“Shimbun also added that Panasonic and Sanyo have already test-manufactured a version of the storage battery for home use.”

and there jaybus posted in response to the article:

“See Nationmaster.com. In per capita electrical power consumption, the US is 9th and Japan 17th. You will notice that nations such as Iceland, Norway, and Canada top the list. No mystery, it’s cold there.”

To me in that pic of the battery it looks no longer than my forarm.

I truely hope it is this revolutionary!!!

Appart from serious applications… think how much fun you could have with one of these in something like a T-Rex 600 RC Helicopter with mounted video gear flying about! Have dreamed about something like this with extended flight time for a Long time!!!

2) We’re approaching a lithium shortage at high speed.

3) A week seems excessive if you just want to backstop your solar/wind system.

4) Why does every household have to generate its own power? I’d love to relocate my PV array to someplace where the sun shines more often and where somebody else could look after it and its battery backup for a management fee.

There are many areas of the US where 300 or more KW-hr/week are the norm.

Average US residential monthly power consumptions are located at
http://www.eia.doe.gov/cneaf/electricity/esr/table5.html

Batteries to provide this kind of power for a week are simply not reasonable in cost, and particularly in life-cycle costs as deep discharge for maximum home power tends to destroy lithium (and most other solid electrode) cells quickly.

So your either have to double up on the batteries needed for lighter discharge and longer life or run a smaller number deeper with a shorter life-span. Either way, you lose.

1) grid
2) solar and/or wind
3) generator
4) from your car (hybrid smart-grid just for your home battery)

No?

Well, maybe it will help some hollywood “eco warriors” run their 15,000 sq ft mansions?

Solar can’t replace baseline power generation, because (duh!) it doesn’t work at night. You need to build about 3 kwh for every 1 kwh of baseline power for wind, because (duh) it’s not always very windy. But if you have large-scale storage, using variable sources like solar and wind for baseline becomes feasible. That’s big stuff.

m00t

A small American house uses about 300 KW-hr of electricity in a week.

A 300 KW-hr battery would be
1. HUGE
2. HUGELY EXPENSIVE
3. DANGEROUS

I suspect this battery is actually to mate with small 200 watt solar panels and their inverters which generate a laughably small amount of power for the cost.

When are you people going to figure out that you’re being played like fiddles? No product in hand, no story, period.

TANSTAAFL.

(There Ain’t No Such Thing As A Free Lunch.)

Err… cool those batteries using your home’s water or circulating cooler air through the battery to cool it down?

Instead of keeping 55 gallons of gasoline stored for your generator, have this battery pack and a couple of solar cells handy.

It reflects EVs are not simply able to take full advantage of the excess juice, but can make a considerable contribution to the forthcoming sustainable yet intermittent energy sources as a precious storage.

As with Nissan and the others, leasing and recycling battery pack is capable of making EVs affordable. Similarly, grasping energy industry, we could expedite the roll-out of EVs without hesitation.

Our energy future might hang on our different approach.

Thanks A Lot !

As far as eco-friendly is concerned, you have to know more about the production and disposal process of the device before you can go calling it environmentally friendly. Lithium is not exactly an inert and harmless material, and as far as I know, Li-ion batteries can’t be revived after they lose their ability to hold a charge. Thousands and thousands of giant lithium-ion batteries ending up in a dump would definitely not be eco-friendly.

Still – electricity will be cheaper by night very soon in many places, so even something that costs $1000 and stores 20 kWh of electricity would be useful. But can that be done?
Right now, Lithium ion cells are $3 and store 9 watt hours, so $3000 would store 9 kwh. So a factor of 5 – 10 away from useful, right now.

The battery shown looks somewhat small when you consider also running a washing machine, stove and hot water tank.

Overall, it appears an interesting idea.

What is that? Are they just afraid of change or that they can’t install it themselves because they don’t understand the technology?

Mike

A bank of batteries could be used to power the peak load demand for air conditioning or heating instead of taking off of the grid at the worst possible time. Then, at night, it could be charged when the power demands are lower.

The really sad thing is that we could have had this technology running 10 or 15 years ago using gel cell batteries if it hadn’t been for the power companies fighting against net metering. Yes, the vast majority of the electrical system inefficiencies today exist because of the unwillingness of power companies to move forward with technological change.

In any case, I think that lead acid batteries are still the best option for this application because we don’t care about weight, only reliability, and capacity. Another nice feature of gel cell batteries that they do not exploding catch fire. They’re very stable, very well known technology that can be recycled easily and cheaply.

Also, this must be aimed for the north, as I can’t imagine a week of battery in the summer with a bunch of 1.5kW ACs running without the battery take a whole room.

Get the point?