On 7/22/2017 8:56 PM, Robert Krawitz wrote: > But it's considerably more than 10% in practice, right?
It depends. It's as much an ideal as Musk's asserted 90% efficiency for Tesla and Powerwall when in reality Tesla and other EV owners see as low as 50% with new cells. And as noted previously, that figure drops as batteries wear. > You still need storage for those blackouts (albeit less), right? Yes, but with blackout windows of ~70 minutes you can effectively use supercapacitors which in principle should be superior to chemical batteries for short term storage. > The author is quite clear that he simply doesn't see this as being > plausible any time soon. And no doubt batteries will improve along > the way. I do doubt it. Li-ion appears to be it, the pinnacle of commercial battery technology. Li-air has potential but it needs a breakthrough to make it commercially viable and you can't count on breakthroughs. Likewise Li-sulfur which has wear and volatility (read: safety) issues. And, of course, batteries aren't renewable. -- Rich P. _______________________________________________ Discuss mailing list Discuss@blu.org http://lists.blu.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
