Self-charging battery from Phys.org

Usually 2 separate units are used to generate and store energy. 1. Something to generate the energy, like solar, coal, gas, etc. 2. A battery to store the energy. Now for the first time, using nanomaterials, a self-charging battery has been made.

They used a PVDF film, which is a piezoelectric material. That means when it's compressed, it generates a small amount of electricity. This is how many cigarette and barbecue lighters work. You have to press that "ignite" button pretty hard to make a spring-loaded hammer smack a piezoelectric material, to generate that spark.

A compressive force at 2.3Hz could generate 327 to 395 millivolts. While that is not enough to power an LED, which requires about 2200mv, that voltage can be boosted somewhat. This important because it creates energy from mechanical movement in one step.

A compressive force with a frequency of 2.3 Hz could increase the voltage of the device from 327 to 395 mV in 4 minutes.

Read more at: https://phys.org/news/2012-08-self-charging-battery-energy.html#jCp

A compressive force with a frequency of 2.3 Hz could increase the voltage of the device from 327 to 395 mV in 4 minutes.

Read more at: https://phys.org/news/2012-08-self-charging-battery-energy.html#jCp

A compressive force with a frequency of 2.3 Hz could increase the voltage of the device from 327 to 395 mV in 4 minutes.

Read more at: https://phys.org/news/2012-08-self-charging-battery-energy.html#jCp

Source
Phys.org. 2012-08.

Study: Xinyu Xue, et al. “Hybridizing Energy Conversion and Storage in a Mechanical-to-Electrochemical Process for Self-Charging Power Cell.” Nano Letters. DOI: 10.1021/nl302879t.

Xinyu Xue, et al. “Hybridizing Energy Conversion and Storage in a Mechanical-to-Electrochemical Process for Self-Charging Power Cell.” Nano Letters. DOI: 10.1021/nl302879t

Read more at: https://phys.org/news/2012-08-self-charging-battery-energy.html#jCp

Thin film cell generates 6vdc.

This cell is no more than 1mm thick and about 2x2 inches. It generates 6vdc. I'd like to figure out how to make one to test how many amps it has.

This guy has been doing a lot of work over a year and he might be on to something if he can scale up production.

Youtube.

He also has a prototype called  mini generator. He uses a silicon graphite cell but with a slightly different electrolyte. These are not capacitors, they are generators that make their own electricity. The voltage is 3.5-v4dc, good enough to power 1-2 LED lights, or more with a voltage booster. Magnets are used to compress the layers to increase efficiency, but if he uses neodymium magnets the cost could go up to $10usd for the one cell he displays in this video. NDs are not cheap.

New battery technology

Barium-titanate ultracaps. 

2007, MIT Technology Review:

A new ultracapacitor technology by EEStor is claimed to store 10x the power of a lead-acide battery at half the cost and is superior in terms of energy density, price, charge time and safety. Ultracaps, as they are sometimes called, can store and release energy an almost unlimited number of times, or more times than current rechargable batteries anyway. It uses barium-titanate powders.

Energy cost comparison to drive 500 miles:

1. Gasoline: $60
2. New EESU ultracap: $9

Alas, Wikipedia says the claims were 100x what the actual results were.

Bloom energy cell

Google has been testing the Bloom Energy cell which takes natural gas (and oxygen from the air) as input. Google has been testing it since 2008. The BEC does not use combustion to create energy. It's being tested by other large companies all over the world like Johnson and Johnson, AT&T, Nokia, Bank of America, Caltech, Adobe, Dreamworks, Ebay, Honda and Panasonic.

An "energy cell" can be combined into an "energy stack", and these can be combined into an "energy server". Energy servers are installed onsite so electricity doesn't have far to travel in order to be used.

Here's model UMP-571, which weights 5000 lbs and outputs 200kw at 480vac. It seems a bit big for home use as US homes take 120vac.

Lithium air battery could have big gains

Extreme Tech, Oct 2015. There's a chart here which shows on one axis, energy density by liter of volume, and the other axis shows energy density per kilogram. Lithium batteries have their advantages (no recharge memory) they also have disadvantages (sudden explosions or fire).

Quantum batteries

ExtremeTech, Aug 2015. Go and read it. Two entangled qubits can actually store energy. Neat.