this post was submitted on 04 Aug 2023
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Plan to commercialize supercapacitors in the next few years

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[–] eager_eagle@lemmy.world 35 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (6 children)

A solution that is inexpensive, scales, is not inconvenient, and fits household demands? What's the catch?

I hope it's as good as it sounds and becomes a thing.

[–] Rakust@kbin.social 16 points 1 year ago (2 children)

One of the big catches is how Greenhouse gas intensive concrete production is

[–] Spedwell@lemmy.world 4 points 1 year ago

I think the idea here is to bake it into construction that would happen anyway. If you just need energy storage, keep using batteries. But if you're pouring a foundation already, why not also turn that foundation into a battery?

[–] eager_eagle@lemmy.world 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

concrete seems to be used here for its structural properties, just like we do it today. Their solution doesn't seem to require it:

If more powerful capacitors are required, they can be made with a larger concentration of carbon black, at the expense of some structural strength. This could be useful for applications where the concrete is not playing a structural role or where the full strength potential of concrete is not required. For applications such as a foundation, or structural elements of the base of a wind turbine, the “sweet spot” is around 10 percent carbon black in the mix, the team says.

[–] zout@kbin.social 2 points 1 year ago (2 children)

And how greenhouse gas intensive is carbon black production?

[–] deegeese@sopuli.xyz 7 points 1 year ago

If you’re releasing CO2 you’re losing carbon.

If you make it with electricity it’s effectively a carbon sink.

[–] eager_eagle@lemmy.world 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

If it's just a byproduct of other industries, like existing coal power plants, it might be seen as carbon neutral. And lithium batteries also use it.

[–] zout@kbin.social 1 points 1 year ago

Carbon black is produced bij burning a hydrocarbon with a limited amount of air. It's not a byproduct, but uses organic materials. This can be of renewable sources like vegetable oil, but it is made a lot from the heavy fractions in fossil oil.

[–] iltoroargento@lemmy.sdf.org 12 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

I mean, there's a reason why we've taken so long with even electric cars lol I hope this becomes a reality, but moneyed interests will fight tooth and nail.

Edit: Also, they sold the idea of electric cars to us so we wouldn't question a lack of infrastructure investment in railways which we so desperately need.

[–] kautau@lemmy.world 3 points 1 year ago

Yeah they’ll scoop up the technology patents and then slowly utilize it if and when it works in their favor to maximize their profits

[–] bernieecclestoned@sh.itjust.works 6 points 1 year ago (5 children)

The team worked out that a 45 cubic meter material block of nanocarbon-black-doped concrete would have enough capacity to store about 10kWh

10kWh is enough to run a house for a day, how much concrete would be in a house with concrete walls?

[–] TropicalDingdong@lemmy.world 8 points 1 year ago

I mean, its not clear you want to build a house out of concrete walls that aren't entirely, well, concrete. Even so, its a neat idea, but coming out of the MIT press mill, I'll not be holding my breath for it to become real. MIT is basically a meme at this point with regards to press releases that don't manifest into reality.

[–] mlc894@lemm.ee 4 points 1 year ago

I wonder if the foundation of the house would be convenient for this… that much concrete is equivalent to a cube of side length around 10 feet, which seems to at least be in the ballpark for the total amount of concrete in a foundation. I think?

[–] WiseThat@lemmy.ca 4 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

For a basement with a 5-inch slab and exterior walls are 8 inches, 8ft high and also concrete... Then 45 cubic meters is about what you'd need.

Of course, your basement walls are about as electrically grounded as it gets, so I doubt you'd be able to store power in them. One leak and you're discharging all that power into the groundwater.

So, feasible amount. Just needs isolating and could replace expensive batteries for solar?

[–] eager_eagle@lemmy.world 4 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

naturally it depends on the walls and house layout, but just to have an idea: assuming a concrete thickness of 20cm and 4 external walls of 20m x 3m each:

0.2 * 4 * 20 * 3 = 48m^3

probably in the 100-200m^3 ballpark if we count internal walls, which are thinner, but cover more total length.

And I know walls are usually not pure concrete, but functions like energy storage could very well change how we build them.

[–] WetBeardHairs@lemmy.world 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

10kWh is enough to run one 110VAC outlet at full capacity for about 10 hours. I don't know where that 10kWh figure comes from but most American houses use between 15-30kWh per day.

So that 10 foot cube would need to be closer to 15ft cubed. It's huge. Perhaps the foundation of the structure would work, as someone else mentioned.

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[–] zout@kbin.social 6 points 1 year ago (2 children)

One catch is that carbon black is mostly made from fossil oil.

[–] eager_eagle@lemmy.world 8 points 1 year ago

It's more nuanced than that. The question is whether we're just using carbon black that's already an excess byproduct of other industries, or we'd be actively producing it to make these wall batteries.

[–] ericlewisauthor@lemmy.world 2 points 1 year ago

The catch is, if it works some oil company is gonna buy it out and kill it.

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[–] VulcanSphere@kbin.social 21 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Blocks of cement infused with a form of carbon similar to soot could store enough energy to power whole households. A single 3.5-meter block could hold 10kWh of energy, and power a house for a day, and the technology could be commercialized in a matter of years, the scientists say.

[–] TropicalDingdong@lemmy.world 27 points 1 year ago (1 children)

This kind of shit comes out of MIT daily and never manifests into reality. They've got a great PR team.

[–] elbarto777@lemmy.world 7 points 1 year ago (1 children)
[–] TropicalDingdong@lemmy.world 13 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Just try this as an exercise. Keep a journal of how many world changing batteries are presented by the MIT PR department from today, through one year. Three years later, open the journal and see how many have found any meaningful application in the real world.

You gave a link to the MIT PR department. Like, yeah, that's my point. They are phenomenal at tooting their own horn. But the conversion rate to there actually being a there there is extremely low.

[–] elbarto777@lemmy.world 5 points 1 year ago

Oh I see! Fair enough.

[–] sin_free_for_00_days@sopuli.xyz 10 points 1 year ago

Hope this works out. It would be amazing to see new construction using this in foundations. Built in energy storage.

[–] amanaftermidnight@lemmy.world 9 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

It's concrete, not cement. Cement is a component, not the end product.

If you leave a bag of portland cement outside and let the rain cures it then that's a cement block.

And the article mentions both but in contradicting contexts. Is "cement blocks" actually "concrete blocks"? Then later it mentions cement being incorporated into the resulting concrete, so what was the previously mentioned "cement blocks"? Nothing made of cement in the shape of blocks are ever incorporated into concrete. Cement powder is.


Anyway, cool concept. In the mean time, the world also needs to figure out how to make concrete more green, because manufacturing cement releases a lot of greenhouse gases.

[–] pixxelkick@lemmy.world 9 points 1 year ago (2 children)

We have already solved this problem, and concrete blocks is not the way to do it.

Water can do the exact same thing, but it flows through pipes and can be moved by pumps, it doesnt "break", it doesnt require complex moving mechanisms, and it can actually 100% fill a given volume (blocks cannot)

We already do this, right now.

This is the whole "they are trying to re-invent trains again" thing.

[–] ryven@lemmy.dbzer0.com 4 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Did you read the article? This isn't gravity storage, they're making big capacitors by taking advantage of the way carbon black spreads into closely-spaced pockets when added to cement. It would be part of an electrical circuit.

I'm not saying it's a good idea; I'm not an electrical engineer, so I can't really assess the benefits and risks. But I don't think it's the thing you're complaining about.

[–] Corkyskog@sh.itjust.works 3 points 1 year ago

Isn't it good to have other methods. There will be places where water is impractical.

[–] fhqwgads@possumpat.io 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Direct link to paper: https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2304318120

Not my field but takeaways from a quick glace are that they note that the more energy dense they make it the worse it is at being concrete, and that their 10kwh number needs 45m³ of concrete. That would be 15x15x0.2m or like 55ftx55ftx8in which isn't crazy but it's a pretty decent amount.

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[–] dan1101@lemmy.world 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I thought this was going to be the thing where they use cheap power to raise big weights and then generate power from gravity lowering them.

[–] QuinceDaPence@kbin.social 3 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

In general those are a bad idea. A lot of complexity for not much power storage.

Presurized caverns or pumped storage are much better version of that idea.

[–] blanketswithsmallpox@kbin.social 3 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)
[–] TropicalDingdong@lemmy.world 3 points 1 year ago

I adore his mid-western pragmatism.

[–] DarkGamer@kbin.social 3 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

The team worked out that a 45 cubic meter material block of nanocarbon-black-doped concrete would have enough capacity to store about 10kWh of energy, which is reckoned to be the average daily electricity usage for a household, so remote off-grid houses with batteries in the foundations could operate using windmills or solar panels.

That's ~1600ft^3 for those of us unfortunate enough to have an innate sense of freedom units and not logical units; a lot of concrete!

I'm very curious about the longevity and durability of these bricks, and safety considerations. Such a house could potentially, (pun intended,) instantly discharge a lot of electricity into someone who comes in to contact with its foundation. Don't use that masonry drill, it might kill you!

[–] TropicalDingdong@lemmy.world 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Or alternatively, can it even discharge fast enough to provide a meaningful enough amount of electricity?

What does the charge/ discharge cycle do to the integrity of the concrete?

What special conditions are necessary for is curing? Whats the yield? Because the consequences of having a 45 cubic meter block of concrete that was supposed to be a battery sitting in my yard but isn't are not trivial.

Whats the carbon footprint of adding 45 additional cubic meters of concrete to every structure? It takes a shit ton of energy to rip off the necessary electrons from lime stone to make lime.

[–] QuinceDaPence@kbin.social 1 points 1 year ago

They're saying it coule be part of the foundation.

Basically for the average American house I think that would just be a slightly thicker foundation (if it could work like that)

[–] monkic@kbin.social 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

This is really exciting if it works out and gets commercialised widely! One thing I’m not sure I understand is whether this requires entirely new cement, or if somehow the carbon black and capacitors can be mixed into existing cement structures (especially roads)? As mentioned in the article, cement is a high emission product and we already have so much of it in the world.

[–] Voyajer@kbin.social 2 points 1 year ago

It would require adding carbon black in the correct proportions during initial mixing, so new concrete only. The structure that functions like a supercap is formed during curing.

[–] ryannathans@lemmy.fmhy.net 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (5 children)

The team worked out that a 45 cubic meter material block of nanocarbon-black-doped concrete would have enough capacity to store about 10kWh of energy

Try to visualise 45 cubic meters for the energy storage for 1 person for 1 day without any heating/cooling

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[–] Ertebolle@kbin.social 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

A single 3.5-meter block could hold 10kWh of energy, and power a house for a day

That's... not a lot of energy; can use it up doing like 2 loads of laundry if you have an electric dryer, or running a central A/C for a few hours. (let alone charging an EV, where you can burn through it in a bit over an hour to add maybe 15% or so)

[–] TropicalDingdong@lemmy.world 1 points 1 year ago (2 children)

I'd put my estimates on the size battery you need for a residential structure at around 50kwh.

[–] QuinceDaPence@kbin.social 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

I've only done solar + battery setups on RVs and found 8kWh to be the probably the minimum if you have to run the AC at 100% duty cycle. Realistically at night that probably won't happen but I haven't had a chance to test the current one where I'll actually he doing that with a kill-a-watt to get a real world number.

[–] Ertebolle@kbin.social 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Tesla Powerwall is 13.5, but that's mostly intended to store excess solar energy, not as a full backup power source.

[–] TropicalDingdong@lemmy.world 1 points 1 year ago

I have two power walls. I wish I had 4-8.

4 would keep me powered most every day and night, with just my panels (8kwh max supply). If I had in the range of 8 power walls, I could completely disconnect from grid supply and I would effectively never run have to concern myself in everything but the most extreme of weather circumstances. My local supplier has basically garbage policies around me giving back to the grid, and I have to pay a ridiculous connection fee.

I've got a friend who has convinced me to let him take apart my gen 1 leaf for the battery, which should give me an additional 24 ish kwh storage. I produce plenty of electricity during the day. I just need places to put it.

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