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romanr writes:
"Copper oxides, also known as cuprates, are the most promising materials for superconductivity. Today, cuprates can be superconductive at temperatures as high as -150 °C. But for many years scientists wondered why they lose superconductivity when concentration of electrons drops below certain level. Most scientist thought that the cuprates gradually became insulators.
Scientists from Université de Sherbrooke discovered that the loss of superconductivity is because of a sudden appearance of a distinct electronic phase in the material that enters into competition with the superconductivity and weakens it. It means, that higher temperature superconductors will be possible if we can get rid of the competing phase. This new approach opens a way to get an ambient temperature superconductivity."
(Score: 1) by sfm on Tuesday February 18 2014, @02:50PM
Flywheels have additional downsides:
Need to be in a vacuum to reduce air friction
Need special materials to achieve energy density near Li-batteries
Special containment "case" is required, both for holding a vacuum and in the event of catastrophic failure
Also, there are non-trivial engineering concerns
Magnetic bearings exist, but they tend to be expensive
Any movement in the axis of rotation causes Coriolis force. For a vertical flywheel, simply the rotation of the earth produces a force depending on latitude
All of these problems have technical solutions and flywheels are a viable technology. Unfortunately, it is hard pressed to compete economically with other forms of energy storage in all but a few special cases.