1MWh (1000KWh) battery packs for large EVs

[TheBeastie]

This new electric bus from Proterra in California has a 660 kWh battery pack in it..
BYD electric bus has a 547.5 kWh battery pack.
Tesla has managed to double its battery packs from around 50KWh to 100KWh in less than 5 years..
The new roaster is expected to have a 200KWh.
The Tesla electric semi-truck is believed to be over 1MWh battery.

It's only be a matter of time before we see the 1,000KWh / 1MWh battery pack in large EVs to completely crush range anxiety.

Now we are starting to see a steady line up of large EVs that have 500KWh+ battery packs inside so I have to ask where are we going to get the power to run it all? Can our grids handle it?
To me it seems pretty easy to see how much power we are going to start using when you see the 1MWh milestone.

Also in the future, if everyone's electric then I can only assume it will the USA/Aus/western world standard 2 cars in the garage with 100kWh battery packs then it only takes 5 households on the street to also have 1MWh of power that could potentially need charging at the same time.

http://www.businessinsider.com.au/proterra-unveils-electric-bus-with-350-mile-range-2016-9
https://www.wired.com/2016/09/new-electric-bus-can-drive-350-miles-one-charge/
http://www.byd.com/na/old/auto/60feet.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proterra,_Inc.

Then we got the Electric trucks coming from Mercedes Benz etc.
https://www.daimler.com/products/trucks/mercedes-benz/urban-etruck.html

Analysing Bills speeches via youtube on the future power needs he has obviously been thinking a lot about it.. In fact, he's been funding/designing/building his own nuclear power technology, a test plant is being built in China..
He's doing it as part of his life's goal to just help the world the best way he can as he states in this video. As he's giving away almost all of his fortune of 40 billion dollars in philanthropy work.
http://terrapower.com/
https://youtu.be/IsRlN1oDm60
https://youtu.be/JaF-fq2Zn7I
https://www.ted.com/talks/bill_gates?language=en
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-S6tQpeXpVE
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_%26_Melinda_Gates_Foundation

It's important and possible to miss when watching the videos that this is pretty different from the old 60's era nuclear reactor, as the Bill Gates nuclear reactor can use nuclear waste as fuel and only needs to be refueled every 60 years.
This is the main one to watch if your only going to watch one.
[youtube]JaF-fq2Zn7I[/youtube]

Watching these videos he actually seems pretty frustrated at times as he can't believe what he calls "wasted money" on wind farms and solar, he calls them "cute stuff" as if it's useless in reality.
If you watch some of these videos its got a fair few attacks like this.. https://youtu.be/IsRlN1oDm60?t=34m44s

I agree with him, my biggest fear is that so much money will be spent on the "cute stuff" that by the time EVs hit the mass market it will be too expensive to charge your car and the whole movement will be killed off or at least severely slowed for no good reason.

If that happens we will be stuck on co2 emitting combustion vehicles for longer and undermining the whole clean energy movement in the first place. Sometimes I wonder those who fight the hardest to shutdown coal powerstations are in fact those working for the Oil companies as it will be more profitable for the oil companies if everyone to be addicted to their flavor of fossil fuel for longer, as folks will resort to charging their electric car via combustion motors if it's still cheaper.
We will be stuck on hybrids for decades.
The reason I see it this way as locally I see a constant stream of stories like this as coal powerstations get shut down.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-03-09/soaring-energy-prices-stretch-rural-businesses-to/8341306
http://www.abc.net.au/7.30/content/2017/s4617366.htm
Government energy policies strangle brothers' export business

Other article on the Bill Gates nuclear reactor.
http://www.businessinsider.com/bill-gates-talks-private-nuclear-fission-plant-terrapower-2016-4/?r=AU&IR=T

*ADD*.
I thought I would add this here to help make it easy to understand how dangerous nuclear really is. It's easily absorbable, just as absorbable than the misleading lies spread over the decades about nuclear in general, this makes it useful.
It's a scene (from many great scenes) from the documentary titled "Uranium – Twisting the Dragon's Tail" https://g.co/kgs/7oFhUP

https://youtu.be/3ItOIz5gJiQ
[youtube]3ItOIz5gJiQ[/youtube]

What do you think?

*ADD/EDIT*
I created an updated single large all-encompassing post on green energy environmental damage, CO2, and where energy consumption is really going with nuclear etc here
https://endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=89002&start=2300#p1405704

 

[kiwiev]

I think battery storage and energy storage is going to go hand in hand, one of the best methods would be on demand hydro with wind and solar powered pumps recycling the water to the top of the Hydro scheme.
They can turn of and on in 30 seconds.
I think range anxiety is a symptom of our generation growing up with a gas station on every corner, if it was a fast charge station on every corner no one would worry.
Cheers Kiwi

 

[izeman]

the question is: HOW ARE YOU GONNA CHARGE THAT THING???
1MWh. that's a lot of energy. that's the energy my 5 person household uses in 2 MONTH. and all this energy has to go into the bus in an over-night charge?

 

[kiwiev]

the question is: HOW ARE YOU GONNA CHARGE THAT THING???
1MWh. that's a lot of energy. that's the energy my 5 person household uses in 2 MONTH. and all this energy has to go into the bus in an over-night charge?

Yes its going to be interesting most electric networks struggle at 6 pm when everyone is cooking their dinner never mine trying to charge their cars.

Maybe a Tesla power wall on steroids

Cheers Kiwi

 

[Ratking]

I think the largest problem is what to do with all the power when there is no demand for it? If you scale up the grid and production to handle large EV's charging, what do you do when there is less demand? Most efficient power production methods cannot shut down and turn on fast. The process is slow, but the power could be sold to other countries.

 

[izeman]

The solution is to use those big car's batteries as buffer, so they can flatten out the grid's peaks.


Gesendet von iPhone mit Tapatalk Pro

 

[TheBeastie]

I think battery storage and energy storage is going to go hand in hand, one of the best methods would be on demand hydro with wind and solar powered pumps recycling the water to the top of the Hydro scheme.
They can turn of and on in 30 seconds.
I think range anxiety is a symptom of our generation growing up with a gas station on every corner, if it was a fast charge station on every corner no one would worry.
Cheers Kiwi

Looking at diesel buses it looks like it's pretty common for buses to go over 1,000km in range, I think this is important because people don't like to have to wait..
http://www.volvobuses.com/bus/india/en-in/buses/Volvo9400_multi-axle/Pages/components.aspx

Problem with hydro is that cities just can't build a dam anywhere they want.. places that have hydro are just geologically lucky and just about anywhere it could be done has already been done.

 

[izeman]

600l diesel give you a much higher range than 1000km. It's at least twice as much.


Gesendet von iPhone mit Tapatalk Pro

 

[Punx0r]

If vehicles start having huge batteries because they become cheap, then batteries for grid storage will also be cheap...

Also, if we believe the quote that it takes as much electricity to produce a gallon of petrol as will power an EV 30 miles, and figure an average of 30mpg for an ICE vehicle, then unless I'm mistaken, the world already produces enough electricity for all road transport. It would just be used to power EVs rather than producing ICE fuel...

 

[liveforphysics]

I used to do data center infrastructure design that would draw 16MW 24-7, and this was just hosting email.

Larger data centers do >50MW power draw 24-7.

It's not even a big deal to get a 50MW power drop, or a big deal to provide it. It feels like an impossible challenge if you're used to working in the residential power space, but compared to industrial power processes having 10MW power drops is trivial with some basic off the shelf equipment.

 

[Ratking]

I used to do data center infrastructure design that would draw 16MW 24-7, and this was just hosting email.

Larger data centers do >50MW power draw 24-7.

It's not even a big deal to get a 50MW power drop, or a big deal to provide it. It feels like an impossible challenge if you're used to working in the residential power space, but compared to industrial power processes having 10MW power drops is trivial with some basic off the shelf equipment.

But we are talking large scale, where maybe half a city is charging vehicles, and since people have habits you can bet that they will charge at the same time. That means GW of surge power draw

 

[izeman]

I used to do data center infrastructure design that would draw 16MW 24-7, and this was just hosting email.

Larger data centers do >50MW power draw 24-7.

It's not even a big deal to get a 50MW power drop, or a big deal to provide it. It feels like an impossible challenge if you're used to working in the residential power space, but compared to industrial power processes having 10MW power drops is trivial with some basic off the shelf equipment.

But we are talking large scale, where maybe half a city is charging vehicles, and since people have habits you can bet that they will charge at the same time. That means GW of surge power draw

correct. and those ppl do it all at the same time. or will have to to get enough power into their cars if charging takes the whole night.
ppl go to work, use power while going there, most of them won't be able to charge at their working location, so go home, charge there at 6pm and that's when you get HUGE load shifts.
powering DC is a totally different story.
and i don't need to say that it can't be solved, it's just a challenge. that's why i mentioned car's batteries as energy buffer. they may be charged during daytime using the solar panels on your roof and then can help cover peaks in the evening when dinner cooking starts. it will not be 100% charged in the morning, but that probably is not needed as noone drives those cars to 0% charge, and it may be top charged if there is a little time slot during night hours when the grid is not overloaded. SMART grid has the answers.

 

[Punx0r]

Exactly. You go to work, plug in your car. Same when you get home. It doesn't have to charge immediately, at the same time as everyone else's, it just needs to charge sometime over the next few hours (expect maybe you're in a hurry and then pay extra for a priority charge). If chargers are internet-connected the power company could very easily schedule them to match available capacity.

 

[kiwiev]

Exactly. You go to work, plug in your car. Same when you get home. It doesn't have to charge immediately, at the same time as everyone else's, it just needs to charge sometime over the next few hours (expect maybe you're in a hurry and then pay extra for a priority charge). If chargers are internet-connected the power company could very easily schedule them to match available capacity.

And wouldnt it be cool if you could get a phone app that charged your account for power from any supply at work where ever there was an outlet.
Down here in Oz I hooked up a mates charger to night rate power 75% cheaper comes on at 10 pm and turns off at 6 Am

Cheers Kiwi

 

[Punx0r]

We have a similar scheme in the UK: Economy7 (11pm-6am). A signal is broadcast using audio radio network which the electricity meters use to switch to the cheaper rate. Homes with electric heating often use this to automatically charge storage heaters full of thermal bricks at night then release it gradually over the following day. A system not without its flaws but demonstrates a simple load scheduling system that's been working for ~30 years.

 

[TheBeastie]

Interesting article here on how clean EVs actually are based on their source of energy, no good driving a coal powered electric car..
France is the winner.
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-09-20/how-much-cleaner-really-is-a-tesla-depends-on-where-you-are

 

[Hillhater]

Interesting article here on how clean EVs actually are based on their source of energy, no good driving a coal powered electric car..
France is the winner.
]

Hmm? ..and who has the most Nuclear ?
I guess it depends on your view of what is "clean"

 

[izeman]

Yep. France is almost 100% nuclear energy. CO2 wise they clearly lead. It may have some other draw backs though


Gesendet von iPhone mit Tapatalk Pro

 

[Wheazel]

I worked as process engineer in the pulp industry 10 years ago. Especially towards thermomechanical pulping.
Mechanical pulping mills can draw big power. In my area here in sweden there is a tmp paper mill drawing a steady 250-275MW 24/7.
And also an aluminum production plant pulling almost as much. And this is in a ~100k people area.

 

[liveforphysics]

I worked as process engineer in the pulp industry 10 years ago. Especially towards thermomechanical pulping.
Mechanical pulping mills can draw big power. In my area here in sweden there is a tmp paper mill drawing a steady 250-275MW 24/7.
And also an aluminum production plant pulling almost as much. And this is in a ~100k people area.

250MW is a nice sized power drop, I've personally never worked on one that big.

As solar panels and home energy storage batteries continue to lower in cost and improve in function, the whole model of a central-power-delivery system will be concluded. Modern factories will be built in locations that work to have them powered by sun/wind/geo-thermal or whatever works best for that region.

All non-sustainable practices conclude, then it becomes the humans choice to become extinct as a species or switch to sustainable practices.

 

[Ianhill]

I think Britain has made up it's mind and extinct as a species is a big possibility with the nuclear paths the government past and future has chosen, clean nuclear energy is possible but its not in their interest if there's no plutonium output.
If the best thing to do with nuclear waste is to dig a big hole or throw it in ocean in sealed barrels then I say it's more of a disaster than coal.
As for the 1Mw battery i think weight will still be an issue for a long time i think the best solution for electric cars are quick change packs like a mobile phone with stations that service u quickly just like a petrol station but drive on to a ramp that automatically removes and replaces with a charged and load tested pack you carry on with journey and then the station charges the pack fast as possible with out damage, quick load test and ready for the next customer.

 

[TheBeastie]

I worked as process engineer in the pulp industry 10 years ago. Especially towards thermomechanical pulping.
Mechanical pulping mills can draw big power. In my area here in sweden there is a tmp paper mill drawing a steady 250-275MW 24/7.
And also an aluminum production plant pulling almost as much. And this is in a ~100k people area.

250MW is a nice sized power drop, I've personally never worked on one that big.

As solar panels and home energy storage batteries continue to lower in cost and improve in function, the whole model of a central-power-delivery system will be concluded. Modern factories will be built in locations that work to have them powered by sun/wind/geo-thermal or whatever works best for that region.

All non-sustainable practices conclude, then it becomes the humans choice to become extinct as a species or switch to sustainable practices.

Well if we take that 250MW figure and use a modern solar farm real world example like the Topaz Solar farm.. it would take exactly 50km2 sized solar farm to produce that power during the day..

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Topaz_Solar_Farm
Quote from Wikipedia "Site area 9.5 sq mi (25 km2)
Average generation 1,100 GWh(125 MW avg. power)"

*Edit*
I have decided to replace all the solar farm from the Topaz Solar farm to the Desert Sunlight Solar as its performance numbers for its size are considerably better. The solar farm is 16km2 and built into a single compressed tight spot, I think this new farm is as good as it gets.
Numbers for 2016 were excellent, this year appears to have been considerably sunnier then previous years. 1,346,282MWh / 8760_hours_in_year = 153MW average power out (for if it had storage etc)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Desert_Sunlight_Solar_Farm#Statistics

You said it's a 24-hour 250MW operation so we would need a battery pack to keep it going through the night time and also based on the Desert-Sunlight farm data the amount of energy received as much as halves during the winter time even in the desert.

I think x2 the solar farm to 32km2 would be about right, on average the solar farm would create 306MW, but during a winter month its more like 204MW as 77,949MWh / 744_hours_in_December2016 = 104MW average output. Thus x2 would be 208MW
The big differences between summer and winter even in the desert makes it complicated.

A Tesla Model S battery pack is pretty compact so let us take that as our expected size module..
It's 284cm long by 177cm wide for the 85 kWh battery pack. Which is 5.027m2 square meters.

To run the plant off this solar farm 24/7 we need a large battery pack..
250MW x 24 hours = 6000MWh, Then x 14 it to 84,000MWh to make it through a solid 14 days of winter due to the expected half the amount of total energy outputted as listed on the Desert-Sunlight winter months. Realistically it probably may require having an even bigger battery to make it all through winter but that was the idea of increasing the solar farm size from 16km2 to 32km2 to get the extra amount of power for 24/7 operation during winter.

You may consider 84,000MWh battery pack oversized but during the winter months the average MW output can more than half in solar farms.
The Desert-Sunlight farm created only 77,949MWh in Decemember 2016. 77,949MWh / 744_hours_in_December2016 = 104MW average output. Thus x2 32km2 size would be 208MW average output.

So we would need an extra 42MW output from the battery pack to cover the shortfall for the month for our 250MW needing mill.
42MW x 744 hours = 31,248MWh sized battery pack to get ourselves through the whole less sunny December of 2016.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Topaz_Solar_Farm#Statistics
You could argue then we only need a 32,000MWh then, but January is typically the same as December so you still need to double it to 64,000MWh. But then there is over discharge capacity. Everyone who's familiar with ebikes knows if you overdraw amps on a battery pack too small you kill its total cycle lifespan considerably.
View attachment 1
And this is the thing that continues to surprise me with doing these calculations, as the extra dimensions of variability are too much for the average human mind and what looks possible starts to look more and more impossible or at least quite unviable. But headline numbers are great if you want to deliberately want to deceive people.

How many Tesla Model S battery packs is that? 84000MWh / 0.085MWh = 988,235 Model S Tesla battery packs.
So 988,235 x 5.027m2 = 4,967,857 meters squared battery pack that you would hopefully only have to replace every 10 years but Teslas aren't used 24/7 or used to pull their full 85kwh potential overnight. But the x 14 size to make it through winter could compensate for over cycling and make it last 10 years.
You could divide 4,967,857 by 10 to give a size where you would probably stack 10 Tesla modules on top of each other to fit in your standard warehouse building, so 496,785 square meters.
According to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tesla_Motors#Batteries Tesla sell the packs at US $400/KWh
Tesla charges US$400/kWh for the 85-kWh battery
Tesla 400 x 85kwh = $34,000
For a 1MWh battery pack, $400 x 1000 = $400,000 per 1 MWh

So we take $400,000 per 1MWh x 84,000MWh needed battery pack for $33,600,000,000
Bill Gates said in his speech if you got solar panels for free the cost of installing them ruins their viability against nuclear, maybe in his next speech he could also take a dig at batteries?

I am just doing the maths out loud here.. might of made a mistake.. Seems like a lot of work to do in solar panel size and batteries to waste just to stay on "renewables" to keep a pulp mill going or something else of industrial nature. Apparently, even industrial bakeries need huge power.
Link to a typical 1680MW coal power station as a reference.. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gladstone_Power_Station


I was looking at this video/article today where the power grid almost did blow out between two major cities because Adelaide's wind farms were off due to no wind and the sudden need for all its power to come via the interstate grid nearly blew it out of action..
Research on the event by the Grattan Institute has argued that without a single nationwide climate plan, household power bills will rise unnecessarily and Australia will not hit its carbon cutting targets. "So we end up not achieving our emissions targets or, if we do, we do it at even higher costs than is necessary and in the meantime there could even be a risk of blackouts," report author Tony Wood said.
The report also cautioned the rise of intermittent wind generation poses risks in managing the stability and reliability of the power grid.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-09-25/sa's-power-price-spike-sounds-national-electricity-alarm/7875970
https://youtu.be/ymPJhCuB9NI

https://youtu.be/a-OSNLqQ0qU

*Add* not more than a few days after making this post South Australia goes completely in the dark due to the grid interstate connection between Victoria and SA blew so they lost all base load power as Victoria would have supplied them with coal fire powerstation base load.. And SA apparently can't utilize their 40% wind power because the wind is blowing too strongly. Always seems like renewable power looks all happy until the coal/gas/nuclear power station in the other state/country loses its connection.
Its almost like God wanted to help prove my argument on this thread/post..
http://www.theage.com.au/national/state-in-the-dark-south-australias-major-power-outage-20160928-grqmn2.html
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/nation/sa-blackout-heads-will-roll-nick-xenophon-says/news-story/1a67198f0c3c7901f288301723440e6b
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-09-28/south-australia-suffers-state-wide-power-failure-as-storm-hits
http://www.businessinsider.com.au/south-australia-has-lost-all-power-after-a-huge-storm-and-the-state-has-ground-to-a-halt-2016-9

 

[Ianhill]

Myself I don't see why lithium cells are used outside of electric transportation the low weight and high density is offset massively with cost compared trojan high capacity deep cycle cells, If its stationary weight and space is not really an issue so I'm genuinely astounded that the power walls have done so well being lithium based, A higher capacity cheaper alternative could easily be made/sourced for cheaper but the Tesla brand is just like apple at the moment people are fitting them to keep up with the Jones's I got more panels on my roof than you have and a pd100 on my drive.
Solar farms and wind turbines etc are useless to the grid without some sort of storage it needs water pumped up hill/battery storage etc so it can store or use what's been generated as most the time wind turbines sit idle not because theres no wind to generate but there's no demand or means of stories g the energy so there's massive waste and possibility but UK thinks its best to build more nuclear facility's and all be it in tourist areas again just like Infamous selafield most dangourous place in Europe.

 

[Hillhater]

.....According to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tesla_Motors#Batteries Tesla sell the packs at US $400/KWh
Tesla charges US$400/kWh for the 85-kWh battery
Tesla 400 x 85kwh = $34,000
For a 1MWh battery pack, $400 x 1000 = $400,000 per 1 MWh

I realise this is all "guesstimations" ,.....but Tesla do produce commercial power storage modules designed for this type of application.....and they have a calculator to help estimate the costs..
https://www.tesla.com/powerpack/design#/
Going by that, 1MW would cost $2.5m, !

 

[TheBeastie]

.....According to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tesla_Motors#Batteries Tesla sell the packs at US $400/KWh
Tesla charges US$400/kWh for the 85-kWh battery
Tesla 400 x 85kwh = $34,000
For a 1MWh battery pack, $400 x 1000 = $400,000 per 1 MWh

I realise this is all "guesstimations" ,.....but Tesla do produce commercial power storage modules designed for this type of application.....and they have a calculator to help estimate the costs..
https://www.tesla.com/powerpack/design#/

Wow nice find..
I don't know what settings you were using on the calculator but I was able to push it down to $534,520 per 1MWh ($2,672,600
/ 5MWh).. by choosing the biggest possible battery that still listed a price.. putting aside the technicals of it all.
So its 84,000MWh x $534,520 = $44,899,680,000 (44.8 billion dollars)

We can also use their space estimation data as well.. Says here its 87m2 for 5MWh(5,000KWh) so its 17.4 per 1 MWh..
So its 17.4 x 84000 = 1,461,600m2 (1.4616 km2) sized battery pack for our truly renewable pulp mill.. If we are going to be throwing out this sized battery pack after 10 years or so has anyone done research on how much energy including mining all the raw materials is including the steel casing of the 18650 cell to see how much is being thrown away or recycled after the 10 year lifetime?


To be honest I kind of expect someone to build a battery pack this large for such a project (more likely a city than a pulp mill) simply because of the renewable projects that have already been built.. It doesn't matter how crazy it might actually look when done and examined in more detail as folks vote in politicians who do what the people want and renewable power is what they want.. Most people see those facebook renewable memes and decide they know everything needed to know about electricity needs and vote in leaders who will implement those plans as it was their pre-election promise.. Holding up election promises is always one of the biggest things any democratic leaders do.

The fear of climate change is powerful and the majority of people are too simple/ill-informed to even contemplate nuclear. I been looking at nuclear on and off casually for years and I never knew that Bill Gates was into nuclear until recently when it popped up to me on youtube.
And he has come up with a very complete and sane technology choice as these next gen nuclear reactor designs promise to burn and remove existing nuclear waste and at the same time be cheaper than coal. Renewable energy doesn't remove any existing nuclear waste from the earth it just creates more radioactive sludge via rare earth mining used to create solar panels etc.
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2012/aug/07/china-rare-earth-village-pollution

I have realized you can't leave it up to mass media to properly inform people.. I think once 5G internet becomes popular in around 2020 than at the same time I think Bill Gates funded nuclear technology will have its best shot at being put into the most easily absorbable media for people's minds, since instant internet video media will be more easily and commonly accessed than free-to-air and cable TV is now.

The easily absorbable ideas given to folks via facebook renewable energy memes like those below will have greater competition in 5 years time.
It's pretty clear facebook memes and established old news media absolutely crush all in terms of sway power and decision making currently.

I see people share these renewable energy memes on facebook all the time and it really seems they feel like they are experts on the whole situation and vote on politicians accordingly.
So far videos like this do surprise people even though they are basic science.. While not as easily absorbable as a renewable energy meme because its loaded with science hopefully in the future anyone one the street will now stuff like whats in this video..
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TRL7o2kPqw0