I think James Burke showed the value of unconnected advances leading to monumental changes in his "Connections" series from decades ago. In rewatching, I was struck by an episode where, with lab gear in tow, he climbed a hilltop to demonstrate the concept of GPS without, I think, himself not really understanding the implications of everyone soon having that ability at their fingertips.
The later series were not so good, but tje original was amazing. Shame there's so little of it floating around the internet. Punch cards, used to programme even the most advanced computers back them, originated in an experimental weaving machine to make fancy rugs faster, about 200 years earlier! Part of the fun of that old series is looking at where they end up, and wondering what people would have made of the exponential advances since then
To give an small idea of the value and power of electrical storage, I'll pass along this anecdote I picked up from a video a few years ago. There is this small island off the coast (I believe it is the southern part) of Africa. This island has never had dependable electricity. Even with a fuel generator, they had problems getting, and affording enough diesel to keep their small grid up. Enter solar, with batteries, which had finally become cheap enough for them to install such a system. Well, now for the first time since electricity was discovered, this island has RELIABLE electricity. The anecdote leads me to a couple of questions: I've heard that there are micro grid projects in just about every African country. Does this mean that Africa could do with electrical grids, what they did with phones? (With phone technology they bypassed land lines and went straight to cell technology.) So could they bypass huge interconnected grids, and have instead bunches of micro grids running off renewable energy and energy storage (of some kind)?
I don't think that you do too many videos on batteries. But part of that is I think of what you are often talking about as energy storage not batteries. For batteries I think electrochemical reversible reaction for storage. For hot storage, cold (ice) storage, hydro pump storage, compressed air storage and other I don't think batteries. I think energy storage.
There already exist at least two forever batteries. Both have solved the problem of dendrite growth which is the weak point of some other batteries. One is the Redflow plating/flow ZnBr battery. It plates Zn on to carbon dosed horizontal plates during charging and the Zn goes into solution as ZnBr during discharge. The battery must be discharged completely from time to time and this eliminates any build up of dendrites. The second is the Ambri liquid metal battery. It uses three molten layers - a metal, salt and metal (at present Ca and Sb and a Ca salt) and because all three layers are molten, no dendrites can't form. There is also a ZnBr gel battery by Gelion. I don't know if this is a 'forever battery' but it seems likely. Of course, all flow batteries (mainly based on V or Fe) are forever batteries with, possibly, occasional pump changes needed.
Great conversation vids! More please! (Matt, take it easy sometimes, we'll still be here, no presh) Tom Scott interviewed what he considered the last inventor for invention's sake, Percy Spencer, inventor of the microwave oven. From a melted candy bar in his pocket, to warming up frozen hamsters "humanely", he went on to create the appliance we all have in our kitchens today. It was not the goal but the journey.
At about @24:33 ... I think another issue that prevents any form of new energy technology coming to market or to market quickly is the lack of R n D. Most company investors and or governments look at one thing, "Line go up.". They don't care about what's new if it can't be as lucrative or better than what currently exists. However, some countries are looking past the revenue and at the larger picture. In those places they are mostly renewable and less reliant on fossil fuels. They are putting resources into the new technology and advancing at a quicker pace. Dan, the commentator mentions this about China's LFP market at 50%. In America we are too happy to continue to push fossil fuels because of profits. There's not a govt belief in renewables. (this has changed some recently but no where near other countries.) So maybe those complaining need to look at those factors. A company can only innovate at X rate if they have the resources to do so. Those resources could be jobs, new tech to help manufacture the new tech ... so many things. Less people complain about fossil fuel issues than they do about renewables. "I don't want a solar farm on that empty field." "I don't want to see wind turbines off the coast of my million dollar house/vacation time share." 🤷♂ Add the tech itself, "Heat-pumps are terrible!" "Gas stove > induction!" See what I mean? Fossil fuels ruining the planet people disbelieve.
In concept it's eerily similar to the sustaining vs disruptive changes that Clayton Christensen lays out in The Innovator's Dilemma. A company won't question their decisions or takes risks as long as their market continues to demand the status quo. Only later do they realize that a firm willing to make the change even if it's "worse" tech to start is now going to outcompete them by moving into the same customer base. Christensen refers to this according to business but it applies to Countries themselves. In this case China was the innovator and the USA was the old guard only making sustaining innovations, nothing disruptive.
China's government doesn't have a belief in renewables. That's why their air quality is so low, filled with the smog of coal plants. But they DO have a belief in fooling investors into thinking they're more of a technological competitor to the U.S than they actually are.
@@MysteriousSoulreaper The problem with your final sentence there is that China has been stealing innovations from the U.S. A lot of this stuff becomes easier to develop when you don't have to pay for much of the R&D because someone else did.
21:00 it certainly does matter depending upon use case. Please don't be so flippant. If we want longer lasting batteries in a phone or car the size and weight become a major consideration.
ITER is based on slow, painstaking decades of research and experimentation. The practical physics lessons learned, all indicate that ITER, will (eventually - I admit, but anyone remember a delay or two on a certain JWST.) perform as expected, and provide 10 x energy input. I have seen nothing but 'great ideas', from all these 'start-ups', 'Look, if you narrow the flux here', 'or twist the magnetic field here...', but no real experimental evidence to back it up. I see a bunch of folks, very good at PR and getting investment, in fact the only evidence of their potential in most reports is how much money they raised. Good luck to all of them. I'll take whatever breakthrough gives us peaceful fusion.
For both of you guys, I'm sure you have listened to Tony Saba. In his "The Great Transformation" presentation to the Saudis TAQA in Dhahran he made the point that this is not a one for one substitution of power generation. That in fact we will be designing for the trough, for the coldest darkest hours of winter when solar and wind sources availability are at their lowest. Today we design the electric power systems for the peak, as you too assume when discussing these battery systems. But, this is just wrong. Yes, the supply challenge has increased enormously, but that is what each system be it my system, or yours, or the grid will be aiming for. This fact, and the assumption many are currently making are miles apart. It doesn't change the challenges, but it does impact the way forward. ua-cam.com/video/7eJKTYc_v-I/v-deo.html
The bigger topic than talking endlessly about new batteries. Should be. Can we finely get rid of AA and AAA batteries? I am so sick of getting a new electronic device and realizing I need 20 AA batteries to power it. A small Lithium battery has way more energy storage. And is rechargeable. Yes I know they make rechargeable AA and AAA batteries. But they are junk in comparison.
Sorry guys, it's not a marathon. If you have a fantastic idea for the best battery ever but it takes you 30 years, you'll be bankrupt and somebody else will have your patents for peanuts. It's a series of dashes where you need to be in the running enough to generate revenue.
When storing energy on gasoline, diesel, coal etc. is no longer an option we need different options in battery chemistry and other storages. Even when electric is more efficient. Just think about fossil fuels usage.
I think James Burke showed the value of unconnected advances leading to monumental changes in his "Connections" series from decades ago. In rewatching, I was struck by an episode where, with lab gear in tow, he climbed a hilltop to demonstrate the concept of GPS without, I think, himself not really understanding the implications of everyone soon having that ability at their fingertips.
The later series were not so good, but tje original was amazing. Shame there's so little of it floating around the internet. Punch cards, used to programme even the most advanced computers back them, originated in an experimental weaving machine to make fancy rugs faster, about 200 years earlier! Part of the fun of that old series is looking at where they end up, and wondering what people would have made of the exponential advances since then
To give an small idea of the value and power of electrical storage, I'll pass along this anecdote I picked up from a video a few years ago.
There is this small island off the coast (I believe it is the southern part) of Africa.
This island has never had dependable electricity. Even with a fuel generator, they had problems getting, and affording enough diesel to keep their small grid up.
Enter solar, with batteries, which had finally become cheap enough for them to install such a system.
Well, now for the first time since electricity was discovered, this island has RELIABLE electricity.
The anecdote leads me to a couple of questions: I've heard that there are micro grid projects in just about every African country. Does this mean that
Africa could do with electrical grids, what they did with phones? (With phone technology they bypassed land lines and went straight to cell technology.)
So could they bypass huge interconnected grids, and have instead bunches of micro grids running off renewable energy and energy storage (of some kind)?
I don't think that you do too many videos on batteries. But part of that is I think of what you are often talking about as energy storage not batteries.
For batteries I think electrochemical reversible reaction for storage. For hot storage, cold (ice) storage, hydro pump storage, compressed air storage and other I don't think batteries. I think energy storage.
The market is a marathon, not a sprint. Well said.
There already exist at least two forever batteries. Both have solved the problem of dendrite growth which is the weak point of some other batteries. One is the Redflow plating/flow ZnBr battery. It plates Zn on to carbon dosed horizontal plates during charging and the Zn goes into solution as ZnBr during discharge. The battery must be discharged completely from time to time and this eliminates any build up of dendrites. The second is the Ambri liquid metal battery. It uses three molten layers - a metal, salt and metal (at present Ca and Sb and a Ca salt) and because all three layers are molten, no dendrites can't form. There is also a ZnBr gel battery by Gelion. I don't know if this is a 'forever battery' but it seems likely. Of course, all flow batteries (mainly based on V or Fe) are forever batteries with, possibly, occasional pump changes needed.
I will never get tired of battery videos
Great conversation vids! More please! (Matt, take it easy sometimes, we'll still be here, no presh) Tom Scott interviewed what he considered the last inventor for invention's sake, Percy Spencer, inventor of the microwave oven. From a melted candy bar in his pocket, to warming up frozen hamsters "humanely", he went on to create the appliance we all have in our kitchens today. It was not the goal but the journey.
I wish you would talk more about batteries. I want more batteries.
More battery videos!!! I can't get enough!!
I bought a set of beard trimmers from China, it lasts for 3 or 4 trims in a month (maybe an hours running), it charges up in about 20 seconds.
At about @24:33 ...
I think another issue that prevents any form of new energy technology coming to market or to market quickly is the lack of R n D.
Most company investors and or governments look at one thing, "Line go up.". They don't care about what's new if it can't be as lucrative or better than what currently exists.
However, some countries are looking past the revenue and at the larger picture. In those places they are mostly renewable and less reliant on fossil fuels. They are putting resources into the new technology and advancing at a quicker pace. Dan, the commentator mentions this about China's LFP market at 50%.
In America we are too happy to continue to push fossil fuels because of profits. There's not a govt belief in renewables. (this has changed some recently but no where near other countries.)
So maybe those complaining need to look at those factors. A company can only innovate at X rate if they have the resources to do so. Those resources could be jobs, new tech to help manufacture the new tech ... so many things.
Less people complain about fossil fuel issues than they do about renewables. "I don't want a solar farm on that empty field." "I don't want to see wind turbines off the coast of my million dollar house/vacation time share." 🤷♂ Add the tech itself, "Heat-pumps are terrible!" "Gas stove > induction!"
See what I mean? Fossil fuels ruining the planet people disbelieve.
In concept it's eerily similar to the sustaining vs disruptive changes that Clayton Christensen lays out in The Innovator's Dilemma. A company won't question their decisions or takes risks as long as their market continues to demand the status quo. Only later do they realize that a firm willing to make the change even if it's "worse" tech to start is now going to outcompete them by moving into the same customer base. Christensen refers to this according to business but it applies to Countries themselves. In this case China was the innovator and the USA was the old guard only making sustaining innovations, nothing disruptive.
China's government doesn't have a belief in renewables. That's why their air quality is so low, filled with the smog of coal plants. But they DO have a belief in fooling investors into thinking they're more of a technological competitor to the U.S than they actually are.
@@MysteriousSoulreaper The problem with your final sentence there is that China has been stealing innovations from the U.S. A lot of this stuff becomes easier to develop when you don't have to pay for much of the R&D because someone else did.
Sadly, the bit about the wired bluetooth headphones broke my brain and you guys sounded like Charlie Brown's teacher for the rest of the episode.
That's called base science ... normally done by universities as nobody else can afford to stumble down blind alleys.
21:00 it certainly does matter depending upon use case. Please don't be so flippant. If we want longer lasting batteries in a phone or car the size and weight become a major consideration.
ITER is based on slow, painstaking decades of research and experimentation. The practical physics lessons learned, all indicate that ITER, will (eventually - I admit, but anyone remember a delay or two on a certain JWST.) perform as expected, and provide 10 x energy input. I have seen nothing but 'great ideas', from all these 'start-ups', 'Look, if you narrow the flux here', 'or twist the magnetic field here...', but no real experimental evidence to back it up. I see a bunch of folks, very good at PR and getting investment, in fact the only evidence of their potential in most reports is how much money they raised. Good luck to all of them. I'll take whatever breakthrough gives us peaceful fusion.
For both of you guys, I'm sure you have listened to Tony Saba. In his "The Great Transformation" presentation to the Saudis TAQA in Dhahran he made the point that this is not a one for one substitution of power generation. That in fact we will be designing for the trough, for the coldest darkest hours of winter when solar and wind sources availability are at their lowest. Today we design the electric power systems for the peak, as you too assume when discussing these battery systems. But, this is just wrong. Yes, the supply challenge has increased enormously, but that is what each system be it my system, or yours, or the grid will be aiming for. This fact, and the assumption many are currently making are miles apart. It doesn't change the challenges, but it does impact the way forward. ua-cam.com/video/7eJKTYc_v-I/v-deo.html
The bigger topic than talking endlessly about new batteries. Should be. Can we finely get rid of AA and AAA batteries? I am so sick of getting a new electronic device and realizing I need 20 AA batteries to power it. A small Lithium battery has way more energy storage. And is rechargeable. Yes I know they make rechargeable AA and AAA batteries. But they are junk in comparison.
👍
I don't want wired bluetooth earbuds, I want regular earbuds! It makes me suspect that they removed the headphone jack because it wasn't proprietary!
Sorry guys, it's not a marathon. If you have a fantastic idea for the best battery ever but it takes you 30 years, you'll be bankrupt and somebody else will have your patents for peanuts.
It's a series of dashes where you need to be in the running enough to generate revenue.
When storing energy on gasoline, diesel, coal etc. is no longer an option we need different options in battery chemistry and other storages. Even when electric is more efficient. Just think about fossil fuels usage.
tooo long