Metal-Air Battery Could Store 11 Times More Energy than Lithium-Ion

[madokie]

This is going to be an interesting decade when it comes to producing and storing energy. dm

PhysOrg.com) -- A spinoff company from Arizona State University plans to build a new battery with an energy density 11 times greater than that of lithium-ion batteries for just one-third the cost. With a $5.13 million research grant from the US Department of Energy awarded last week, Fluidic Energy hopes to turn its ultra-dense energy storage technology into a reality.

The new Metal-Air Ionic Liquid battery is being designed by Cody Friesen, a professor of materials science at Arizona State and founder of Fluidic Energy, along with other researchers. The key to the new battery is that it uses ionic liquids as its electrolyte, which could help it overcome some significant problems faced by previous metal-air batteries. In the past, metal-air batteries have usually used water-based electrolytes, but due to water evaporation, the batteries tended to fail prematurely.

The advantage of ionic liquids, like those used in Fluidic Energy's new battery, is that they don't evaporate. Ionic liquids are salts that are a liquid at room temperature. Compared to water, ionic liquids are much more viscous, and they also conduct electricity fairly well. The challenge will be finding an inexpensive ionic liquid that works well in the new batteries, although Friesen has not yet discussed the specific ionic liquids his company has been investigating.

A metal-air battery that uses ionic liquids as its electrolyte could have several advantages. For one thing, it can function for a longer period time since its electrolyte doesn't evaporate. Also, the batteries could offer better electrochemical stability, which means they could use materials that have a greater energy density than zinc. Friesen and his research team hope to achieve energy densities of anywhere from 900 to 1,600 watt-hours per kilogram. This density could lead to electric vehicles that could travel 400 to 500 miles on a single charge, Friesen said.

More: http://www.physorg.com/news176646131.html

[wtmusic]

1. Holy. Crap.

With energy densities like that we could say goodbye to oil (watch your back, Prof. Friesen). :scared:

[OKIsItJustMe]

14. “With energy densities like that we could say goodbye to oil…”

The ability to store energy is not the ability to generate it.

[wtmusic]

16. No problem

with safe nuclear. :thumbsup:

[kristopher]

17. Safe nuclear?

Might as well predicate it on pixie dust, both are equally real.

[TxRider]

19. I don't think so

Nuclear can be safe, relatively anyway.

Problem I have seen for nuclear is that it seems to be the most expensive alternative there is.

Our STP Nuke plant in Bay city Tx. is a perfect example.

It was supposed to cost 498 million, it ended up costing 4.8 billion, for a 2500MW production capacity. With very expensive maintenance etc. piling more cost on.

[kristopher]

20. Jumping off a building is safe too.

As long as you don't consider the final impact as part of the risk assessment. And while the risk from Chernobyl type failures are well mitigated by system design, the element of human failure in such complex systems cannot be designed out.


There are a range of threats that nuclear power is associated with, including the proliferation of nuclear weapons. These are risks that far exceed the viable renewable alternative and it is simply not necessary to accept them.

[HysteryDiagnosis]

2. Please please please make it real... K&R'd n/t

[PeaknikB]

3. Is this the same as Zinc or Nickel batteries?

I'm not sure if this is really new.

[Greyskye]

4. Not the same.

The ionic liquids they're talking about have a number of advantages over Zinc or Nickel batteries, including an increased energy density.

Hope it turns into a viable technology.

[madokie]

5. Nope

and this is new, real new in fact. go to the link and check it out and you may find the answers you seek

[PeaknikB]

7. I went to the article

It doesn't say what it really is, all it says is it's a "Metal-Air Ionic Liquid battery". If it sounds too good to be true...

[madokie]

8. They say what it is but that can't be true,

so you tell me what it is then. your circle logic has me all cornfused

[OKIsItJustMe]

15. Let me suggest another article

http://www.technologyreview.com/energy/23877/?a=f

Betting on a Metal-Air Battery Breakthrough

A government-funded start-up claims it can make ionic liquid energy storage feasible.

By Tyler Hamilton

Thursday, November 05, 2009

A spinoff from Arizona State University says it can develop a metal-air battery that dramatically outperforms the best lithium-ion batteries on the market, and now it has the funding it needs to prove it.

…

Friesen, whose Arizona State research team has spent the past few years experimenting with various ionic liquids, says a metal-air battery using an ionic liquid as its electrolyte not only functions significantly longer--because drying out is no longer a problem--but it also gets a big boost in energy density. "These liquids have electrochemical stability windows of up to five volts, so it allows you to go to much more energy-dense metals than zinc." He says his research team will target energy densities of at least 900 watt-hours per kilogram and up to 1,600 watt-hours per kilogram in the DOE-funded project.

The problem with ionic liquids is that they're still made in small quantities, making them expensive compared to many other solvents used to dissolve salts. "But some people are making ionic liquids now out of things that are already known and produced in high quantities, like detergents," says Wilkes.

…

Friesen downplays the cost concern, pointing out that the liquids become quite economical when developed in-house in large volumes. He's careful, however, not to say too much about the ionic liquids his team has developed, revealing only that there are "several contenders that seem to work well."

…

[autorank]

6. We'll all be worshiping engineers someday;) k*r

Great news. Thanks!

[tinrobot]

9. That's an amazing power density.

We're talking very light batteries.

The 53kwh battery in the Tesla is almost 900 pounds and is good for 250 miles. At a density of 1600wh/kg, the same 53kwh battery using this technology would weigh about 75 pounds. A 500 mile battery would weigh only 150 pounds, and it would actually be good for more than 500 miles because the car would be a lot lighter.

[NNadir]

10. Actually, people have been prattling about ionic liquids for decades.

They are considered "green solvents" by many people, but if you are familiar with the scientific literature (as opposed to googling around in a second hand manner) one will discover that very little is known about the toxicology of ionic liquids, not that there is ONE car CULTist anywhere who gives a rat's ass about toxicology and cars.

As it happens, I have been reading a great deal on the topic of IL's recently, as an outgrowth of a lecture I attended, and some symposia, run by the internationally known IL expert Jim Wishart, who piqued my interest while speaking on the stability of free solvated electrons and their effect on the oxidation state of plutonium.

Wishart is a scientist at the Brookhaven National Laboratory.

In fact, by coincidence, while avoiding a certain class of non-thinkers on blogs because it is useless, in general, to talk to them about anything real, I was considering a paper entitled "A review of ionic liquids towards supercritical fluid applications" (J. of Supercritical Fluids 43 (2007) 150–180) wherein the issue of toxicology was specifically and clearly addressed in these exact words:

3.3. Toxicology of ILs
The green character of ILs has been usually related with their negligible vapor pressure; however their toxicology data have been very limited until now. Several authors <26–29> already mentioned this lack of toxicological data in the literature <30>. Although ILs will not evaporate and thus will not cause air pollution, it does not mean that they will not harm the environment if they enter. Most of ILs are water soluble and they may enter the aquatic environment by accidental spills or effluents. The most commonly used ILs and are known to decompose in the presence of water and as a result hydrofluoric and phosphoric acids are formed <31>. Therefore, both toxicity and ecotoxicity information which provide metabolism and degradability of ILs are also required to label them as green solvents or investigate their environmental impact...

...The impact of ILs on aquatic ecosystems is highly important since some of ILs have a high solubility in water. Maginn <33> provided the LC50 levels for two imidazolium-based ILs with Daphnia magna, common fresh water crustaceans. Due to the reason that D. magna are filter feeders at the base of the aquatic food chain, their responses to ILs are essential to understand how these new solvents may impact an environmental ecosystem. As ILs, 1-n-butyl 3-methylimidazolium cation with PF6⁻ and BF6⁻ anions are used and the results are tabulated in Table 2: These two ILs are as toxic to Daphnia as benzene and even far more toxic than acetone, but much less toxic than ammonia, chlorine, phenol, etc.

In general, like many, I am intrigued by the potential of ionic liquids under controlled conditions by literate people who know what they are dealing with.

The idea of oblivious consumer car cultists driving around at high speed with these chemicals, however, personally appalls me, not that I am ever startled by how elaborate the environmental shell games of the car CULTists can be and how little they care to find out about the potential environmental impact of their latest fantasy du jour. The continuous contempt for environmental science (and other sciences) on the part of this sort is hardly a surprise, and goes back many, many, many, many years and is, after all, the basic phenomena underlying the career of amoral and immoral people like, say, Amory Lovins.

The J. Supercrit. Sci. paper, which can be accessed by any one who has rights at a good scientific library, is abstracted on line here:

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6VMF-4NYSXM7-1&_user=10&_coverDate=11%2F30%2F2007&_alid=1144686092&_rdoc=2&_fmt=high&_orig=search&_cdi=6149&_sort=r&_docanchor=&view=c&_ct=2&_acct=C000050221&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=10&md5=47fb3507f376cfabbb356c3cb48da15a">J. of Supercritical Fluids 43 (2007) 150–180

[DCKit]

11. Yeah, I'm hoping my personal nuclear reactor will be under the tree in a few days too.

I kept trying to read what you wrote, but the mental picture all those crazy people driving around with tanks of 15 and 20 gallons of gas strapped to their ass kept interfering.

[TxRider]

12. It would depend

On the chemical makeup of this particular ionic fluid.

But depending of course on this particular fluid would it be better than the hundreds of billions of gallon of oil or of gasoline spiked with stuff like MTBE, benzene, toluene, and xylene we drag around all over the place and spill into the waterways.

The LD50 of MTBE, the gasoline additive is 4g/kg or 4,000ppm

I might feel safer with orders of magnitude less liquid, in a more secure package.

[madokie]

13. Man O man you're sure hung up on Mr. Amory Lovins, aren't you

did he dis you at some point in life? Did he take your girl friend away from you sometime in the past? Or is it that he makes money at what he does and you don't and you can't stand the thought of someone with a better grasp of his or her knowledge than you making more money than you do.

I vote for the last one

Personally I have loads of respect for Mr. Lovins and zero, make that a big fat (0) for you.
Have a blessed day, that is if a non believer like myself can bless anyone, I'm not sure how all that works. Oh and guess what I really don't care one way or the other. Jebus won't be coming to whisk you away from all this nuclear waste that is piling up around the world so you nuke fellows need to figure out what to do with the toxic stuff before we're overrun with it.

Nnadir why don't you set up an interview with Mr. Lovins and record it so we can make up our own minds as to who to believe and trust? What, you won't do that either? You're like a sack of farts, full of hot stinking air and nothing more.

[kristopher]

18. Interesting indeed.., Thanks for the post. nt