Carbon and Oxygen and Dirt Cheap Batteries

Dean Sigler Announcements, Batteries, Solar Power, Sustainable Aviation Leave a Comment

Carbon and oxygen comprise a big part of the universe, and are essential to life on earth. They may also be the answer for long-term energy storage in a promising battery development from Noon Energy.  “100 hours of storage at one-tenth the cost of lithium-ion batteries for long-duration storage.” It started on Mars According to Electrek, “Chris Graves, Noon Energy’s founder and CEO launched the company in 2018 After helping to develop NASA’s Mars Perseverance rover MOXIE device, which produces oxygen from the Martian carbon dioxide atmosphere.”  According to TechCrunch, “The device sucks in carbon dioxide and strips off an oxygen atom, which it stores on board. The remaining carbon monoxide is exhausted into the thin Martian atmosphere. MOXIE, by the way, is an acronym for “Mars Oxygen ISRU Experiment. ISRU is another acronym, In Situ Resource Utilization,” or on-site use of available resources.  MOXIE was also the name of an early carbonated soft drink or  energy beverage. On Mars, MOXIE …

Using Ford F-150 Lightnings to Charge a Pipistrel Alpha Electro

Dean Sigler Announcements, Batteries, Electric Powerplants, Solar Power, Sustainable Aviation Leave a Comment

Using Ford F-150 Lightning pickups to charge a Pipistrel Alpha Electro will enable spectators at the Lafayette College-Lehigh football game to see an electric airplane flyover.  Remy Oktay wants to perform at his school’s football game, and needs to fly the craft from Hartford, Connecticut to the game in Easton, Pennsylvania. Bringing Your Own Charging Stations Recent attempts to fly reasonably long distances with electric airplanes have shown a few limitations.  Aside from the self-recharging craft like Solar Impulse or the Raymonds’ Solar-Flight Duo, planes with rechargeable batteries cannot go far without needing a compatible charger. We reported on several of these distance flight, noting the accommodations each made to fly beyond their home fields. Gabriel DeVault made a California outing into a search for viable charging station.  Friend Bob Mackey flew a Maule along the route, carrying a charger to keep Gabriel’s eGull going. A Swiss team flew to the North Sea, with chase cars lugging their charging gear …

Fisker’s Plans for Cars and Patents for Solid-State Batteries

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Is there a Fisker battery in the future of electric vehicles?  The latest proclamations from Henrik Fisker indicate he is ready to launch a lovely four-seat car for CES 2018, and that it will have LG Chem batteries capable of powering the vehicle for 400 miles.  Charging the batteries for nine minutes will add 125 miles range.  That’s definitely competitive, but Fisker promises more for a future EMotion supercar. Fisker claims that machine will have newly-patented solid-state batteries that charge in a minute, have 2.5 times the energy density of currently available lithium batteries, and will be far cheaper to manufacture than today’s cells.  That’s in 2023, five years out. Five Years Out “Five years out” has been the refrain for hydrogen-powered cars for perhaps five decades, and is a useful predictive metric for innovators seeking investors, who will wait patiently (theoretically) for a return on investment.  Your editor rushed to see a prototype Fisker on display about a decade ago.  …