minute.
Your corner gasoline pump transfers energy at about a gigajoule per minute.
1000x differences are hard to make up with incremental improvements. Electric vehicles need a game-changer. Maybe this is it.
Molten metal batteries and liquid battery recharging? So I’m guessing we next combine them and build a satellite system called Sky Net to keep us SAFE?!
Calling John Connor, I repeat, calling John Connor!!!!!!!!!
And let’s hope he doesn’t get ‘slimed’ before he turns of the computers.
One jar of Smucker’s Electric Jam please!
I love how they avoided the term “fuel cell”.
“Wow, honey, I don’t know where you got that new lube but it really gave me a thrill!”
One of the comments at the site said that the MIT flow cell had 10x the energy density of previous flow cells, not 10x the energy density of lithium-ion batteries. It sounds as the new technology is still worse than lithium ion. It might still be decent, but it’s not the game changer the article implies.
Yes, why not just use a fuel cell? Incidentally, there is another issue here. IIRC there are several different types of combustion engine (Stirling engines being one) with better efficiency and probably better potential reliability (because of less moving parts) than conventional IC engines including diesel. I am curious as to why so little work is being done on them; maybe it is precisely because the cars using them would last longer AND need less maintenance and repair.
Car dealerships make most of their money on grotesquely overpriced servicing, after all.
Also: Stirling engines are external heat engines. They are limited by the need to transfer heat energy through a solid/gas interface. IC engine make the heat right in the working fluid itself, without the heat transfer and material temperature limitations.
A fuel cell would use the fuel, and dispose of the now-worthless end products, correct?
This sounds like the depleted gel would be recycled out as it was replaced by already-charged gel at the pump. It could then be charged on-site and “sold” to somebody else who came for a fill-up later.
George T:
Nice link! The engineering numbers are pretty explicit at the end:
With reasonable allowances for the stack, storage vessels, and balance of plant, we estimate that optimized SSFC systems using established lithium intercalation compounds could have energy densities of 300–500 Wh L − 1 (specifi c energy 130–250 Wh kg − 1 ), which would satisfy metrics considered necessary for widespread adoption of all-electric vehicles. [ 4 ] Further improvements would be possible by ‘dropping in’ higher-energy-density or lower-cost storage compounds in the SSFC platform as they are developed.
For large-scale applications, the SSFC design should also provide lower materials and manufacturing cost than conventional lithium ion battery technology. At near-term costs of $10–15 kg − 1 for active materials and $14 kg − 1 for nonaqueous electrolyte, the semi-solid suspensions alone have an energyspecific cost of $40–80 kWh − 1 depending on the specifi c chemistry, which leaves substantial room to achieve system-level cost targets of $250 kWh − 1 and $100 kWh − 1 for transportation andgrid level storage, respectively.
So… if I’m remembering the specs on current electric cars right, those batteries should be similar in price and slightly inferior in density to current li-ion battery packs, but wouldn’t cost any more and could be charged/filled in minutes, rather than hours.
Even if the energy density is slightly less than li-ion it might be a net win. Li-ion batteries are only delivering about 60% of their full potential in normal operation, aren’t they, in order to prevent degradation?
Oops, maybe a duplicate comment; I think I mistyped my email address.
Even if the energy density is slightly less than li-ion it might be a net win. Li-ion batteries are only delivering about 60% of their full potential in normal operation, aren’t they, in order to prevent degradation?
I am curious as to why so little work is being done on them; maybe it is precisely because the cars using them would last longer AND need less maintenance and repair.
Ah yes, conspiracy, the first and eternal refuge of the nitwit.
One more thing: One of the objections to the use of high-capacity (Li-ion for example) batteries in electric cars is that they take time to recharge. Would it not be possible to keep stocks of batteries at service stations and simply swap them out when a car comes in with an exhausted battery?
Sure, this would require the service station to keep stocks of batteries. But is this any worse than having to keep thousands of gallons of petroleum products in stock?
Of course, this would probably require some standardisation in battery designs – anathema to Americans, no doubt.
Lithium-ion batteries can be degraded pretty quickly by misuse. If you’re going to trade in a battery at a service station, why bother treating it well? This can be fixed–you can put some sort of tamperproof history in the battery, service stations can charge more money for taking a mistreated battery in exchange, you can read the temperproof history on the battery you’re about to get in exchange to see if it is worth what the service station says it is, you can trust nobody will find a way to work around the tamperproof history.
It reminds me of the “capacitance gel” from the movie Demolition Man.
Odd, it reminded me of the three seashells…
It’s not a capacitance gel, it’s obviously a negatively charged viscous ectoplasm. In an accident it could spill and form a psychomagnetheric slimeflow with supernormal potential.
I’ll bet the first driver of one of these negatively charged ectoplasmicly propelled vehicles gets behind the wheel and starts blabbering “On a mountain of skulls, in the castle of pain, I sat on a throne of blood! What was will be! What is will be no more! Now is the season of evil!”
This is a bad, bad idea.
“…why are my drippings with goo?”
“Generally you don’t see that kind of behavior in a major appliance.
It could give the Energy Drink market a real jump-start!
Note this statement:
[[Perhaps even more importantly though, this technology can (supposedly) store 10x more electricity, at half the price of current conventional battery technology.]]]
This low cost if sustained when it goes commercial will lead to many applications beyond electric vehicles, especially in terms of renewable energy.
“It could give the Energy Drink market a real jump-start!
Brawndo! It gots what cars crave!
It’ll be interesting if they can make this work with a zinc slurry in a zinc/air cell. Zinc is cheap and the major problem with zinc/air batteries, dendrite formation during recharging, wouldn’t matter.
In other news, I note Bill Gates is funding the MIT molten metal battery startup. These batteries promise to provide lost cost energy storage for the power grid.
I wonder if there are any stumbling blocks such as the gel freezing in the winter?
I found their six page paper as a PDF.
I wonder if there are any stumbling blocks such as the gel freezing in the winter?
They could use a non-aqueous carrier liquid, or add components to lower the freezing point. The fluid could even be modified according to the season.
BTW, one significant advantage of their scheme over conventional batteries is safety: the anolyte/catholyte are largely stored separately, rather than having the two reactants layered in close proximity as in conventional batteries.
I hope this works. Two approximations to remember for electric vehicles:
Tesla’s “fast” charger (the 240Vac hardwired one) transfers energy at about a megajoule per minute.
Your corner gasoline pump transfers energy at about a gigajoule per minute.
1000x differences are hard to make up with incremental improvements. Electric vehicles need a game-changer. Maybe this is it.
Molten metal batteries and liquid battery recharging? So I’m guessing we next combine them and build a satellite system called Sky Net to keep us SAFE?!
Calling John Connor, I repeat, calling John Connor!!!!!!!!!
And let’s hope he doesn’t get ‘slimed’ before he turns of the computers.
One jar of Smucker’s Electric Jam please!
I love how they avoided the term “fuel cell”.
“Wow, honey, I don’t know where you got that new lube but it really gave me a thrill!”
One of the comments at the site said that the MIT flow cell had 10x the energy density of previous flow cells, not 10x the energy density of lithium-ion batteries. It sounds as the new technology is still worse than lithium ion. It might still be decent, but it’s not the game changer the article implies.
Yes, why not just use a fuel cell? Incidentally, there is another issue here. IIRC there are several different types of combustion engine (Stirling engines being one) with better efficiency and probably better potential reliability (because of less moving parts) than conventional IC engines including diesel. I am curious as to why so little work is being done on them; maybe it is precisely because the cars using them would last longer AND need less maintenance and repair.
Car dealerships make most of their money on grotesquely overpriced servicing, after all.
Why not just use a fuel cell?
Fuel cells require expensive electrocatalysts. Batteries don’t.
Also: Stirling engines are external heat engines. They are limited by the need to transfer heat energy through a solid/gas interface. IC engine make the heat right in the working fluid itself, without the heat transfer and material temperature limitations.
A fuel cell would use the fuel, and dispose of the now-worthless end products, correct?
This sounds like the depleted gel would be recycled out as it was replaced by already-charged gel at the pump. It could then be charged on-site and “sold” to somebody else who came for a fill-up later.
George T:
Nice link! The engineering numbers are pretty explicit at the end:
With reasonable allowances for the stack, storage vessels, and balance of plant, we estimate that optimized SSFC systems using established lithium intercalation compounds could have energy densities of 300–500 Wh L − 1 (specifi c energy 130–250 Wh kg − 1 ), which would satisfy metrics considered necessary for widespread adoption of all-electric vehicles. [ 4 ] Further improvements would be possible by ‘dropping in’ higher-energy-density or lower-cost storage compounds in the SSFC platform as they are developed.
For large-scale applications, the SSFC design should also provide lower materials and manufacturing cost than conventional lithium ion battery technology. At near-term costs of $10–15 kg − 1 for active materials and $14 kg − 1 for nonaqueous electrolyte, the semi-solid suspensions alone have an energyspecific cost of $40–80 kWh − 1 depending on the specifi c chemistry, which leaves substantial room to achieve system-level cost targets of $250 kWh − 1 and $100 kWh − 1 for transportation andgrid level storage, respectively.
So… if I’m remembering the specs on current electric cars right, those batteries should be similar in price and slightly inferior in density to current li-ion battery packs, but wouldn’t cost any more and could be charged/filled in minutes, rather than hours.
Even if the energy density is slightly less than li-ion it might be a net win. Li-ion batteries are only delivering about 60% of their full potential in normal operation, aren’t they, in order to prevent degradation?
Oops, maybe a duplicate comment; I think I mistyped my email address.
Even if the energy density is slightly less than li-ion it might be a net win. Li-ion batteries are only delivering about 60% of their full potential in normal operation, aren’t they, in order to prevent degradation?
Ah yes, conspiracy, the first and eternal refuge of the nitwit.
One more thing: One of the objections to the use of high-capacity (Li-ion for example) batteries in electric cars is that they take time to recharge. Would it not be possible to keep stocks of batteries at service stations and simply swap them out when a car comes in with an exhausted battery?
Sure, this would require the service station to keep stocks of batteries. But is this any worse than having to keep thousands of gallons of petroleum products in stock?
Of course, this would probably require some standardisation in battery designs – anathema to Americans, no doubt.
Lithium-ion batteries can be degraded pretty quickly by misuse. If you’re going to trade in a battery at a service station, why bother treating it well? This can be fixed–you can put some sort of tamperproof history in the battery, service stations can charge more money for taking a mistreated battery in exchange, you can read the temperproof history on the battery you’re about to get in exchange to see if it is worth what the service station says it is, you can trust nobody will find a way to work around the tamperproof history.