Tenergy batteries

[J.P.M.]

Of course not. I'm not an idiot, as you are so fond of implying.

You'll have to hide your contempt a little better if you want to have a civil discussion.

I'm not implying anything. Rather, it seems to me you are inferring. I'd also note that I'm not the one who put on their forum ID (at one time - paraphrasing here) - something like: 'I don't know much about solar energy, but I like science'., or some such wording. I didn't write that. My apologies for a less than perfect recollection of your words. Whatever it was, It didn't seem to be a sterling endorsement of your qualifications with respect to solar and renewable energy. Care to correct my memory ?

I have no contempt to hide, nor have I attempted to hide it - not hiding it being something your second sentence confirms. It's all in the open for anyone who wants to know.

In any case, if it's contempt, it's contempt not for you. It's for your one sided and IMO, mostly unqualified and uninformed statements that seem to rely on the opinions of others that you seem to agree with. It seems to me I see more of other's opinions from you than I do your opinions, or that you're a shill for those pulling off the solar tit for no other gain than their own.

All opinions are valid, but that says nothing about how well those opinions reflect reality, or realistic possibilities. And, it says nothing about motive.

My opinion, FWIW, is that a lot of what you reference is one sided, poor or non science, probably more often written by someone who knows more about word processing and/or how to make a slick power point presentation than anything about energy matters or issues, and or/they were on deadline and needed 500 words and a slick graph or some visual candy.

I've been around R.E. for a long time and I've seen the damage and the follow on harm, intentional or not, that people with M.O,'s similar to yours can do. They are loose cannons whose actions not only give the R.E. naysayers a lot of a lot of fodder - I bet Sunking really loves you - but spreads half truths and incorrect information that does not help the cause when the stuff you pass along gives other ignorant folks the false impression that solar is the magic bullet that will save humanity.

I wish you would think more about what you are doing. I believe you are hurting the cause of solar energy.

I think I know some stuff about Solar and renewable energy and conservation. However, I try to keep my mouth shut about technical issues where I think I'm ignorant - and there's a lot of that. Doing that hopefully limits the bad (incorrect) information from me that can do damage. Seems the right thing to do.

As for civil conversations, I'm a mechanical, not a civil engineer. No matter. I'd prefer to have no conversations with you, civil or otherwise except, and within the limitations of my knowledge areas (or perhaps common sense), to point out things you write of that I consider unsafe, harmful or simply incorrect or dumb. I will continue to comment to your posts as I deem appropriate and/or necessary.

The last word on this subject, for now, is yours.

Take what you want of the above. Scrap the rest.

[SunEagle]

THX, that was fast.

I can tell you that I have a little bell that goes off when you send out a request for help but I would be fibbing.

I just happened to log on and your post was the only one that had a Flagged report in my Notification list.

[Sunking]

fixed.

THX, that was fast.

[SunEagle]

Another post blocked.

fixed.

[Sunking]

Another post blocked.

[Sunking]

The Bosch unit in question I have already linked too. It is BPT-5-S Hybrid. It uses Lithium Cobalt if anyone ever bothered to read. It comes in 2.2 Kwh increments up to 13.2 Kwh. It is th eTesla Powerwall competition. Not rocket science. 5 year warranty period if you pay extra. Yes Dan I knew you would try to prove me wrong. You fell for it sucker. No battery has 25 years warranty. Well there is one with a 30 year warranty used strictly for Telecon, Lucent Round Cells a pure lead battery. Don't ask you cannot afford them and they are not for cycle applications.So th eclaim Bosch offers 25 years on Lithium Cobalt is pure fantasy. Hell there is no such thing as a 25 year old lithium battery period. It is a big fat lie. Plain and simple.

No I do not work for any battery manufacture, they work for me. During my tenure at MCIWorldcom I was the largest buyer of all Telecom batteries from 1993 to 2003. That gave me many privileges like seting on IEEE Batery Committees, driving the agenda fort BattCom conference every year, and product development of al th emajor battery players like C&D, Johnson Controls, Rolls, Exide, and a few others to remane nameless. At IEE we write the standards. MCI Worldcom was th elargest buyer of batteries and all telecom equipment. When we went bankrupt we caused several other companies to go bankrupt like Northern Telecom, Exide, Marconni, Reltec. In my largest production year 2001) we bought over $1B worth of batteries. Just in a single office installing 6-48 volt 10,000 amp power plants, and each plant with 14,000 AH batteries. For giggles and grins each plant used 168 2-volt 2000 AH cells x 6 plants is 1008 700lb batteries (around 700,000 lbs just in one building) $20M for each site just in batteries. So yeah I know a thing or two about batteries.Even worked with them in the Navy on a Submarine

I have worked with Lithium batteries since the mid 90's. Still not impressed, neither is the industry. They have their place like Power Tools, Laptops, EV's where you can justify the cost and risk of fire. LiFeP04 was suppose to be the God Send. They were released in 2008 from Chi-Coms. They are pure crap John Public has very little access to quality LFP cells made by A123, Boston Power, and Enerdel. The ones you might get access to are going to cost you $2 to $5 per watt hour. Chi-Coms cost 50-cents per watt hour. None of them can compete with quality Pb batteries. A decent 5 year Pb will cost you just under 20-cents per wh, and last as long as a quality LFP, and last much longer than Chi-Coms. Buy a high-end Pb battery for 23 to 25 cents per Kwh and you now have a 7 to 10 year battery that will run circles around any Lithium chemistry you can name.

I do not care what the Dan;s, Karak, and Barbaras say, I wil not allow them to talk people into making horrible financial decisions. I will do my best to inform folks so they can make an informed decision. I have documentation and test to back it up. LFP only has LIP SERVICE from a noisy minority who lie like thieves.

When economics change, and the problems worked out, I will change my tune. But not a minute before. You can say anything you want about me. I don't give a damn. But one thing even my enemies will say about me is I put peoples safety and finances ahead of anything else. I care more about folks lives and money more than they do. Karrak is already known to be vested, he is a re-seller of Chi-Com crap. I do not sell a thing.

[DanKegel]

for lithium batteries with iron phosphate based cathodes, the chemistry is different enough that you're not going to learn as much. They are very different animals.

I believe it. Are the anodes similar, though? I suspect that even with different chemistry, some of the engineering still carries over.

It's great this forum has such battery expertise around.

[jflorey2]

You're right, of course. But it's a family tree, and some of what was learned with earlier chemistries probably applies. I don't think what I wrote was inaccurate in a larger sense.

For lithium-ion batteries with cobalt-based cathodes, there's a lot of learning that ports over to lithium-ion batteries with manganese-based cathodes (for example); many of the same concepts apply. But for lithium batteries with iron phosphate based cathodes, the chemistry is different enough that you're not going to learn as much. They are very different animals.

To put it another way, if you have an electric bike and you start off with lithium-ion cobalt and switch to a manganese chemistry, you're going to be able to still care for it without learning too much about the new chemistry. But if you switch from LiFeCO4 to cobalt you will likely make some expensive mistakes* before realizing that there are significant differences.

(* - I started working with lithium ion cobalt in 1997 and made many of those expensive mistakes; fortunately I was in a lab that was set up to deal with such mistakes.)

[DanKegel]

In a larger sense, batteries are energy storage devices. So, in a larger sense, do you believe that make all your opinions about all battery types more accurate ?

Of course not. I'm not an idiot, as you are so fond of implying.

You'll have to hide your contempt a little better if you want to have a civil discussion.

[J.P.M.]

You're right, of course. But it's a family tree, and some of what was learned with earlier chemistries probably applies. I don't think what I wrote was inaccurate in a larger sense.

In a larger sense, batteries are energy storage devices. So, in a larger sense, do you believe that make all your opinions about all battery types more accurate ?

[DanKegel]

You are talking about two very different things here.

(Lithium ion batteries != Lithium iron phosphate batteries)

It would be a mistake to conflate them and think that experience with one translates into assurances that the other will function to a given level, IMO.

You're right, of course. But it's a family tree, and some of what was learned with earlier chemistries probably applies. I don't think what I wrote was inaccurate in a larger sense.

[jflorey2]

SunKing appears to be an authentic expert on lead-acid batteries. He likes Trojan, with good reason. They're great, but they're not for people who want to buy a system and forget it. That's the target market for the lithium battery folks. The jury is still out on the current crop of lithium house batteries, but they're riding a huge wave of experience (laptop -> phone -> car), and 3000 cycles seems practical.

You are talking about two very different things here.

Lithium ion batteries (i.e. lithium-cobalt, lithium-manganese) power laptops, phones and cars. Their energy density is very high; their power density, not so much. They are typically limited to .5 to 1C charge rates and 1-2C discharge rates. They have issues with thermal runaway, dendrite formation and overcharge. We have a LOT of experience with them and know that a 500 cycle life is about what we can expect, depending on state of charge during storage, temperature, charge rate etc.

Lithium iron phosphate batteries power things like power tools and electric bikes - things that don't need the energy density but need to deliver lots of power quickly. We have less experience with them. They are lower in energy density but have a much longer life (a few thousand cycles in most cases.) These are the most likely candidates for home-scale BESS (despite Tesla's early forays into this area.)

It would be a mistake to conflate them and think that experience with one translates into assurances that the other will function to a given level, IMO.

[SunEagle]

SunKing appears to be an authentic expert on lead-acid batteries. He likes Trojan, with good reason. They're great, but they're not for people who want to buy a system and forget it. That's the target market for the lithium battery folks. The jury is still out on the current crop of lithium house batteries, but they're riding a huge wave of experience (laptop -> phone -> car), and 3000 cycles seems practical. Caveat emptor - you can't assume any particular vendor has their **** together. I'm going to let the early adopters take a bullet or two before making the plunge.

I agree the Lithium battery technology will be the future of energy storage for solar. But regardless of what some people have stated about their experience the damn things as still way too expensive to use unless you are paying thru the nose for your electricity.

So maybe FLA is going out and being replaced by Lithium tech but those Winstons do not seem like an effective way to reduce mine or most of the US home electric costs.

Even that 8.8kWh rated Bosch system would have to cost less than $5000 for someone to justify it even if it did last for 25 years only using 50% DOD.

Energy storage with batteries is going to happen but the prices will have to come way down for most people.

[DanKegel]

As far as I know Sunking does not work for any battery manufacturer. Although he probably has more hands on experience with batteries than most of the people here in this forum.

SunKing appears to be an authentic expert on lead-acid batteries. He likes Trojan, with good reason. They're great, but they're not for people who want to buy a system and forget it. That's the target market for the lithium battery folks. The jury is still out on the current crop of lithium house batteries, but they're riding a huge wave of experience (laptop -> phone -> car), and 3000 cycles seems practical. Caveat emptor - you can't assume any particular vendor has their **** together. I'm going to let the early adopters take a bullet or two before making the plunge.

[karrak]

Well let's use a real model. Start with a Trojan IND9-6V 464 AH battery. These batteries are verified and tested to IEC 61427 standard. The standard is not a accelerated test, it is real life, real application proven. It is not a model of 100% charging, it is Partial State of Charge meaning the batteries are never ever fully charged. Real as it gets.

More absolute rubbish. IEC 61427 is an accelerated test and it is not real life. Each major test cycle of IEC 61427 as described by Trojan is supposed to represent one year of real life use takes around 46 days. It is based on a model which assumes that doing 50 charge/discharge cycles between a SOC of between 10%to 40% and 100 charge/discharge cycles between a SOC of 100% to 75% at a temperature of 40C^o is the same as one year of normal off-grid use.

Now real life is Barba's over six year use of Winston LFP batteries, steveg's 6 years use of an LFP battery in an off-grid system, or my experience of around 3 years use of Winston LFP batteries in two off-grid systems. The common theme with all these systems is that we have not noticed any change in the operation of these batteries over the time we have had them.

Simon

Off grid 24V system, 6x190W Solar Panels, 32x90ah Winston LiFeYPO4 batteries installed April 2013
BMS - Homemade Battery logger
Latronics 4kW Inverter, homemade MPPT controller