It has been used to replace stand by batteries in several devices and prototypes of automobiles.
“China is experimenting with a new form of electric bus that runs without powerlines using power stored in large onboard supercapacitors, which are quickly recharged whenever the electric bus stops at any bus stop, and fully charged in the terminus. A few prototypes were being tested in Shanghai in early 2005. In 2006, two commercial bus routes began to use supercapacitor buses; one of them is route 11 in Shanghai. [10]”
This seems to be legititmate.
kind of a tangent, but I stumbled across an article promising that flywheel batteries were just around the corner too - and that we would see them in everything from buses to mobile phones. Hmmm…
A phone with an incredibly fast-spinning flywheel inside it might be difficult to carry around, I think, due to gyroscopic effects.
And I recall a Scientific American article about, oh, 20-30 years ago that described flywheel technology in such a way that I almost began stuffing my piggy bank to buy a flywheel-powered car the next year.
Nobody has ever designed a flywheel that can store a reasonable amount of energy, and still not fail catastrophically (and dangerously). I’ve always thought that they would make good off-grid energy storage devices, but they’re a long ways away from practicality.
Sorry. I just followed a link that was already here. See post #4. I thought maybe people actually read the thread and the eveidence before taking off on the sarcastic remarks. Ultra capacitors have already been used in auotmobiles.
They’re not bad for regenerative braking and smoothing out dips and peaks in a noisy or unreliable supply - but as a primary power store - yeah, never going to work.
Depending on your definition of reasonable, I would beg to differ. I will be living off the (power) grid in about 5 years and I checked into using a flywheel for storage. Unfortunately they are all priced for industry and so looks like I’m gonna be investing in a battery bank.
Well, if you ran the thing at 440 V. it might be possible. The fly in the ointment is that as the capacitor discharges the voltage falls so the drive motors would need to be able to deliver power with good efficiency over a wide range of voltage.
The article cited in the OP says that it is thin metal sheets separated by a proprietory material. That’s just a parallel plate capacitor. In order to get the capacitance needed they would have to have developed a material with fantastically high dielectric constant, exceedingly low loss and high breakdown voltage.
If they did all that I figure you could charge the capacitor up to the useable energy in a tank, 16 gallons, of gasoline in just about an hour.
Well the people at Beacon Power would beg to differ. As would their fans at The California Energy Commission. Now as to “practicality” … well they’ve not yet run a profit. And as pointed out they are scaled for industrial use, not residential.
These particular ultracapacitors, if they ever really materialize, are different than others referenced. The power stored in little weight and for relatively little cost would leapfrog over the tremendous advances in battery technology. But few believe they will really exist. Meanwhile Li-ion and polymer batteries get lighter and cheaper while gas gets more expensive.
It really does get exciting. Tesla coming at it from the high end, GM getting serious with the Volt, a $30K BEV family sedan by the Miles Automotive Group (fronting for a Chinese manufacturer), a fun two-seater - Venture One - that comes in hybrid and electric versions, heck even Volvo, , Mitsubishi, and even that shameless self promoter Malcolm Bricklin are all announcing plans to get in the mix.
Oh Beacon is real enough. And a darling of some of the alternative energy funds. Again “practical”? No, not really. Batteries are apparently cheaper, even if they have to be replaced every so often. Even stationary fuel cells (see PlugPower) should beat it on price. But a reasonable amount of energy and not subject to catastrophic (kittenostrophic? if its just a small disaster?) failure? It’s those.
Great. Another AstroPower. You want to know how much money I lost on them?
Until Beacon’s technology is proven, manufacturable, and cost-competitive, they’re just blowing smoke, as far as I’m concerned. And, I notice these things are buried underground. I wonder why?
