lithium-ion

Lithium ion battery industry to boom with wind, solar power

Lithium ion batteries used as energy storage for utilities will be a $1 billion industry by 2018, according to a report released Wednesday by Pike Research called "Energy Storage Technology Markets."

Much of the lithium ion battery development has been geared toward perfecting the batteries as power sources for electronics, and in recent years, cars. But the alternative energy industry is going to benefit from that research, too. Once that happens, there will be a surge in the sales of industrial-scale lithium ion batteries for power utilities, according to Pike research.

"Utilities will be the downstream beneficiaries … Read more

Suzuki builds a little Volt of its own

Suzuki is an automaker that we don't hear too much from in the U.S. However, when we do hear from it--such as with the two SX4s we've tested--we generally like what it has to say. So when we got word that a plug-in hybrid version of one of the smallest Suzukis, the Swift, would be on display at the 2009 Tokyo Motor Show, our interest was piqued.

The Suzuki Swift plug-in hybrid can be classified as a series gas-electric hybrid or an extended-range electric vehicle, depending on who you ask. The front wheels are turned by … Read more

Battery maker A123 Systems charged from IPO

Lithium ion battery maker A123 Systems had a rousing debut on the public stock market on Thursday, giving some good news to legions of energy investors and entrepreneurs.

The Watertown, Mass.-based company, which was spun out of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, saw its share prices rise over 50 percent from its offering price to close at over $20.

Through the initial public offering, the company is expected to raise over $400 million, Reuters reported. It had initially hoped to net $250 million but adjusted its offering price to raise more.

A123 Systems' IPO has been closely watched in … Read more

Volvo developing its first all-electric car

Volvo Cars has announced that, in addition to developing a plug-in hybrid electric vehicle, it has an all-electric version of the C30 hatchback in the works. The electric variant will be called the C30 BEV (battery electric vehicle) and will be the automaker's first all-electric vehicle.

The C30 BEV will replace the internal-combustion engine with an electric motor of indeterminate output. Meanwhile, the gasoline tank will be dropped in favor of a lithium ion battery pack. Volvo states that it is still working on the best placement of the 24 kWh battery pack, but has stated that the center … Read more

New hybrids proclaim their German engineering

I'm a big fan of "German engineering"--that combined focus on power and precision that distinguishes the better automobiles designed or manufactured in Germany.

At Frankfurt's International Motor Show, BMW will be showing off two new hybrid cars intended to deliver the full promise of German engineering. This is no small thing because most hybrid cars to date have been lightly built and somewhat underpowered in order to improve fuel economy.

The two new BMWs are more like previous offerings from that company: big, solid cars with lots of power to maintain performance in spite of … Read more

New Sony battery promises longer life, faster charge

Sony on Tuesday announced a new type of rechargeable lithium ion battery that promises a life span more than four times that of current lithium ion batteries. Specifically, Sony touts a capacity retention north of 80 percent after 2,000 charge-discharge cycles.

Without getting too technical about the whole thing, the new battery uses as its cathode material olivine-type lithium iron phosphate, which Sony says is ideal for the job "due to its robust crystal structure and stable performance, even at high temperatures."

The material also apparently contributes to the battery's faster charging time--it can hit 99 … Read more

Nissan, EnerDel to fund auto battery research

Seeking out a better auto battery, Nissan Motor and EnerDel said Thursday that they will team up in support of research into a better conductive material for batteries.

The pact calls for the two companies to co-fund research at the Argonne National Laboratory to develop a new electrolyte made of a slurry liquid. The work is being done specifically for electric and hybrid vehicle batteries.

EnerDel, which makes lithium ion batteries, has agreements to supply Think Global's city car and Fisker Automotive's luxury plug-in electric vehicle, both of which are expected to be available in the next year. … Read more

The Pre's Battery Life

I didn't want to comment on the Pre's battery lift until I'd tried it out for a full week. Well, the week is up and here goes...

While the battery in my Palm Pre lasts all day with little to moderate usage, it runs down very quickly.

An example would be Independence Day when I took about 40 pictures at our town's parade and then proceeded to upload about a dozen of them via email to Whrrl. In 2 hours I used about 80% of the battery life.

Today I read a very long email while … Read more

The end of battery-backed cache?

Adaptec has announced the immediate availability of a Series 5Z Unified Serial (SATA/SAS) RAID controller family with "Zero Maintenance Cache Protection." It's designed to replace the current generation of RAID controllers that use lithium ion batteries to protect data in cache memory.

This announcement is significant for two reasons. First, its shows the expanding role of NAND flash. Recently, NAND flash has been associated with the second coming of solid state disk (SSD) in enterprise disk arrays. In spite of reliability issues (the more flash memory is written to, the less reliable it becomes over time), … Read more