Just so everyone knows, the amount of charge a battery can hold will never increase much more than what we can do now with Lithium Ion. Batteries store their charge on metal atoms. Increasing a battery's charge requires packing more metal atoms into a small space. The heavier an atom, the further apart it must be from fellow atoms. Therefore, lighter atoms can have a higher charge density. Lithium is one of the lightest metals we have found so far that can hold a charge in this way. Minor improvements in the charge density will be made in years to come, but nothing substantial.
Using a fuel-based battery, like a fuel cell, will have a much higher charge-density. Anyways, a lithium-ion battery that can handle years and year of charging and recharging is great!
@kedmond This is true, but keep in mind that there could be battery technologies to come that we can't even imagine at the moment, and they could be rechargeable ones with very high charge density. And that's not to mention that we keep getting better and better at making device components very energy efficient, so we can still improve on battery life that way.
@kedmond wrong, go read about material science. Simply increasing the surface area of the anode and cathode will easily triple the power and energy density of today's batteries. Have you heard of Lithium Air batteries. Lithium is only half of the lithium battery, the anode materials are the weak spot in current designs. Saying "never" in a post about batteries or other technology is foolish.
@cosmicinglewood oh and another thing, fuel cell vehicles are electric! All the more reason to move forward with Lithium EV's now; that way when the Fuel Cell finally becomes commercially practical is 30 years, we can swap the Lithium Arrays out of the electric cars with a Fuel cell better, which incidentally will be much less complex than converting a gas/diesel vehicle to electric/ bev or fuel cell. And for myself and everyone else who lost $ in Ballard Power systems, I have heard enough about these so called "miracle fuel cells"; BEV's now, Fuel Cells when they become practical...
@cosmicinglewood The #1 reason locomotives don't drive the wheels directly through diesel engines is torque. Electric motors have instant max torque, while diesel/gas engines have to ramp up in RPM before reaching max torque. This isn't as big of an issue for cars.
Assuming that we already know all the chemical elements in the periodic table, lithium is simply the best anode for a battery and nothing can beat it. It has the highest potential against hydrogen (3V), giving it high power density, and is the lightest metal. But it is true that it has a theoretical maximum electrochemical equivalence of 6 Ah/g. And that is set in stone. Currently lithium ion batteries get about half of that. Because a battery contains a lot of other things besides lithium, the energy density is lower. So no matter how we construct a battery, and no matter what cathode we use, there are always going to be limitations. Lithium Air batteries have the highest energy density, because the active material comes from the air, but they have horrible power densities and are nowhere near commercialization.
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Just so everyone knows, the amount of charge a battery can hold will never increase much more than what we can do now with Lithium Ion. Batteries store their charge on metal atoms. Increasing a battery's charge requires packing more metal atoms into a small space. The heavier an atom, the further apart it must be from fellow atoms. Therefore, lighter atoms can have a higher charge density. Lithium is one of the lightest metals we have found so far that can hold a charge in this way. Minor improvements in the charge density will be made in years to come, but nothing substantial.
Using a fuel-based battery, like a fuel cell, will have a much higher charge-density. Anyways, a lithium-ion battery that can handle years and year of charging and recharging is great!
@kedmond
This is true, but keep in mind that there could be battery technologies to come that we can't even imagine at the moment, and they could be rechargeable ones with very high charge density. And that's not to mention that we keep getting better and better at making device components very energy efficient, so we can still improve on battery life that way.
@kedmond
You should look up nanowire battery.
@kedmond wrong, go read about material science. Simply increasing the surface area of the anode and cathode will easily triple the power and energy density of today's batteries. Have you heard of Lithium Air batteries. Lithium is only half of the lithium battery, the anode materials are the weak spot in current designs. Saying "never" in a post about batteries or other technology is foolish.
@cosmicinglewood oh and another thing, fuel cell vehicles are electric! All the more reason to move forward with Lithium EV's now; that way when the Fuel Cell finally becomes commercially practical is 30 years, we can swap the Lithium Arrays out of the electric cars with a Fuel cell better, which incidentally will be much less complex than converting a gas/diesel vehicle to electric/ bev or fuel cell. And for myself and everyone else who lost $ in Ballard Power systems, I have heard enough about these so called "miracle fuel cells"; BEV's now, Fuel Cells when they become practical...
@cosmicinglewood The #1 reason locomotives don't drive the wheels directly through diesel engines is torque. Electric motors have instant max torque, while diesel/gas engines have to ramp up in RPM before reaching max torque. This isn't as big of an issue for cars.
@kedmond
Assuming that we already know all the chemical elements in the periodic table, lithium is simply the best anode for a battery and nothing can beat it. It has the highest potential against hydrogen (3V), giving it high power density, and is the lightest metal. But it is true that it has a theoretical maximum electrochemical equivalence of 6 Ah/g. And that is set in stone. Currently lithium ion batteries get about half of that. Because a battery contains a lot of other things besides lithium, the energy density is lower. So no matter how we construct a battery, and no matter what cathode we use, there are always going to be limitations. Lithium Air batteries have the highest energy density, because the active material comes from the air, but they have horrible power densities and are nowhere near commercialization.