Thread: Rapid charge

Charging portable electronics in 10 minutes: New architecture for lithium-ion battery anodes far outperform the current standard -- ScienceDaily

We have known for a long time that battery electric cars would be a major advance, permitting personal vehicles that do not emit carbon. Environmentally, a great step forward. However, a major problem is the time to charge an electric car's batteries. Generally overnight. But the reference above shows it is likely to be possible to have a rapid recharge set of batteries that will charge in ten minutes. This is not much different to the time required to refill a car's tank with petrol. Would this development make you willing to change to an electric vahicle?

Of course, the rapid recharge also applies to cell phones and lap tops etc.

It's a good step forward.

Nitpicks.
It only takes about 2 minutes to fill my tank, perhaps up to 4 for my aging small 4x4 pickup. Of course if I could let it charge and still go into the store, instead of watching my pump, it would come out about the same.

Electric cars only makes sense where there's already lots of renewable power sources. On average in the US it actually doesn't save much CO2 over its lifecycle because parts of the country are mostly fossil fuel power generation and creates a huge toxic disposal problem. I know personally I won't consider them until batteries life approaches 15 years and replacement is more affordable.

Lynx

There was an article a while back (sciencedaily or New Sceientist - I cannot recall which) which pointed out that an electric car charged from power generated by burning dirty coal, would still mean less CO2 released per kilometre travelled than a petrol driven car. This was due to greater efficiencies. The difference was substantial.

Having said that, I agree of course, that we need to be moving away from burning coal. Nuclear, wind, sun, or (if desperate) natural gas, are all better ways of generating electricity.

Originally Posted by skeptic

Lynx

There was an article a while back (sciencedaily or New Sceientist - I cannot recall which) which pointed out that an electric car charged from power generated by burning dirty coal, would still mean less CO2 released per kilometre travelled than a petrol driven car. This was due to greater efficiencies. The difference was substantial.

If that article considered less than 10% less is considered "substantial".

The problem is many studies do not consider the added CO2 required for production and disposal of electric vehicles compared to ICEs. Those that do find much less potential savings of CO2 in addition to pointing out the additional burdens of toxic materials (e.g., Comparative Environmental Life Cycle Assessment of Conventional and Electric Vehicles - Hawkins - 2012 - Journal of Industrial Ecology - Wiley Online Library )

While should welcome any improvements in batteries we still have a long ways to go before it's the go-to technology. And everything needs to be viewed through the broad lens of its entire lifecycle.

Lynx

I do not claim to be expert in this field, but the claim was 'substantial' reductions in CO2. However, I agree that the whole world needs to get away from burning coal, ASAP.

Originally Posted by skeptic

We have known for a long time that battery electric cars would be a major advance, permitting personal vehicles that do not emit carbon. Environmentally, a great step forward. However, a major problem is the time to charge an electric car's batteries. Generally overnight.

Two of the more popular EV's on the market - the Leaf and the Tesla - can be charged in about half an hour. It would be trivial to replace the batteries with faster charging batteries (A123 made a battery that could charge at a rate of 100C, which translates to under a minute) but then you'd reduce range, and no one wants that. Half an hour seems to be OK for most people, especially since the chargers are being installed in the parking lots of shopping centers, gyms, schools etc.

Billvon

When the technology is ready, it will be used. Not necessarily to replace old batteries, but certainly in new cars. There is no indication that it will reduce range. No doubt time will tell, but we can expect new battery technology to grow. I suspect that, in say ten years, batteries for electric cars will recharge very quickly and have a greater range on top of that.