from the getting-a-charge-out-of-old-batteries dept.
Over at the UCLA newsroom is a report into the possible emerging market in used electric vehicle batteries, the opportunities and the ways in which that market could be encouraged to grow.
Put simply the idea is that the used EV batteries which have come to the end of their operating life, and no longer have the capacity to run vehicles effectively, can then be re-purposed as part of centralised or distributed storage capacity for renewable power generation systems:
“Most batteries will retain much of their capacity and value after the use of the car,” said report author Ethan Elkind, associate director of the Climate Change and Business Program at UCLA and UC Berkeley law schools, which leads the initiative. “As a result, repurposing them can absorb excess renewable energy and dispatch it when the sun isn’t shining and the wind isn’t blowing.”
This isn't a new idea, with an earlier report going into more detail on the technical feasibility, and an earlier article at Consumer Reports quoting previous work as:
Holmes’ studies of electric car batteries have shown that even when a car battery has only 70 percent of capacity left—too little to serve in a car—that it may have about 10 years of useful life left as storage devices on the grid
This report looks at the political and economic challenges, as well as summarizing the technical. The report is available for download is an easy overall read, and chock full of references.
Originally spotted via Scientific American.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by kaszz on Sunday September 21 2014, @11:38AM
The problem [berkeley.edu] seems to be that the original manufacturer might be liable in the repurposed application. It seems however like a lawyer designed problem. If you buy something, you also inherent the responsibility for that product.
The sun shines without a legal code for that..
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 21 2014, @12:17PM
"excess renewable energie storage" and then the coffee came out of the nose and ears.
renewable is how much? 7% if not counting hydro? worldwide?
see how far you have to drive until you see your first panel ... anywhere. how many houses have passed? if each one uses 200 watt in one hour averaged over 24 hours you will quickly see that woefully no nedd battery.
(Score: 3, Informative) by kanweg on Sunday September 21 2014, @12:58PM
Depends on where you live. In Germany, this summer at some days 50% of the electricity generated was generated by the sun. It was a record. New panels are installed every day. It makes sense to store excess energy during the day and keep other utilities running at a more constant rate. Some of them (nuclear, coal) aren't good for following demand (in contrast to for example gas powered utilities).
The same goes for storing the variable output of wind turbines. Short term storage using batteries, long term storage using hydro. It makes sense.
Bert
(Score: -1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 21 2014, @02:30PM
hey. thanks for comment.
we need 1000% solar one tthousand and then we make methan and longer chains becasue crappy battery will die 5 years and its too much material to make.
think BIG.
(Score: -1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 21 2014, @02:39PM
"my" government is like mice. they love to make a mess errr... nest with excess documents. more mouse then ape descendent : )
have a sunny day ... again.
(Score: 4, Informative) by subs on Sunday September 21 2014, @08:09PM
Some of them (nuclear, coal) aren't good for following demand (in contrast to for example gas powered utilities).
There three things quite not true in this sentence:
1) Nuclear can't follow load. In fact it can, even using LWR technology from 60s and 70s. The main reason they tend not to do it (rather than not being able to do it) is because the fuel costs are so low and capital costs so high that it makes sense to run the plant at full power for as long as possible to maximize earnings. This is quite analogous, in fact, to things like geothermal plants, for which fuel costs are effectively zero, so what remains is constant plant O&M and capital expenses - with such a cost structure, it's simply economically advantageous to be selling into the market at almost any price.
2) Coal can't follow load. Again, it can. This has only been true for fairly old coal plants, but the more modern units can throttle, typically between 30-100%.
3) Not all gas is equal in load-following capabilities. Your typical 500MW+ CCGT takes up to an hour from idle to full load. OCGTs are much quicker, taking a few minutes at most to spool up to maximum power, but they're far less efficient (29% vs. 60%) and those are your typical spinning backup for wind & solar - not very green.
(Score: 2) by dublet on Monday September 22 2014, @08:08AM
Exactly the reason that some hydro stations have been built in the UK: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dinorwig_Power_Station [wikipedia.org]
"If anyone needs me, I'm in the angry dome. [dublet.org]"
(Score: 2) by subs on Monday September 22 2014, @11:40AM
Depends on the task you're trying to accomplish. The grid uses various methods to achieve stability over a whole range of time scales, from single seconds using flywheels and spinning reserves, to minutes (hydro, either pumped or regular) to hours (load-following dispatchable generators, e.g. NG turbines). Dinorwig therefore fits into the middle here - relatively fast ramp up/down, but limited run time (Dinorwig, for example, is dry after ~6 hours at full load).
For wind & solar the problem is that they are both intermittent and that their intermittency spans *all* of the above time scales. You can get wind gusting or cloud-passage, which causes easily 10-20% performance variation from a large installation within seconds. Then there's the slower drop off when the resource becomes gradually available or unavailable, e.g. the wind dying down or overcast pulling up in a matter of several minutes. Finally, there's long-term periods of nearly completely unavailability, e.g. rainy seasons and wind lulls where the resource is completely unavailable for easily 1-2 weeks or more. These are just some of the problems with intermittent sources and their advocates try to deflect by claiming that it's all about predicting the weather and planning ahead - it isn't. It's about being able to dispatch on demand under all of these circumstances.
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Monday September 22 2014, @07:08AM
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 21 2014, @08:03PM
see how far you have to drive until you see your first panel
Could it be that all the Greenies were insightful enough to have bought houses on the south side of the street and the solar panels are on the -back- side of their homes? ;-)
(It's obvious Baptists are having sex, but you'll never catch them doing it--or admitting to it.)
OK, I'll go away now.
-- gewg_
(Score: 3, Insightful) by VLM on Sunday September 21 2014, @12:31PM
"has only 70 percent of capacity left—too little to serve in a car"
So... if my car had the 13 gallon tank removed and a 9 gallon tank installed, it would be utterly unusable because I'd only have 270 miles of range for my 20 mile commute.
Maybe its a journalist filter epic fail and they meant 7 percent not 70 percent. My commute would be somewhat more difficult if I lost 93% of capacity.
(Score: 1) by andersjm on Sunday September 21 2014, @12:51PM
The extra cost of hauling 30% dead weight may be reason enough to replace it.
(Score: 1) by kanweg on Sunday September 21 2014, @12:52PM
A 70% capacity of the original means that the range you can cover with your car has dropped with 30%. That may be below to what is practical. My commute is fairly long compared to the range of some cars. If the capacity were to drop by 30%, some cars would not allow me to drive one way from home to work (or back) if I start with a full battery. In such a case, I'm better of with a new battery for the car. The old one is useful for net storage. Or it can be recycled. All the valuable elements are still in there and can be perfectly recycled. The metal ions themselves don't deteriorate.
Bert
(Score: 3, Insightful) by fnj on Sunday September 21 2014, @01:42PM
This makes no sense whatsoever. The quote in the summary, "... when a car battery has only 70 percent of capacity left—too little to serve in a car ..." is, to put it bluntly, stupid. So a car with an originally range of 30 miles is now only 21 miles. Or 70 miles becomes 49 miles. Or 200 miles becomes 140 miles. That does not make it unusable at all.
Some owners may be using every bit of the car's perfomance. Maybe their commute is 25 miles, and losing 9 out of 30 miles range rules the car out for THEIR commute (they are living dangerously to begin with if they are cutting their margin that short). But plenty of other owners would find it still perfectly serviceable. And even the postulated commuter would find his reduced range perfectly serviceable for a grocery run, driving the kid to music lessons, going to the doctor's/dentists's pffice, etc.
If it had been worded more thoughtfully, the point could have been better made. Some owners might choose to trade in a 70%-capacity battery if they got a decent trade-in allowance. And the suggested secondary market might enable that.
(Score: 2) by McGruber on Sunday September 21 2014, @03:32PM
You're overlooking regenerative braking.
(Score: 3, Informative) by Adamsjas on Sunday September 21 2014, @05:59PM
Quote FNJ: Some owners might choose to trade in a 70%-capacity battery if they got a decent trade-in allowance. And the suggested secondary market might enable that.
There is already a robust secondary market for batteries, especially for the Prius, because there are a lot of them on the road. It turns out the great Prius battery replacement worry was over-hyped, and the batteries last longer than expected. I've also read that people ignore the replacement warning that shows up on a Prius dash at abotu 150,000 miles, which suggests people are fine with accepting 70% charge capability. Crash your Prius, without damaging the battery and the resale value of the battery may be higher than the rest of the car combined.
Also, I wonder about the issue of battery repair. Are these batteries composed of many of cells, where only a few may be bad? Can you just measure the output and discharge rate of each cell individually and replace the worst one them and reconnect the whole pack?
(Score: 2) by EvilJim on Sunday September 21 2014, @11:07PM
I saw something a while back where someone was replacing individual cells in their packs, cant recall if it was a prius or other, but they looked the same as laptop battery cells.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by carguy on Monday September 22 2014, @12:31AM
Yes, there is a cottage industry of people who rebuild and/or "recondition" hybrid car battery packs. The same might be done for full electrics, but those packs are much larger...
A friend with an early Honda Insight bought a special charger that has a mode for equalizing the individual cells--basically it charges for a long time at a very low current (to control heating of the fully charged cells). A few cycles of this slow charge, followed by discharge, brought the lagging cells up enough to stop the Insight computer from throwing an error code about a failed battery. Now his car is still usable with the original battery.
(Score: 2) by EvilJim on Monday September 22 2014, @02:11AM
thats pretty sweet, I might have to try that with some of my not-so-good cells which aren't dead yet. (used in random electronic projects)
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Monday September 22 2014, @06:44AM
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 3, Interesting) by VLM on Sunday September 21 2014, @02:36PM
"some cars would not allow me to drive one way from home to work (or back)"
I did make a huge mistake in discussing my gasoline car in an electric car article. If you look at any discussion on any technical site there is an absolute fixation (perhaps just astroturf, but still very popular) that electric cars are utterly useless until the battery can go 500 miles because less than the 1% or so of humans needed to be commercially successful have a commute lower than 500 miles, or whatever ridiculous number. Also traditionally the "mandatory minimum range" has always been re-defined (again, probably via astroturf) to always be 25% larger than whatever's shipping, no matter if its homemade lead acid with a 20 mile range or a 200 mile range Tesla the "mandatory minimum usable range" will always be astroturfed to reality plus 25%, even if a battery lasts 500 miles on a charge, it'll be defined as useless and commercially un viable at that time, because it doesn't go 625 miles on a charge and real americans (tm) all have commutes a multiple of that distance.
Given that cultural background, electric cars will not be sold, the astroturf will rise to deafening proportions, unless they have perhaps 20x to 30x the range actually required by real users, so if your "gas tank" is thirty times larger than you need, a mere 30 percent decline will NEVER be a practical problem.
Based on my extensive experience with rechargeable batteries, a battery that's down to 70% probably doesn't have long to live. But thats a different matter. It is a little weird to go to all the trouble of building a "hospice for near dead batteries" but if they can make money off it, well fine then, an elderly rechargeable battery can spend its last 10 charge/discharge cycles in a well deserved battery rest home. I don't think in the real world it'll be financially viable for pure labor reasons of having to install near dead batteries and remove totally dead batteries in a week or so, but whatever fiction raises the investment bucks, if it works, it works.
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Monday September 22 2014, @06:59AM
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 3, Interesting) by VLM on Monday September 22 2014, @12:20PM
"if they are highly impractical for the yearly road-trip."
Rental. Never take your personal car on a road trip. Both here and at that other site, I've posted the amazing experience one of my coworkers who owns a tiny little commuter car, had when her giant barge like SUV rental broke down in some rural area of texas (or it was someplace down south, anyway). 45 minutes later a rental rep drove up with a replacement, she moved some junk from one car to the other, signed some papers, and drove away in her new rental, only "cost" was about an hour without air conditioning in Texas.
If you're involved in an accident or car theft, assuming you pay for the extra insurance and no criminal charges are filed, again, you pretty much just drive away in a new car. No sweat.
Your engine explodes outside a cattle ranch in Texas, You have a big problem, an absolute nightmare of spending your vacation, perhaps plus a couple days extra (and your boss will love that), sitting at a crooked mechanics shop as he rips you off. Someone else's engine explodes outside a cattle ranch in Texas, they have a big problem, you just get to try the guaranteed rental replacement program.
Its kinda fun to drive something different, and when you calculate the cost of depreciation and gas and insurance and maintenance on your daily driver, it takes a big chunk out of the cost of the rental.
Finally this makes the Huge assumption that an electric car is somehow unusable for a road trip. Which I guess depends on your personal style and what you consider fun. On a bad day at work, I never sit there day dreaming of sitting in my car for sixteen hours. So as long as the battery lasts longer than I want to sit on my butt for what I'd call "fun", I'm fine. "more than a part time job as a taxi driver" doesn't count as "fun" to me, so as long as I can drive three or four hours per day I'm happy enough. If I wanted to rocket thru the country and not see or experience anything on the way, I'd have just taken a plane or train and relaxed instead of driving.
(Score: 2) by dry on Monday September 22 2014, @02:15AM
I wonder if they're worth more recycled rather then re-purposed? Seems that the materials are in short supply and recycling may be more worth while.
(Score: 4, Informative) by tonyPick on Sunday September 21 2014, @06:38PM
Well, there's both capacity fade, and power fade. As power fade occurs that'll hurt the ability of the vehicle to accelerate, which may be a bigger factor than raw operating range.
Also several of the estimates look at the state of the battery in relation to the overall vehicle lifetime ("the state after 150,000 miles" is used in a couple of places, but those reports looked pay walled) so there may be a journalistic simplification involved there.
As the submitter - I did hunt for the referenced Holmes report used on capacity information to double check, but couldn't get a link. I'd _guess_ the figure is from a combination of the state of the battery after the overall vehicle lifetime, mean range, average vehicle usage patterns, power fade and charging efficiency, but if anyone has a link to hard numbers I'd be interested (they may be lurking in the report references).
Try this thesis link for a background PDF on Battery EOL analysis: http://digitool.library.colostate.edu/webclient/DeliveryManager?pid=182215 [colostate.edu]
(Score: 1) by Username on Sunday September 21 2014, @02:42PM
From what I understand telsa batteries are made up of thousands of AA style lithium cells. Might be time consuming but not very hard to just go though them and replace the bad cells. Seems risky to just leave the bad cells in there if they repurpose the pack.
(Score: 1) by art guerrilla on Sunday September 21 2014, @07:14PM
no, its BEEELIONS of AAA cells...
at least, i think that's what el reg said...
(Score: 2) by fnj on Monday September 22 2014, @12:23PM
(Score: 1) by pnkwarhall on Monday September 22 2014, @12:37AM
1) There is a cheap and "green" (in that it's basically recycling) source of electricity storage for solar power, if I ever want/need to live off the grid or want to supplement my energy needs.
2) Apparently, to some people, needing to replace a car battery after 100-150K miles is an unacceptable hardship that means electric cars aren't "ready for primetime"!
Lift Yr Skinny Fists Like Antennas to Heaven
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 22 2014, @12:54AM
Lets put it in numbers...
Lets say I buy a gas burner. After 100k if I maintain it the car will be in decent shape but not getting the 25mpg that the sticker said anymore. Maybe 5-10%. Not terrible but not great. To get that back would cost me 10k. But I could live with it.
Lets say I buy one with a big battery. After 100k if I maintain it it will go 70% as far. And may not be able to move at all. To fix it costs 10k. At that point I need to drop 10k to get my car to run again.
Its like having a car with a killer balloon payment at 8-10 years of ownership.
So the question is does the cost advantage and co2 shifting exceed the cost of a gas car. The answer is 'maybe' but only with tax subsidies at this time. Which means you pay for it in a round about way in taxes. But those taxes are not used for infrastructure but so you can drive a car.
At this point in time. It is a narrow 'maybe' to buy one or not. You may or may not see ROI until 4+ years in if you are lucky depends where you live. Where I live electricity is about 8-9cents per kw. In somewhere like socal it is much higher and may be worth doing. It really depends.
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Monday September 22 2014, @05:12PM
I don't watch much TV, but I've noticed how Toyota is pushing the idea that the Prius is now 14 years old.
I'd like to see the stats on their >10 year batteries.