An advance in the technology for flow batteries may lead to systems for electric vehicles (EVs) that allow them to be refueled with liquid, much like conventional combustion vehicles do now. MIT researchers have developed a semi-solid flow cell which offers 10 times the performance of liquid chemical flow batteries.

Flow batteries are similar to fuel cells but they differ in that the reaction in flow batteries is much more readily reversible. Flow batteries have been used for large-scale energy storage and grid load balancing applications, but until now, they have not had the energy density to make them competitive for use with EVs.

Since the electrolytes for flow batteries are kept on-board the vehicle, rather than being consumed and exhausted like more conventional liquid fuels, the process of refueling the vehicle would also include emptying and collecting the old electrolyte for reprocessing. It would likely take longer than refueling with a combustion fuel, but could be faster than even quick-charge electrical chargers.

Because much of the electrolyte material is kept in separate storage, flow batteries are not susceptible to self-discharge that conventional batteries are. Flow batteries may also offer a better way of extending the current range limits of electric vehicles. The size and cost of a battery system could be half that of current EV battery systems.

Thanks, Trek!

The California state legislature has voted to ban polystyrene foam (aka Styrofoam) take out containers.  Restaurants and other vendors will no longer be able to package food or drink in the material starting January 1, 2014.

Polystyrene can take thousands of years to biodegrade in landfills and, in California, it constantly makes its way into storm drains that empty into the ocean and is the second most common type of beach litter.  Basically, it’s become an environmental scourge and California is hoping to do away with it.

Fifty jurisdictions in the state have already passed local bans and it’s likely that a full house vote in August will make the ban statewide.  With plenty of alternatives available, including compostable containers, businesses should have no problem complying.

via L.A. Times

Canadian firm Thin Red Line Aerospace is working on the first test deployment of its energy storage system for use with off-shore wind turbines. The Energy Bag provides power storage as “undersea compressed air energy storage” (CAES) to store compressed air deep underwater, and then release it again to drive generators when more power is needed. Storing power for peak load demand or for periods of intermittent wind are an important part of developing a responsive wind generation system that can effectively contribute to the grid at all times.

The process is conceptually straight forward: Wind turbines fill the balloon-like underwater bags with compressed air that later drives electrical generators on demand. While initial application is ideally linked to floating wind turbines, excess electricity from the grid—or from clean energy sources such as tidal and wave power—can also be used to drive compressors to fill the energy bags. The technology is especially suited to countries with relatively deep waters near their coasts.

Instead of engineering a heavy pressure vessel to store large amounts of highly compressed air, the Energy Bag uses a deep water location to serve as the pressure vessel to store the compressed air at extremely high pressures. The prototype Energy Bag itself weighs only 75 kilograms (165 pounds), but is able to displace 40 tons of seawater. It will be located about 600 meters (2000 feet) below the surface, where pressures are 60 to 70 times atmospheric pressure. The power storage in just one bag can be considerable. “At depths of around 600m, there will be enough pressure in one 20m-diameter bag to store around 70MW hours of energy. That’s around the same as 14 hours of energy generation from the largest offshore turbines currently in operation.”

The Energy Bag has the potential to be orders of magnitude less expensive than industrial battery storage systems, and even just a fraction of pumped hydro storage systems. Not every location has deepwater locations suitable for this power storage, but several areas in Europe in particular have both good wind potential and deep water close by offshore as potential locations where this could be implemented.

via: Great Lakes Energy News

As part of the Green Highway project where California, Oregon and Washington are partnering to turn Interstate 5 into the first alternative-fuel-friendly freeway in the U.S., AeroVironment is installing Level 3 EV quick chargers along the route in Southern Oregon.

For this first phase of the project, from the California state line to the Willamette Valley, 150 miles of the highway will have convenient access to EV chargers that can fully charge a battery in 30 minutes.  Eight interchanges will be picked based on common destinations, vehicle range and driving distances.  The chargers will be installed by the end of the fall.

The Green Highway will ultimately run from San Diego to Vancouver, B.C. and will feature not only EV charging and battery swap stations, but alternative fuel filling stations for biodiesel, compressed natural gas and hydrogen.  The project is being funded by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.

via Engadget

A new nanocomposite material discovered by researchers at Rice University has the intriguing property of getting stronger from repeated stress. The material is made from verticaly aligned nanotubes combined with polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS), an inert, rubbery polymer. After repeated compression (3.5 million cycles over a period of about a week), the material was found to be 12 percent stiffer than its original state.

Commercial possibilities for the material may not be immediately evident, but the research is intriguing. If the properties in this material can be understood, there may be applications for larger scale uses, such as for construction. Products that are subject to vibrational stresses may also be aided by materials like this which improve in stiffness over time.

via: KurzweilAI.net