Comments on: Introducing an ultra low cost, long lasting battery made of water and blue dye http://gigaom.com/2012/12/04/introducing-an-ultra-low-cost-long-lasting-battery-made-of-water-and-blue-dye/ Thu, 23 May 2013 16:02:36 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.com/ By: fireofenergy http://gigaom.com/2012/12/04/introducing-an-ultra-low-cost-long-lasting-battery-made-of-water-and-blue-dye/#comment-1304422 Mon, 28 Jan 2013 06:32:39 +0000 http://gigaom.com/?p=590695#comment-1304422 I guess paying a few dollars in research (tax) money is worth it, if even the Chinese are the only ones who benefit.
Kinda pisses me off though, that the LiFePO4 is still sold as if it was made from gold in America.

]]> By: Battery Guy http://gigaom.com/2012/12/04/introducing-an-ultra-low-cost-long-lasting-battery-made-of-water-and-blue-dye/#comment-1289178 Sun, 30 Dec 2012 17:46:22 +0000 http://gigaom.com/?p=590695#comment-1289178 Mr. Franklin has it 70% correct. For grid powered energy, gravimetric energy density doesn’t matter…it’s all about volumetric energy density (Wh/L). Additionally lead acid batteries have very poor charging C rates, thus they don’t work well for grid power peak shaving.

Where Mr. Franklin is correct is the hyping of bad investments and the federal government sticking it’s nose (and money) where it shouldn’t be. The battery industry (namely Li-ion) is having severe lay-offs and cutbacks because they got so bloated with governement grant money. The government invested in a product that wasn’t mature enough or have a good enough customer base.

Retailers typically add 30-40% markup on lead acid batteries.

Prussian blue not toxic? HAHAHAHAHAHA. How naive! Yes, if you eat it you will be fine, but if you put it in a battery and it goes exothermic (=catches fire and/or vents), you will be getting a mouthful of cyanide.

]]> By: lweendo http://gigaom.com/2012/12/04/introducing-an-ultra-low-cost-long-lasting-battery-made-of-water-and-blue-dye/#comment-1251431 Thu, 13 Dec 2012 18:08:06 +0000 http://gigaom.com/?p=590695#comment-1251431 It’s a good idea and I think such research should be rewarded, I hate it when people conclude that it wouldn’t work, why don’t they come up with something to show then you can open your mouth? until then, shut up please!!

]]> By: Jim Hassinger http://gigaom.com/2012/12/04/introducing-an-ultra-low-cost-long-lasting-battery-made-of-water-and-blue-dye/#comment-1232129 Thu, 06 Dec 2012 10:56:53 +0000 http://gigaom.com/?p=590695#comment-1232129 Odd. This “Ben Franklin” differs from the actual one. Warning: Ben Franklin was a womanizer, and he had secret meetings with a junto. This lad seems to think that anything that the government offers money for research is corruption, or stupid or something… Well, that’s interesting, Ben. Tell us when you discover electricity, will you?

]]> By: Matt Ernst http://gigaom.com/2012/12/04/introducing-an-ultra-low-cost-long-lasting-battery-made-of-water-and-blue-dye/#comment-1231722 Thu, 06 Dec 2012 05:41:31 +0000 http://gigaom.com/?p=590695#comment-1231722 Exide Technologies has about 15% gross profit margin on lead acid batteries. Just how much markup do you think the retailers get?

Prussian Blue is a simple compound of iron, nitrogen, and carbon. It’s trivial to scale the manufacturing and the inputs are orders of magnitude more abundant than lead. It’s as nontoxic as dirt. Who cares about the lousy specific energy for stationary applications?

]]> By: Ben Franklin http://gigaom.com/2012/12/04/introducing-an-ultra-low-cost-long-lasting-battery-made-of-water-and-blue-dye/#comment-1231026 Wed, 05 Dec 2012 21:32:20 +0000 http://gigaom.com/?p=590695#comment-1231026 What a load of crap. Once again the sophmoric professors at the DOE fail to understand the difficulty in scaling stored energy. A couple of profs oxidize copper and they’re ready for $4M. Sounds like the $2.6B the DOE lost in the ARRA funds for the big LIB’s…oh but now they know.

And BTW 40 mAh/gm sucks. A couple of small pouch cells work in the lab and “Sure…we can make a few GWh…oh and sure it’ll cost $100/kWh”. How much Prussian Blue Dye is made in the world? What – not thinking about global supply chains again. Oh – is it recyclable. What – we’ll just put in Grandma’s basement next to theChevy Volt batteries. Idiots.

And by the way for you idiots in la-la land lead acid batteries cost much less than $100/kWh to make. They just sell them on the internet for more…it’s called margin, something that has alluded the other great investments by the DOE.

Reporters need to stop passing on the hype from the loons in the Federal Zoo. I’d recommend doing maybe a little bit of math and research before parroting the party line. Articles like this continue to destroy capital markets by hyping bad investments.

]]> By: Katie Fehrenbacher http://gigaom.com/2012/12/04/introducing-an-ultra-low-cost-long-lasting-battery-made-of-water-and-blue-dye/#comment-1228209 Tue, 04 Dec 2012 16:13:39 +0000 http://gigaom.com/?p=590695#comment-1228209 Awesome! Thanks @tjanderson.

]]> By: tjanderson http://gigaom.com/2012/12/04/introducing-an-ultra-low-cost-long-lasting-battery-made-of-water-and-blue-dye/#comment-1228191 Tue, 04 Dec 2012 16:08:25 +0000 http://gigaom.com/?p=590695#comment-1228191 I saw some of the original research on this, and it looks amazing. Great write up.

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