Breakthrough Power Technology Claims to Deliver 500 Miles on 5-Minute Charge

[Nomad559]

http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/story?id=3547157&page=1

Millions of inventions pass quietly through the U.S. patent office each year. Patent No. 7,033,406 did, too, until energy insiders spotted six words in the filing that sounded like a death knell for the internal combustion engine.

An Austin-based startup called EEStor promised "technologies for replacement of electrochemical batteries," meaning a motorist could plug in a car for five minutes and drive 500 miles roundtrip between Dallas and Houston without gasoline.

By contrast, some plug-in hybrids on the horizon would require motorists to charge their cars in a wall outlet overnight and promise only 50 miles of gasoline-free commute. And the popular hybrids on the road today still depend heavily on fossil fuels.

"It's a paradigm shift," said Ian Clifford, chief executive of Toronto-based ZENN Motor Co., which has licensed EEStor's invention. "The Achilles' heel to the electric car industry has been energy storage. By all rights, this would make internal combustion engines unnecessary."

:)

[truedelphi]

1. Just K & R'ed and please keep us reminded of any developments of this company

[whistle]

2. Sounds like a total scam and a violation of the 2nd law of thermodynamics

Energy dispersal

The second law of thermodynamics is an axiom of thermodynamics concerning heat, entropy, and the direction in which thermodynamic processes can occur. For example, the second law implies that heat does not spontaneously flow from a cold material to a hot material, but it allows heat to flow from a hot material to a cold material. Roughly speaking, the second law says that in an isolated system, concentrated energy disperses over time, and consequently less concentrated energy is available to do useful work. Energy dispersal also means that differences in temperature, pressure, and density even out. Again roughly speaking, thermodynamic entropy is a measure of energy dispersal, and so the second law is closely connected with the concept of entropy.

<MORE>

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_law_of_thermodynamics#Energy_dispersal

[EST]

12. Ya beat me to it!

Thermodynamically preposterous. Besides the fact that you'd have to have an electrical feeder the size of a beer keg, storing that much electricity in anything chemical is, well, preposterous.

[whistle]

21. Five minutes of electrical energy 80% of which is wasted through heat,

...then it is supposed to move a normal automobile even as a compact 500 miles? Totally ridiculous! Another perpetual motion device or a 99.9% efficiency transfer or some sort of frictionless motor...all scams from history, all totally bogus.

[sakabatou]

3. Oh man, this would be great

[glitch]

4. Wow - they've got some heavy backers. Could be very interesting. K & R nt

[Botany]

5. and can it fly too?

:rofl:

[Make7]

6. When is a motor powered by ambient static electricity going to come out? ( n/t )

[bahrbearian]

7. After I work out the bugs in my ,wireless Alternating Current, invention.

[lumberjack_jeff]

17. Tesla coils on every streetcorner! n/t

[Lochloosa]

19. Uhh...

Never.

[papau]

8. A car supercapacitor via barium titanate, aluminum oxide, and glass?

A threat to next-generation lithium-ion makers such as Watertown, MA-based A123Systems, which is working on a plug-in hybrid storage system for General Motors, and Reno, NV-based Altair Nanotechnologies, a supplier to all-electric vehicle maker Phoenix Motorcars>

The company claims to have developed a superior type of supercapacitor (Ultracapacitors have many advantages over traditional electrochemical batteries -Unlike batteries, "ultracaps" can completely absorb and release a charge at high rates and in a virtually endless cycle with little degradation - but compared with lithium-ion batteries, high-end ultracapacitors on the market today store 25 times less energy per pound - and again but he power burst that ultracaps provide can assist with stop-start acceleration, and the energy is more efficiently recaptured through regenerative braking) using barium titanate coated with aluminum oxide and glass, to achieve a level of capacitance much higher than what is currently available in the market. The company's system claims a specific energy of about 280 watt hours per kilogram, compared with around 120 watt hours per kilogram for lithium-ion and 32 watt hours per kilogram for lead-acid gel batteries. This leads to new possibilities for electric vehicles and other applications, including for the military.

EEStor claims that, using an automated production line and existing power electronics, it will initially build a 15-kilowatt-hour energy-storage system for a small electric car weighing less than 100 pounds, and with a 200-mile driving range. The vehicle, the company says, will be able to recharge in less than 10 minutes.

People are skeptical because of leakage - high-voltage ultracaps have a tendency to self-discharge quickly -meaning, if you leave it parked overnight it will discharge. Also ceramic structures are brittle by nature and the thermal stresses may cause cause microfractures and ultimately failure - even EEStor only claims that its system works to specification in temperatures as low as -20 °C, but the US auto market requires specs down to -40 °C. Altair and A123Systems claim that their lithium-ion cells can operate at -30 °C. It will be an interesting safety test when a vehicle packed with a 3,500-volt energy system crashes.

But it does have on its board Morton Topfer, former vice chairman of Dell and mentor to Michael Dell.


http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=HITOFF&d=PALL&p=1&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsrchnum.htm&r=1&f=G&l=50&s1=7033406.PN.&OS=PN/7033406&RS=PN/7033406

United States Patent 7,033,406
Weir , et al. April 25, 2006

Electrical-energy-storage unit (EESU) utilizing ceramic and integrated-circuit technologies for replacement of electrochemical batteries

Abstract

An electrical-energy-storage unit (EESU) has as a basis material a high-permittivity composition-modified barium titanate ceramic powder. This powder is double coated with the first coating being aluminum oxide and the second coating calcium magnesium aluminosilicate glass. The components of the EESU are manufactured with the use of classical ceramic fabrication techniques which include screen printing alternating multilayers of nickel electrodes and high-permittivitiy composition-modified barium titanate powder, sintering to a closed-pore porous body, followed by hot-isostatic pressing to a void-free body. The components are configured into a multilayer array with the use of a solder-bump technique as the enabling technology so as to provide a parallel configuration of components that has the capability to store electrical energy in the range of 52 kWh. The total weight of an EESU with this range of electrical energy storage is about 336 pounds. Inventors: Weir; Richard Dean (Cedar Park, TX), Nelson; Carl Walter (Austin, TX)

[DCKit]

10. Light and inexpensive materials, to boot. SWEET!! nt

[hvn_nbr_2]

9. How long till Exxon buys them out and snuffs it? nt

[MannyGoldstein]

11. I Doubt It

First off, something doesn't have to actually function to receive patent protection - it just has to be new and non-obvious. Other than that, it could be a total fantasy.

Second, that is a LOT of energy to move from one place to another through a connector during recharge. Sounds a little nutty.

[skids]

13. I'm not convinced yet but...

...that is NOT an especially large amount of current to move through a connector if you are topping off 3/4ths of the energy of a 4kV capacitor (that is, increasing its charge from 2kV to 4kV). At its lowest practical charge point it will deliver 10 times the power per amp as houshold 120V. Just keep your finger out of the socket, for sure!

But I am not holding my breath until these folks show a working product AND a plan to scale up to mass manufacture very fast.

[progressoid]

14. "I am skeptical but I'd be very happy to be proved wrong," Perry said.

Ditto.

[garybeck]

15. Could be vacuum flywheel batteries

Several years ago there was a lot of buzz about flywheels that operate in a vaccum. In this case there is near zero friction and near 100% efficiency. The biggest problem was that if the vacuum lost its seal the resulting imposion could be extremely dangerous, and considering car accidents are inevitable, I think that was the main stumbling block. Also we have to consider cost. The fact that the battery could store that amount of energy and be charged up that fast doesn't help us if they cost a fortune.

[lumberjack_jeff]

16. I have an idea.

Let's build a car that harnesses the huge potential energy present in the earth's rotation.

Admittedly, I have a few bugs to work out. The long cable to the moon is problematic, as is the inability to stop, and it's fixed 700mph speed combined with it's inability to turn.

But on the plus side, it makes the trip from Rio DiJaniero to Rio Di Janiero in only 25 hours. :thumbsup:

Honestly, who believes that any realistic system suitable for widespread deployment can deliver 500 miles worth of energy in five minutes.

... well, except a gas pump, I suppose.

[Tab]

18. Actually I was reading about this on a "power" forum a month or two ago

It's basically a supercapacitor. Capacitors save up charges and then release them when needed (and at a higher voltage than normal). For instance, you have them in your stereo, car, television, iPods, whatever. A super-capacitor would be able to charge over 5 minutes and hold that and release it over time.

There was a lot of discussion on the forum, the general agreement was that the science was there, but the materials were not. But all agreed that if they could really pull it off, it would change everything.

[zonmoy]

22. way I see it is that if it isn't a scam then the car, oil, and power

companies will squash it real quick to keep it from lowering their profits.

[EST]

23. The idea of a capacitor storage medium is the way to go, however,

let's do a little back of the envelope figuring, here.

Let's suppose it takes twenty five horsepower to move that car at fifty miles per hour, to ignore friction, a fairly close approximation of my 1958 Fiat 600D--a ghost from the ancient past which, incidentally, got 44 miles per gallon in 1964.

Lessee, now--at roughly 750 watts per hoss, that's about eighteen and a half thousand watts needed to keep it rolling.

Eighteen kilowatts over a trip of ten hours, again, keeping it simple, is one hundred eighty kilowatt hours. Tourist information.

I'm not sure what operating voltage the various electronics require but it really isn't very important, the amount of total power remains the same.

If you were to recharge one hundred eighty thousand watt hours with your common 220 volt residential supply in one hour, DC, of course, but same voltage, would require roughly eight hundred plus amps, (current times voltage equals watts)

To do that in ten minutes would require six times that or about five thousand amps.

Two hundred twenty volts at five thousand amps looks like a rather tall order to me.

I may be a little off in my math, here, and adding another twenty percent to the total would not be out of line, but it's a pretty good approximation fer gummit work.

[Tab]

24. Well, as I said

They aren't questioning the concept in general, just the concept of developing the materials and technology to the point of pulling it off. There are drawbacks, but apparently the concept is compelling enough and they've generally been privately funded.

You cna be damned sure they're looking at licensing rather than probably production. I don't have a '58 Fiat 600D (not unlike a Mini for those unfamiliar) but I do have a '78 MGB. However, you also have to take into account that it can have a much different engine. It won't need a huge engine to survive intense heating from fuel explosions, and perhaps not a lot of other things. You could have very lightweight cars, because in effect, it's an electric engine now. So the parameters aren't the same.

And although many may want to kill it, SOME COMPANY will take a crack at it. If it's a Toyota or something, and they go first, and it does what it says, everyone else will be scrambling, or will be screwed within 7 years. There are too many competitive companies and too much sharing of information. Someone will go for it if it works, and they will be head and shoulders ahead of the rest. The rest will be losers. I'm not sure this will be squashed.

[EST]

26. You are of course, pretty much spot on.

Incidentally, I also had an Austin 850 mini Countryman, one of the best little vehicles I ever owned. It was the Austin Mini, in its original form, before Cooper breathed on them, with the old 850 enging instead of the later one liter. It was a little panel truck with glass all around and van-type doors in the back. I once had a Continental A-65 airplane motor, propeller, tools gasoline, oil, and four men in that little van/panel truck and we drove the sixty mile trip to work on the plane with a couple coolers of soda and some food.Quite a car.
(My first real car was an Austin A-55 sedan, MGA 1500 cc engine, single carb.)

[Warren Stupidity]

20. About that plug:

[lfairban]

25. I'm not sure about this company, but . . .

. . . Ultracapacitors will have a major role in electric vehicles. I assume they will be used in conjunction with batteries, such as Li-ion on LiFePO4 batteries. They would make batteries unnecessary if they could obtain close to the same energy storage density.

Links that I have collected can be found here, (scroll down about a page):

http://home.columbus.rr.com/lfairban/Pages/Home%202000.html#Recreation_and_Sports

and here, (scroll here too):

http://home.columbus.rr.com/lfairban/Pages/Newly%20Discovered%20Links.html#Home

As for this company, I found this quote in the Top Post link:

" Perry is not alone in his doubts. An ultracapacitor industry leader, Maxwell Technologies Inc., has kept a wary eye on EEStor's claims and offers a laundry list of things that could go wrong.

Among other things, the ultracapacitors described in EEStor's patent operate at extremely high voltage, 10 times greater than those Maxwell manufactures, and won't work with regular wall outlets, said Maxwell spokesman Mike Sund. He said capacitors could crack while bouncing down the road, or slowly discharge after a dayslong stint in the airport parking lot, leaving the driver stranded."

Maxwell is probably the leading company developing Ultracapacitors.

Check out this page comparing plug-in hybrids. Notice the superior performance of the Li-ion/Ultracapacitor system in the far right column:

http://www.afstrinity.com/extr-comparison.html

[whistle]

27. Is this the device?

http://patents1.ic.gc.ca/details?patent_number=2434470#imageview


<snip>
Directory:EEStor
From PESWiki

<< A Top 100 Energy Technology >>New ceramic battery may replace gas engines by 2008.

Texas company is working on an "energy storage" device made from ceramics. It's not technically a battery because it doesn't use chemicals. It can allegedly charge within 5 minutes with enough energy to move a car 500 miles on about $9 worth of electricity -- about 45 cents a gallon.

According to the patent, the device is made of a ceramic powder coated with aluminum oxide and glass.

Company is very secretive, and has taken down its website.

"A ceramic power source for electric cars that could blow away the combustion engine."

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http://peswiki.com/index.php/Directory:EEStore