New rechargeable flow battery enables cheaper, large-scale energy storage

[OKIsItJustMe]

http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2013/rechargeable-flow-battery-enables-cheaper-large-scale-energy-storage-0816.html

[font face=Serif][font size=5]New rechargeable flow battery enables cheaper, large-scale energy storage[/font]
[font size=4]Design may support widespread use of solar and wind energy.[/font]

Jennifer Chu, MIT News Office
August 16, 2013

[font size=3]MIT researchers have engineered a new rechargeable flow battery that doesn’t rely on expensive membranes to generate and store electricity. The device, they say, may one day enable cheaper, large-scale energy storage.

The palm-sized prototype generates three times as much power per square centimeter as other membraneless systems — a power density that is an order of magnitude higher than that of many lithium-ion batteries and other commercial and experimental energy-storage systems.

The device stores and releases energy in a device that relies on a phenomenon called laminar flow: Two liquids are pumped through a channel, undergoing electrochemical reactions between two electrodes to store or release energy. Under the right conditions, the solutions stream through in parallel, with very little mixing. The flow naturally separates the liquids, without requiring a costly membrane.

The reactants in the battery consist of a liquid bromine solution and hydrogen fuel. The group chose to work with bromine because the chemical is relatively inexpensive and available in large quantities, with more than 243,000 tons produced each year in the United States.

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[freethought]

1. Okay, it works in the lab. However

quite often such ideas fall flat in the outside world. Cheap is good, at least this idea has that going for it. My only caution would be the use of bromine. I've been around the pure bromine, very, very nasty stuff. They don't specify how concentrated a solution it is.