EEStor Revolution

We have posted on the EEStor ultracapacitor development and its apparent iminent debut. Others are also advancing similar protocols and all are optimistic that they can deliver an energy storage device that can store and control sufficient energy to provide personal transportation comparable to present ranges or at least ten to fifteen times better than present electrical storage devices.

Surprisingly the challenge is technically clear. You need capacitor spheres to hold electrical energy and you need a control system. Because you can initially start with large dimensions, the control system can be solved independently and we can presume this was done long ago. So far, so good.

If you can do all that then energy content becomes a case of decreasing the size of the spheres in order to increase the size of the surface area. In fact it must get down to nanometer size to achieve the desired results and apparently this has been accomplished. Thus their claims of iminent deliverability appear creditable baring the usual last minute technical difficulties.

So we are about to have a magnificent super battery as a stock item of mass production. Others will be also producing a comparable product.

Now this has all been focused on the automobile industry. It is way more important than that.

It will completely change the whole business of energy. To start with, it becomes practical and desirable to establish a consumer owned energy production system. This way the consumer avoids the cost of distribution. A simple initial model is an energy efficient house that collects solar energy on a continuous basis. The house collects energy during the day and supplies what is needed during the evening and night. Then as the sun rises, it automatically tops up the automobile draining the storage device in preparation for fresh accumulation.

Surplus power can even be collected by mobile units, completely avoiding the need for grid linkage. We are assuming an efficient energy transfer system but that seems likely also.

The point that I am trying to make here is that this turns everything we have done for the past century on its head. It is already possible to take a home of the grid with some expense. It now becomes convenient and economic.

This also releases a massive amount of energy back to the primary producers for industrial use and that includes much of that energy lost to transmission losses.

So not only are we having a practical electrical automobile protocol, we are getting a practical home energy storage system that naturally promotes the investment in home based energy production that efficiently integrates into the overall energy supply system.

ZENN Funds EEStor

ZENN has stepped up to the plate and funded the next tranche of funding for the EEStor ultra capacitor system. This is welcome. We as complete outsiders can never know how valid a company’s representations are, while an interested large investor is in position to get all the obvious questions satisfied. ZENN is in that position. They have a clearly declared self interest and unless we start into conspiracy theories, they will do their best to see this through properly.

That they are satisfied with progress opens the door to accepting the eminence of successful product demonstration. As posted earlier, it sounds like they can do it and their success ushers in the first truly practical electrical automobile.

It is also fitting that Lithium technology has recently picked up the pace and may soon be able to match EEStor’s advertised performance. No great breakthrough ever was unchallenged by an alternate technology that accelerated the product rollout.

So without a total briefing on the current state of research, ZENN’s action is about as good as it gets for a third party endorsement along with the additional effective endorsement of Lockheed Martin back in January. Now of these outfits want egg on their face, so you count on a solid job of due diligence.

It is an important milestone and we can expect performance demonstrations. However, never take projected delivery targets in a deal like this too seriously. Treat them as a best guess if nothing goes of track, and since any minor thing can do exactly that, it is always probable that something will cause delays. Wait until they try to get the packaging right.

So far so good. We are possibly on the way to a gasoline free future.

ZENN Motor Company Reports Second Quarter 2009 Results

TORONTO, ONTARIO -- (Marketwire) -- 05/27/09 -- ZENN Motor Company Inc. ("ZMC" or the "Company") (TSX VENTURE: ZNN) a leading developer of zero emission transportation solutions and technologies, today announced its financial results for the three and six months ended March 31, 2009. All amounts are expressed in Canadian dollars unless otherwise indicated.

For the three and six months ended March 31, 2009 gross revenues were $391,227 and $936,619, respectively (2008 - $740,748 and $1,641,172, respectively).

Net losses for the three and six month periods were $1,973,015 or $(0.05) per share and $3,759,387 or $(0.11) per share compared with net losses of $1,837,940 or $(0.06) per share and $3,515,602 or $(0.12) per share for the corresponding periods in the prior year.

At March 31, 2009 the Company had working capital of $12,373,427 including cash, cash equivalents and short-term investments totaling $10,804,427 compared to $15,068,689 and $14,686,100, respectively, at September 30, 2008.

"Revenue in the quarter reflects the general malaise of the auto industry." said Ian Clifford, CEO of the Company. "Fortunately, the Company's strong balance sheet allowed us to continue to invest and make progress in a number of key areas, such as the development of the ZENNergy(TM) drivetrain and cityZENN(TM) projects which are integral parts of the Company's strategy, especially with the planned commercialization of EEStor's energy storage technology."

"On May 21, 2009 the Company confirmed EEStor's permittivity test results which exceeded the target level stipulated in our Technology Agreement with EEStor by over 21 percent," said Clifford. "The permittivity milestone is significant for the Company as it gives us a clearer line of sight to the delivery of a production quality Electrical Energy Storage Unit (EESU) from EEStor. According to EEStor, the EESU is expected to outperform every chemical battery on the market in terms of energy density, charge time, cost, and overall performance. In addition to our exclusive automotive applications, our equity position in EEStor gives our shareholders a stake in the many potential mass applications EEStor can pursue such as powering portable consumer electronics, improving the performance of renewable energy sources such as wind and solar generation, and increasing the efficiency and stability of power grids around the world. The milestone not only triggers a payment of US$700,000 under our Technology Agreement but also the Company's investment option in EEStor and we are currently assessing the opportunity to increase our equity position to the maximum extent possible."

"We believe that the widespread interest by consumers, governments and manufacturers in environmentally friendly, sustainable and cost-effective solutions bodes well for the future of the EV industry and the role that ZMC can play," said Clifford.

Additional Information

Readers are encouraged to read the Company's unaudited consolidated financial statements for the three and six months ended March 31, 2009 and the corresponding Management's Discussion and Analysis both of which have been filed on SEDAR at www.sedar.com and posted on the Company's website at www.ZENNcars.com.

About ZENN Motor Company Inc.

ZENN Motor Company, Toronto, Canada, is dedicated to being a global leader in zero emission transportation solutions and technologies for markets around the world. Driven by quality, ingenuity and a philosophy of social responsibility, the ZMC team is redefining what is possible in both urban and business fleet transportation.

The ZENN(TM) (Zero Emission No Noise) provides an excellent alternative transportation solution for environmentally conscious drivers who want to dramatically reduce their operating costs and free themselves from dependence on oil. The current ZENN low speed vehicle is perfect for urban commuters and commercial fleets such as resorts, gated communities, airports, college and business campuses, municipalities, and parks and is sold through a network of retailers across the United States and directly by the Company in Quebec.

The planned commercialization and implementation of the ultra capacitor being developed by ZENN Motor Company's strategic partner EEStor, Inc., is expected to enable future ZMC vehicles and ZENNergy(TM) drivetrain powered vehicles to travel at speeds and distances similar to internal combustion powered vehicles but at a fraction of the cost and with zero emissions!

EEStor versus Fast Lithium

Some very good news here on the battery technology front. MIT has mastered the art of fast charging a lithium based battery system. This now gives us a direct competitor for the EEStor protocol. Long term, I expect the EEStor ultra capacitor to do more with less and do it better. Once a successful commercial product is available, the technology has plenty of legs available for incremental improvement, and that will lead to penetration of all market segments.

Lithium technology has already been optimized in many ways and this breakthrough finally allows fast charging. Because there is a huge industry infrastructure in place, it will seamlessly slide into all aspects of the market fairly quickly.

Something is made of the heat issue, but that is a red herring. Lithium batteries have been charged by trickle down transformer kits because of battery limitations. Now we will have high speed transformer kits that are well understood and represent no problem at all.

The bottom line is that lithium currently provides maximum energy density. A fast lithium battery is a good proposition for an electric car.

Simply getting a working range of a good 100 to 130 miles is huge in terms of the utility of the electrical automobile. We are suddenly giving the driver a full hour or more of effective driving range. That is sufficient for all but the most insane commutes for our car loving society.

Quite simply, this will make the electric car practical for almost everyone. We jump from a small percentage of the market to most of the market with this breakthrough.

EEStor promises as much and ultimately a lot more, and on commercial delivery will have the same impact.

Otherwise, the next generation of lithium batteries will now be hugely faster and will swiftly penetrate the general battery market. Thereafter all devices will be charged as you briefly wait.

New Battery Could Recharge in Seconds

By Alexis Madrigal March 11, 2009 3:28:20 PMCategories: Chemistry, Clean Tech

http://blog.wired.com/wiredscience/2009/03/superbattery.html

A new battery material that recharges 100 times faster than the lithium-ion in your laptop has been revealed by researchers at MIT.

The discovery could lead to cellphone-sized batteries that could be charged in 10 seconds.

"The ability to charge and discharge batteries in a matter of seconds rather than hours may open up new technological applications and induce lifestyle changes," wrote materials scientists Gerbrand Ceder and Byoungwoo Kang Wednesday in the journal Nature.

In energy storage, there has always been a trade-off between the amount of energy a material could store and how quickly you could discharge it. Batteries were pretty good at storing energy (although not nearly as good as oil), but getting energy into and out of them was tough. Ultracapacitors, and their cousins, supercapacitors, can deliver a lot of charge really quickly, but it takes 20 times more of their materials to store the same energy as a comparable battery.

The new battery material appears to solve that problem by creating a "fast-lane" for ions to move around the lithium iron phosphate material. By applying a special surface coating to the old material, they allow the ions to speed around the battery at rates that are nearly unimaginable.

Rob Farrington of the National Renewable Energy Laboratory's advanced vehicle group, called the battery's ability to deliver energy "remarkable."

But questions remain. Fast-charging might be convenient, Farrington noted, but it requires running a large amount of current to the battery, which he worried would reduce the battery's life.

"High current means lots of heating. If you have high temperatures, you have to ask the question, are you detrimentally affecting the life of the battery?" he said. "The answer is that it's going to shorten the life."

The MIT duo's Nature paper only presents data through 50 charge/recharge cycles, but what's there is promising: There's nearly no drop in capacity.

But as any laptop owner knows, the more charging cycles you go through, the less energy your battery stores. The same battery that let you work for three hours a couple years ago only yields an hour-and-a-half at the coffee shop now.

That's one place where ultracapacitors are likely to retain their advantage over just about any battery.

"There are a lot of applications where you have to charge or discharge hundreds of times a day and in that, ultracapacitors have a very clear advantage," said Joel Schindall, who is heading a separate MIT research effort to develop carbon nanotube-based ultracapacitors.

Still, ultracap producers, though they've made inroads in niche markets. have had a hard time coming up with ultracapacitors that store anywhere near as much energy per weight or volume as a lithium-ion battery. Schindall's effort made waves in 2006 when the MIT Technology Review raved, "A breakthrough technology is holding forth the promise of charging electronic gadgets in minutes, never having to replace a battery again, and dropping the cost of hybrid cars."

But the effort has "stretched out," Schindall said — and he's not sure when his ultracapacitors will be ready to commercialize.

"I don't know whether that will be a week or a month or a year," he said.

Batteries, and all kinds of energy-storage devices, have a notoriously difficult time scaling out of the laboratory into production. We've previously likened the scale challenge to that faced by high school cafeterias. Even if the lunch ladies try to emulate home cooking or a restaurant kitchen, it's just fundamentally harder to cook for 3,000 people than it is to cook for 30 or three. Most of the time, you can't just make the process bigger, you need a new process.

And directly tied into the ability to create an industrial-scale process is the issue of cost, which Farrington said was always one of the barriers to the adoption of energy-storage technology.

Still, Ceder is optimistic. He believes his batteries could make it to the market in two to three years. The tech has already been licensed by two companies. One, A123 Systems, is a U.S. startup that's partnering with General Motors on the Chevy Volt's battery. The other, Umicore, supplies materials to battery manufacturers across the world.

Thursday, 10 am: Updated to include names of companies with licenses to use the material.

Citation: "Battery materials for ultrafast charging and discharging" by Byoungwoo Kang & Gerbrand Ceder doi:10.1038/nature07853

EEStor Posting of Interest

I grabbed this posting from the blog in the link and it is an excellent effort at describing what is going on with the EEstor protocol. It polishes my understanding of the technology and I certainly concur that the claims been made are difficult to achieve benchmarks. And yes, we all want to see this succeed.

Personally, I would like to see a working device make in some way with the specific particle sizes just to see the electro magnetic characteristics test out. How about painting some of it on a conductor? This may be simply naïve, but tricks like that go a long way to making folks comfortable.

I did exactly that once with another product surrounded by even wilder claims that landed on my desk. I designed a simple experiment that showed the claimed behavior and demonstrated it to myself. That simple do it your self experiment eliminated all further objections and the project progressed.

This sucker needs just that.


http://nextbigfuture.com/2009/02/general-motors-admits-to-working-with.html


All very interesting ... non-batteries that achieve energy densities on par with the current chemical practical record holder, Li::MnO (generally known as "Lithium") cells. The common garden variety AA LiMnO cell (rechargable) delivers 3.6 volts, holds about 2 amp-hr of juice (thus stores about 7 watt-hours of energy) ... in an AA package of about 5 milliliters capacity. So ... let's see. 7 Wh x 1000/5 = 1.4 kWh per liter. Hey! Similar to the 1,500 kWh/liter of the "full production" EEStor BariumTitanate cell. Cool.

The only difference is, the BaTiO capacitors - even with 1/100th the size of the patent claims - have yet to be produced. EEStor is to date, a proverbial "announcement engine", sending updates and developments, and endless chitter-chatter to CEO's of every conceivable target market - then disingenuously claiming to be "working closely with (a list of 100) industries". Right.

I think the idea(s) are great (after all BASF, Motorola and a number of others filed for patents for their competing ultra-permitivity dielectrics) , but practically, the issue is that it is virtually impossible to create void (arc-conduit) free ultra permittivity dielectrics ... even filled ones. Layering (say depositing dozens of spin-coated micrometer

scale films) ... could utilize the statistical effect to decouple vertical voids between electrodes (which is why mica has such a spectacular dielectric strength) ... but in the end it may end up in a cat's game.

YET - and let me just say here that I AM a devotee of this technology - yet, there are three striking advantages of the capacitive approach - even it it "only" achieves energy/weight densities similar to the best chemical methods - that are compelling. (a) two orders-of-magnitude faster charge/discharge cycles. (b) near-100% charge/discharge efficiency. (3) practically infinite lifespan. There are also a trio of secondary - but clearly useful - aspects that gather little press... (4) common-ness of materials, (5) low-toxicity materials, (6) no temperature dependencies.

The best batteries (at charging) have endothermic dissolution chemistries that 'suck up thermal energy' as they're being charged. So, while the nature of solute-conductivity (over metal) generates a lot of ohmic heat from high charge rates, the heat is reabsorbed by the endothermic reaction, yielding quite moderate cell heat-up. Of course, it can be pushed (the endothermic reaction only absorbs heat relative to the reaction rate, but the heat goes up as the SQUARE of charging overvoltage) to generate heat ... to maximize charge rate. Typically today's cells are rated between 0.2C to 1.0C charge rate ... e.g. a 2.9 Ah AA cell can be charge maximally in around 2-3 hours (actually somewhat faster, as witnessed in the remote-controlled toy vehicle market).

But lets just say that 3 hours (10,000 sec) is nominal for batteries. They can be put in series-parallel, and still retain the 10,000 sec rating (assuming not too much heat builds up). In order to get 5 minute (300 sec) charging, clearly 1.5 orders of magnitude charge-rate improvement is needed. This ... they're not going to get, under any circumstance. The internal resistance, delta-V squared waste-heat, and so on ... precludes it. further, those losses are non-recoverable in power. All megajoules lost to heat never are recovered as power.

So capacitors have a huge advantage there. This is not to say they're perfect - especially the titanate peroskvites (which are piezoelectric among other things), but the're pretty damned good.

The patent's 30 farad, 3500 volt capacitor would charge at 3.3 volts per second per 100 charging amps. To charge it in the 5 minute (300 second) window, it would need a charge rate of 12 volts/sec ... which would require about 350 amps. Hence the apologetics for "cable heating". Well, thick cables aren't all that expensive, and I could see water-cooled cables in thick black rubber (suitably armored) looking just like the thick hoses on today's filling-station gasoline dispensers. Just about as flexible, tough, and trouble free. A set of interlocks would keep these instantly-lethal voltages from escaping the housings. Yep, 5 minute charge times. Doable.

The second factor (near 100% charge-discharge efficiency) is also critical. Conventional chemical batteries - even the big mature lead-acid ones - tend to lose from 25% to 65% of the energy 'invested' in them. Put in 10 kWh, and you might only get back out 6 kWh. I don't think that is very attractive. By comparison, put 10 kWh into a super-capacitor, and 9.9 kWh comes back out. The 0.1 kWh lost is to resistive and/or dielectric hysterisis losses. That is pretty compelling.

Third (3) practically infinite lifespan. The "other" vexing thing about chemical cells is their almost immediate degradation in capacity, which continues fairly linearly over their useful lives ... then rapidly accellerates at the "end". This is nominally through permanent 'side reactions' that inactivate the electropositive anode materials; modern cell chemistry includes sacrificial compounds to compete for the parasitic oxidation pathways, thus keeping the anode materials from degrading as fast. The 'end point' (rapid decay) though is inevitably realized when the sacrificial compounds run out - as there is only so much 'space' for them in the galvanic cell ... before they start to degrade capacity itself.

Not so theoretically with solid-state dielectrics ... not run completely at their arc-over point. (i.e. when charged conservatively, dielectrics have lifetimes approaching centuries, if not milennia). This is a remarkable boon, as it puts electrical energy storage on the same footing as hydrocarbon based fuel fluids. (A can of gasoline lasts ... the life of the can ... more or less). Yes, dielectrics still leak ... hence the figure-of-merit of 1.2% per year ... but that isn't at all impractical for all vehicular and most other moderate-term energy storage use.

Fourth (4) common-ness of materials ... titanium dioxide is one of the most common minerals (rutile, etc). Barium is a common component of sea water, and is widely deposited in the arid parts of the planet as Baryte... and is produced in the 'millions of tons' per year level presently. These characteristics, along with the other common components (aluminum, alumina, plastics, eutectic tertiary glasses) spell a future that shouldn't be clouded by a 'limited resource' issues. A demand for 300,000,000 300kg batteries a year requires 100 megatons of materials ... or about 10x our present baryte production to achieve. Sounds achievable to me.

Fifth (5) low-toxicity materials. Barium titaniate has a very low dissociation constant, meaning that it is soluble in acidic aqueous fluids in vanishingly small quantities. Barium IS toxic, and the soluble barium compounds are modestly toxic (on the order of lead compounds). But, barium SULFATE is so incredibly insoluble that the admission of even a small amount of sulfate as an antidote serves to entomb in-vivo the barium, rendering it harmless. Titaniates are also non toxic. They are so non-toxic, that the oxides, carbonates and sulfates of titanium are used presently in candy and confection manufacture. Sixth (6) no temperature dependencies. This is particularly important for practical vehicular use. Cars, trucks, earthmoving equipment and industrial equipment is supposed to work realistically from the arctic's temperatures to the Sahara's (-50C to +50C), reasonably reliably. The great majority of electrochemical cell chemistries and configurations suffer from electrolytes that "freeze" (or otherwise deactivate) below -10C. The problem is so severe that modern photographers cannot use their cameras below -10C for extended periods of time without protecting and heating the battery-packs. There is enough civilization living in lower-than-20-below temperatures all winter long that a very low operation point is a requirement. Likewise, many electrochemical batteries suffer from significant recharge-rate limitations at elevated temperatures ... since many of the chemistries utilize gaseous hydrogen in nanocrystalline carbon matrices for the cathodic material. At temperatures above +35C, the gaseous hydrogen rate-of-adherance to the carbon-matrix rapidly diminishes. Again, there are enough people who live in arid, high-heat areas, that this too needs addressing.

The BaTiO (and virtually all titanates) have operating ranges from -75C to +75C. This "solves" the problem of temperature dependency.

In any case, i didn't initially set out to write so much up. I am very much interested in seeing this technology actually produce some REAL WORLD, REAL-SCALE DEMO DEVICES. Not just endless talk about the dielectric strength permittance measurements, and 6 months between trials. This is getting to be TOO OLD of a story. let's just see impractical-but-notable megacapacitors being built. Show the world plenty of these, and in particular (since it is patent protected anyway), making nominal quantities of these available to hands-on-testing ... would be a great way for the researchers to "prove it to the world" and get excitement flowing.

For this is the problem with the technology that causes it to fail the GoatTech tests. No product, lots of talk - especially how it will save the world, solve the problems with every other new-tech/green-tech, endless microscopically 'incremental' developments (which sound like bullshit taken globally), and promises that tomorrow will deliver, but today way more funds are needed.

I just hate to give such a promising technology the title of "SNAKE OIL", but insofar as this old Missourian is concerned ... until they can show the world (and me) ... the oleagenous distillate of common asps ... it is.

GoatGuy

EEStor's Promise

We have reported extensively on the EEStor ultra capacitor battery here, but also have made no particular note of the scope that the technology holds for improvement. The technology relies on producing a matrix of small spheres of active material coated with aluminum and held together in an active binder. The fine details, we do not know and they are not at this point our business.

But we can say something. They targeted a particle size able to provide sufficient energy density to store enough energy to drive a light electric vehicle a distance of 300 kms.

This implies that any improvement in particle size will improve energy density by the cube of the magnitude of its improvement.

It appears reasonable that a first generation improvement could well produce a device that is superior by a factor of ten through one thousand. This is a huge upside. It also suggests that the potential for the technology is almost unlimited, or at least until we hit the real bounds of the particle protocol. They may have started at the technical limits although none of us believe that.

A thousand-fold improvement, which I suspect is feasible, is a revolution in energy storage.

The point is that improvement is merely an improvement in particle size. That is a rather believable research target. The rest is surely troublesome but likely very achievable.

So we all have a lot riding on EEStor’s energy storage technology.

A next generation overcomes the current issue of vehicle weight, just as the first generation overcomes the issue of vehicle range. I must imagine that a third generation will overcome the issue of power for long haul trucking and heavy equipment.

No other energy storage technology holds this promise. It would be nice to have information on what the theoretical limits actually are. You can be sure that we will eventually test them.

Lockheed Martin Files EEStor Patent

The promise of EEStor has just jumped another notch. First, Lockheed which has an arrangement with EEStor is not firing off patent applications like this unless their confidence in the technology is very high. There is little incentive in been premature. You can loose rights that may become valuable decades from now when someone else solves the problem. This patent is a strong indication that they think that they can deliver.

Secondly, and suddenly we are talking about an energy skin. This is huge. To start with, the car battery can become part of the exterior shell. It may even provide other advantages such as shock resistance. In this case it is integral to the body armor. This is real star wars armor.

I am actually more encouraged by this news than any news from EEStor directly. The threshold for disclosure is hugely higher to anything necessary with a startup such as EEStor. All the right questions will have been asked. I even suspect that proof of concept samples were wandering around before the patent was drafted.

We also have another reason for the present level of secrecy. EEStor surely wants product development money from the military and that means subjecting themselves to the type of security that Lockheed Martin lives with every day.

Science fiction writers can now describe an armored combatant packing enough energy in the armor to power a hand held microwave lasing weapon. We can even do it all in white.

Sunday, December 28, 2008

Lockheed Martin Patent Application Includes EEStor EESU

http://www.wipo.int/pctdb/images/PCT-IMAGES/24122008/US2008059684_24122008_gz_en.x4-b.jpg

Another layer of EEStor mystery was removed on Dec 24, 2008 when a patent application belonging to Lockheed Martin was published via the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) for a "Garment Including Electrical Energy Storage Unit." Thus, a new reason for Lockheed Martin's reticence to comment on EEStor technology has emerged: discussing it too early could jeopardize Intellectual Property Lockheed wishes to take a hold of via this and perhaps other patent initiatives.

The application goes on to describe a new form of utility garment that includes body armor among other things. Specifically, the application discusses that the electrical energy storage unit "substantially conforms to an armour plate." The plate in turn may be "contoured to better fit a person wearing armor."

Perhaps the most intriguing aspect of the application is that the EESU is described as "soft" and apparently aids the resistance of the armour:

The soft nature of electrical energy storage layers 203 and 401 a-401 h, relative to armor plate 201 , causes a ballistic round or fragment to spiral upon striking one of layers 203 and 401 a-401 h, which provides an enhancement to the ballistic resistance of armor plate 201

The application goes on to describe power redundancy in the overall garment:

Preferably, the electrical energy storage layer comprises a plurality of sections so that, if one of the plurality of sections is damaged, the other sections of the plurality of sections remain operable. Two or more sections of the plurality of sections of the electrical energy storage layer may be electrically coupled, either in parallel or in series. The body armor includes one or more connectors electrically coupled with the electrical energy storage layer and/or with one or more of the sections of the electrical energy storage layer. The electrical connectors provide access to electrical power stored in the electrical energy storage layer.

The electrical storage layer sits outside the armor layer.

The application includes generality for a lithium ion storage unit as well as a fuel cell storage for recharging the eesu or Li battery and names Toby D Thomas and David L. Hoelscher as inventors. Die hard EEStory followers will recall that the Department of Defense Wearable power competition that took place this past summer listed Hoelscher as it's team lead. Lockheed listed this URL as it's home website.

https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiIHVNdcH0nnLFIyKHoIgVi7ohCPkEX7GrNjYonFcKlbVf76PD-hxbgM55TIbwlgDFZJ9ybOaNmQSuNC7iG4kAkwLzw7mkTUhqA9WL1_bfI_yHkunlFv_Tqvg0yL7WEcRT3snNfAIsY1qc/s1600-h/fig6.jpg

At the time of posting this article, Lockheed Martin was not available for comment.

EEStor from Ecogeek

This short simple item from Ecogeek will help make the EEStor concept a little easier, although it says nothing about the real issues.

I notice commentators whining about the litany of missed delivery dates as if this actually casts doubt on what they are attempting. This is very extreme product development and very difficult. It they were actually meeting so called deadlines, I would be expecting a sham. Most folks cannot change a tire on time and on budget and this is a hundred times more problematic where you are creating a micron sized particle, that is coated no less and then using it to fabricate an electron absorbing layer of these powders and plastic binder.

It is the type of thing that is likely a bitch to do as a one off in a custom rig, whereas a piece of cake in a very expensive production line. Imagine a plasma screen done as a one off! You would be lucky to get proof of concept.

We are still been told very little how this works but we are certainly told what they can do and it is clearly important.

http://www.ecogeek.org/images/image/eestorpatent.jpg


EEStor Gets Patent on Breakthough Mystery Device

Written by Hank Green
Friday, 26 December 2008

Personally, I'm very excited that lithium ion batteries are finally getting advanced enough to find homes in automobiles. But a small company called EEStor is promising "Electronic Storage Units" that will be ten times lighter, hold ten times more power, and cost half as much as lithium ion batteries.

What's more, they'll be able hold enough power to drive a car for 300 miles, charge in less than five minutes (at charging stations, not at home outlets) and will be able to charge and recharge an infinite number of times.

If true, this isn't just great news for the auto industry...it's great news for consumer electronics and the power industry as well. The question is...is it true?

Well, one obstacle was overcome today, when EEStor was finally awarded a patent (PDF) on its technology. But a patent can be awarded for technology that doesn't work or isn't viable...they do it all the time. But now, at least, EEStor will be able to control the device if it turns out to be feasible.

It also opens up the window for all of us to look in on their mysterious chemistry a bit. According to the patent the device is a sort of capacitor that actually contains 31,353 separate capacitors in parallel. These nano-capacitors are basically a ceramic powder suspended in a plastic solution, and we're not going to pretend we understand why they can soak up so many electrons.

The patent does point out that any number of these nano-capacitors can be used in parallel, depending on the needs of the application. So, yes, if they begin manufacturing these things for cars, it won't be long before they're in your laptops and cell phones as well.

But the question of feasibility remains. They're already behind on their scheduled delivery to Zenn auto company (who currently has exclusive rights to use the storage units.) But Zenn apparently remains confident that they will have a vehicle on the roads using the technology by 2009.

I, for one, certainly hope so. But if they do, it's going to mess up a lot of other people's plans.

EEStor Skepticism

The interest in the EEStor battery spurred more interest on my part. Certainly what they are doing is taking an established protocol for a working capacitor and applying thin film methods to achieve a superior product. On the face of it this will work to some degree. The question is then whether the claims made by the company are achievable over which there is a spirited debate. Assuming the company has good reason to make their claims and some comfort that it will be possible to manufacture the final product they are surely doing the right thing in taking this protocol to the extreme limit.

It needs to be done.

This is also opening the door to thin layer manufacturing, a technology begging to be perfected. I have felt that for decades. The unusual differences between different elements, compounds and geometries are hugely magnified when setting things up an atom at a time. A simple example of this is the usefulness of solid crystalline acids.

The EEStor battery is advertised as a sandwich of metal with barium titanate in between metallic conductors. They are working at minimizing the layer of barium titanate by producing a very fine powder. This is reasonable. It still feels like the beginning of a long and arduous journey rather than the downhill romp.

Imagine a materials toolkit that included layers of grapheme, and layers of metal glass easily worked with. Recall that various metal glasses have remarkable electrical-magnetic behaviors. Extracting an ultra capacitor out of that appears plausible. The difficulty is that we are slowly learning now to manipulate these materials, and they all cry for an outer space environment to achieve optimal manufacturing environments.

This is not answering the question of the plausibility of EEStor’s public claims. Yet the issues are apparent to all, and their partners would not let their names be associated with total hooy, thus we must give them the benefit of a doubt and also expect a fair share of missed time lines.

The immediate question is whether they have done enough to fabricate a working product that can give measurable results that are superior. If they can do that and talk about it then the skeptical will step back and provide ample running room.

It is surely too soon to expect spectacular power density but not too soon to expect competitive power density.
When I saw the first sample of a printed solar cell five years ago or so, its efficiency was perhaps 3%. Today they are rushing to market because they have likely hit the 10% threshold. Another decade and we will see 30% and we will all call it am over night success.

This protocol and the competing nanotube protocol replacing the metallic layers for ultra capacitors should travel the same development path.

I wonder if these manufactured layered particles are up to been suspended in molten aluminum and if that would then be an energy absorber?

These items are worth reading as they give a sense of what is taking place technically.

US 7033406 - Electrical-energy-storage unit (EESU) utilizing ceramic and integrated-circuit technologies for replacement of electrochemical batteries; Weir, et al. (April 25, 2006)

Abstract

An electrical-energy-storage unit (EESU) has as a basis material a high-permittivity composition-modified barium titanate ceramic powder. This powder is double coated with the first coating being aluminum oxide and the second coating calcium magnesium aluminosilicate glass. The components of the EESU are manufactured with the use of classical ceramic fabrication techniques which include screen printing alternating multilayers of nickel electrodes and high-permittivitiy composition-modified barium titanate powder, sintering to a closed-pore porous body, followed by hot-isostatic pressing to a void-free body. The components are configured into a multilayer array with the use of a solder-bump technique as the enabling technology so as to provide a parallel configuration of components that has the capability to store electrical energy in the range of 52 kWh. The total weight of an EESU with this range of electrical energy storage is about 336 pounds.

July 29, 2008

EEStor Announces Certification of Additional Key Production Milestones and Enhancement of Chemical Purity -

EEStor, Inc. has certification data from outside sources that purified aluminum oxide, in the range that EEStor, Inc. has certified, can have a voltage breakdown of 1,100 volts per micron. The target working voltage of EEStor's chemical processes is at 350 volts per micron. This provides the potential for excellent protection from voltage breakdown.

EEStor, Inc. has achieved success on one of its most critical technical milestones and that is the certification of the completeness of the powder crystallization of the constituents utilized in producing its CMBT powders. The percent of the constituents crystallized in the CMBT powders ranged from 99.57% to 100.00% with the average being 99.92%. This level of crystallization provides the path for the possibility of EEStor, Inc. providing the published energy storage for present products and major advancements in energy storage for future products.

EEStor, Inc. has certification data that indicates achieving powder particle of 1 micron and distribution along with the aluminum oxide particle coating assists EEStor, Inc. in meeting the energy storage stabilization over the temperature range of interest for key applications.

EEStor, Inc. published patent, application number 5812758, indicates the flexible matrix concept that could provide the potential of multiple technical and production advantages. One of the technical advantages indicated is assisting in providing polarization of the ultra capacitors. Polarization along with other proprietary processing steps provides the potential of a polarization saturation voltage required by EEStor, Inc. (MarketWatch; July 29, 2008)