It’s time for a short break from politics and a brief excursion into… SCIENCE!

[4est_4est_Gump]

Video: The battery that might change everything
JAZZ SHAW
FEBRUARY 23, 2013

It’s time for a short break from politics and a brief excursion into… SCIENCE! (Yes, yes… I know. Republicans don’t care about science, but this may turn out to be important for your smart phone. More on that later.)

Some of the great scientific breakthroughs of the last century came about entirely by accident. Many of you are probably familiar with the origins of the Post It Note, and how it was invented as a result of a failure when attempting to create a super strong adhesive. Well, there may be another such story taking place in the present day. Scientists working with carbon compounds developed Graphene, a safe substance with a lot of structural strength for very little mass and weight. And then some wise guy discovered that it had another use.

The recap: Graphene, a very simple carbon polymer, can be used as the basic component of a “supercapacitor” — an electrical power storage device that charges far more rapidly than chemical batteries. Unlike other supercapacitors, though, graphene’s structure also offers a high “energy density,” — it can hold a lot of electrons, meaning that it could conceivably rival or outperform batteries in the amount of charge it can hold. Kaner Lab researcher Maher El-Kady found a way to create sheets of graphene a single carbon atom thick by covering a plastic surface with graphite oxide solution and bombarding it with precisely controlled laser light.

That last sentence may sound pretty complicated, but the article’s author provides a translation for the layman.

He painted a DVD with a liquid carbon solution and stuck it into a standard-issue DVD burner.

The result was a shockingly thin supercapacitor which could store up a large amount of electrical energy in no time flat. The potential for this sort of discovery should be obvious. Unlike heavy metal batteries, the carbon compound is biodegradable and cheap to manufacture. And a battery made of layers of this material could charge your cell phone for a full day’s use in – wait for it – two seconds. A ramped up version could charge an electric car in a minute or two. (No word on how likely it will be to catch on fire, but bonus points if it doesn’t.)

Here’s the video I mentioned. It’s not long and explains the process better than I ever could. I have to say, this is pretty exciting stuff if it comes to fruition.

http://hotair.com/archives/2013/02/23/video-the-battery-that-might-change-everything/

 

[Beco]

Stop upgrading electronics and cure cancer already..............

 

[4est_4est_Gump]

*chuckle*



It might help the Prius...

 

[kbate]

I still haven't adjusted to paying $29.99 for a light bulb, I can't stomach the idea of my AAA batteries costing $14.99 each.

 

[koalabear]

Stop upgrading electronics and cure cancer already..............

The CDC is too busy with gun control.

 

[sigh]

Actually, the technology sounds pretty cool, but then I'm admittedly something of a science geek. K's comment about cost is dead on, though if it the battery lasts significantly longer, it might be worth it.

Side (i.e., irrelevant) point: the new light bulbs, though they seem to last a looooooong time, are too freakin' big. There are way too many places where they simply don't fit.

Anyway, I followed AJ's link, read the article, watched the video, and then (as always) I made the mistake of scrolling down and reading the comments at the bottom. Why do I do these things? So much for an escape from politics. Very quickly I came across this idiot comment:

One thing I don’t know – was the research subsidized by the government?

My thought is that if not – if it’s paid for by a private company – I’d be supportive of at least researching this further. It’s what we’ve always said – we’re not opposed to ‘green’ energy, we’re opposed to the government sinking cash into subsidizing the research and / or manufacture of the tech.

I’d also bet that if the tech does pan out (and I don’t know enough to have an opinion on that side of it), and it’s funded through private money, it’d be developed and brought to market pretty quickly.

THIS is the benefit of capitalism.

So this fool thinks that if the research were paid for by a private company, then the results (the same exact results, mind you) would be better than if it were initially subsidized by the government, then developed and brought to the same capitalist market by the same private company.

My god, no wonder we can't agree on anything anymore.

 

[Weird Harold]

I still haven't adjusted to paying $29.99 for a light bulb, I can't stomach the idea of my AAA batteries costing $14.99 each.

Don't forget to add in the cost of the charger; Graphene "supercapacitors" are strictly "rechargeable batteries."

You may pay $14.99/each for AAA size supercapacitors but you'll never buy another AAA for that device. In the long run, you'll save a lot more than fifteen bucks -- not to mention supercapacitors don't contain corrosive electrolyte, so you don't have to worry about them leaking and ruining your electronics.

 

[Saint Peter]

Well, it is new so it must suck.

[/RESEARCH]

 

[oxphocker]

Damn that new Jacquard loom is really ruining things for us hand-weavers...let's go smash it!

You guys realize that technology actually LOWERS costs over time? The original cell phone was 4 lbs and the size of a brick and retailed for $4k. Now look at them...cheap and small. The same goes for everything. Battery technology is going to be key to a range of items including cars, electronics, and more. By improving and downsizing this key technology we will have electric cars that can actually go long distances without using hybrid tech or be able to power cool tech like human exoskeletons and wearable computers and more.

 

[phrodeau]

I still haven't adjusted to paying $29.99 for a light bulb, I can't stomach the idea of my AAA batteries costing $14.99 each.

Don't forget to add in the cost of the charger; Graphene "supercapacitors" are strictly "rechargeable batteries."

You may pay $14.99/each for AAA size supercapacitors but you'll never buy another AAA for that device. In the long run, you'll save a lot more than fifteen bucks -- not to mention supercapacitors don't contain corrosive electrolyte, so you don't have to worry about them leaking and ruining your electronics.

You should examine options and make a reasoned choice. For example, it's silly to use a rechargeable battery in a remote when a plain old zinc battery will probably outlast the remote's appliance. And you don't need an LED lamp for the fixture in the furnace room.

 

[trysail]

Just keep the goddamned politicians out of it.



That's all I ask.

 

[Weird Harold]

And you don't need an LED lamp for the fixture in the furnace room.

Not for the amount of time the light is used, but a buttload of savings for the amount of time it gets left on and unnoticed.

 

[Comshaw]

Not for the amount of time the light is used, but a buttload of savings for the amount of time it gets left on and unnoticed.

http://cloudfront.zorotools.com/product/full/4VMG3_AS01.JPG

Or

http://cdn2.bigcommerce.com/server400/3e0eb/products/23843/images/36794/westgate_mfg_YM185-W__90276.1359501331.1280.1280.jpg


Fixed

Comshaw

 

[Weird Harold]

http://cloudfront.zorotools.com/product/full/4VMG3_AS01.JPG

Or

http://cdn2.bigcommerce.com/server400/3e0eb/products/23843/images/36794/westgate_mfg_YM185-W__90276.1359501331.1280.1280.jpg


Fixed

Comshaw

Yep, those are options for people smarter than the minimum required to change a light-bulb. Otherwise, you'll spend more on an Electrician than you would for an energy-saving bulb.

 

[4est_4est_Gump]

Actually, the technology sounds pretty cool, but then I'm admittedly something of a science geek. K's comment about cost is dead on, though if it the battery lasts significantly longer, it might be worth it.

Side (i.e., irrelevant) point: the new light bulbs, though they seem to last a looooooong time, are too freakin' big. There are way too many places where they simply don't fit.

Anyway, I followed AJ's link, read the article, watched the video, and then (as always) I made the mistake of scrolling down and reading the comments at the bottom. Why do I do these things? So much for an escape from politics. Very quickly I came across this idiot comment:

One thing I don’t know – was the research subsidized by the government?

My thought is that if not – if it’s paid for by a private company – I’d be supportive of at least researching this further. It’s what we’ve always said – we’re not opposed to ‘green’ energy, we’re opposed to the government sinking cash into subsidizing the research and / or manufacture of the tech.

I’d also bet that if the tech does pan out (and I don’t know enough to have an opinion on that side of it), and it’s funded through private money, it’d be developed and brought to market pretty quickly.

THIS is the benefit of capitalism.

So this fool thinks that if the research were paid for by a private company, then the results (the same exact results, mind you) would be better than if it were initially subsidized by the government, then developed and brought to the same capitalist market by the same private company.

My god, no wonder we can't agree on anything anymore.

The reason we cannot agree anymore rests in Bastiat's "Broken Window" sophism.

You Liberals just see "technology." We Libertarians look at the Economic impact. The difference is very clear; private sector efforts are measured studied gambles with failure affecting only those directly involved, which weeds out a lot of the impractical, the pipe dream and the not yet ready for a paradigm change ideas (because they could not possibly compete with the known as a substitute good).

Government, on the other hand, takes Capital away from the private sector (stripping it first for overhead) and then doles it out to the aforementioned improbables, often on the basis of crony connections or upon the quid pro quo of where can I manufacture votes for my (my party's) reelection.

I think this is as much a reason as to why we can no longer talk; our politics have been so divorced from economic reality as to destroy the whole fabric of our society in the fighting for slices from a shrinking pie and seeing someone else get a piece means that you will not be sated by your slice.

And many breakthrough inventions are yes, costly at first, that's why we rely on the 1%, to seed the rise in volume which decreases the cost over time.

As for the new bulbs mandated by government. The light sucks, they burn out too quick and then I have to hazmat them and I know most of the common folk are not, so what exactly did government save us?

 

[4est_4est_Gump]

Don't forget to add in the cost of the charger; Graphene "supercapacitors" are strictly "rechargeable batteries."

You may pay $14.99/each for AAA size supercapacitors but you'll never buy another AAA for that device. In the long run, you'll save a lot more than fifteen bucks -- not to mention supercapacitors don't contain corrosive electrolyte, so you don't have to worry about them leaking and ruining your electronics.

I have been having a lot of luck with running a lot of small things on solar chargers with rechargeable D, C, A, AA, AAA and 9-volts.

 

[Ishmael]

Graphene has been known for decades now, the breakthrough in this case is not the discovery of the material, or it's properties, it's the method of fabrication. A method that seems simple enough to make practical, economical, applications of the material possible.

The recharge rate is a little on the practical optimistic side to say the least. The use of graphene to make a practical capacitor does not mean that the laws of physics are put on hold. The inrush current, without some means of moderation, could exceed 10,000 Amps, enough to blow the breakers on the power distribution network at the neighborhood level. And there is also the issue of the thermal properties of the material and how high the temperature will rise in the device with that level of in-rush current.

There is also the issue of the time constant of the circuit, both in charging and discharging. A capacitor behaves far differently than a battery. As a capacitor is discharged the voltage, or power delivery level, drops at an exponential rate whereas a battery will maintain the voltage level for a far longer length of time.

It is an amazing material with a lot of practical applications, such as the fact that it's 100 times stronger than an equivalent sheet of steel, but there are a lot of details to be worked out before it will replace a battery.

Ishmael

 

[sigh]

The reason we cannot agree anymore rests in Bastiat's "Broken Window" sophism.

You Liberals just see "technology." We Libertarians look at the Economic impact. The difference is very clear; private sector efforts are measured studied gambles with failure affecting only those directly involved, which weeds out a lot of the impractical, the pipe dream and the not yet ready for a paradigm change ideas (because they could not possibly compete with the known as a substitute good).

Government, on the other hand, takes Capital away from the private sector (stripping it first for overhead) and then doles it out to the aforementioned improbables, often on the basis of crony connections or upon the quid pro quo of where can I manufacture votes for my (my party's) reelection.

I think this is as much a reason as to why we can no longer talk; our politics have been so divorced from economic reality as to destroy the whole fabric of our society in the fighting for slices from a shrinking pie and seeing someone else get a piece means that you will not be sated by your slice.

And many breakthrough inventions are yes, costly at first, that's why we rely on the 1%, to seed the rise in volume which decreases the cost over time.

As for the new bulbs mandated by government. The light sucks, they burn out too quick and then I have to hazmat them and I know most of the common folk are not, so what exactly did government save us?

AJ, there are many inventions whose initial development were funded by the government that are now being produced profitably by private enterprise.

I could easily point to a dozen or more pharmaceuticals that fit this description. Had we waited for the 1% (those who run the pharmaceutical companies) to invest in them it would have never happened, primarily because at their outset, it was believed, through their "measured studies", that if carried forward, their benefit would apply to too small a percentage of the population to be profitable. In this case, the price paid for their failure would affect far more people than those who made that choice. The government took over and funded development of what were originally orphan drugs, but which now are quite profitable with wider applications. And lots of lives have been saved in the process. Boooo. Bad, evil government.

I don't like the new bulbs either. Didn't I say that? Why are you dissing me for that?

I am NOT in favor of the government "doling out" (as you say) money for research into directed projects (like green tech), but it's stupid to say (as the poster in response to your linked article did) that the results of research are somehow better if it's initially funded by the private sector. Results are results. Their application is the same. Private companies can take those results and run with them (or tweak them a bit to skirt patent law). Once the results are there, once the potential is seen, it can't be hidden again.

If research is driven solely by profit, much research would never begin. You're right. If you feel that only privately funded research is correct, then we'll never reach a middle ground, and we'll never be able to get anything done again as a country, but understand that it's not me sitting stubbornly, unwilling to bend. I see that there can be value in both approaches.

I admit (and have done so many times) that I've learned a great deal that's of value from conservatives in my life. You've changed a basic part of what is now me, and I'm grateful for that. I'm not your enemy, as much as you seem to think I am.

 

[sigh]

Graphene has been known for decades now, the breakthrough in this case is not the discovery of the material, or it's properties, it's the method of fabrication. A method that seems simple enough to make practical, economical, applications of the material possible.

The recharge rate is a little on the practical optimistic side to say the least. The use of graphene to make a practical capacitor does not mean that the laws of physics are put on hold. The inrush current, without some means of moderation, could exceed 10,000 Amps, enough to blow the breakers on the power distribution network at the neighborhood level. And there is also the issue of the thermal properties of the material and how high the temperature will rise in the device with that level of in-rush current.

There is also the issue of the time constant of the circuit, both in charging and discharging. A capacitor behaves far differently than a battery. As a capacitor is discharged the voltage, or power delivery level, drops at an exponential rate whereas a battery will maintain the voltage level for a far longer length of time.

It is an amazing material with a lot of practical applications, such as the fact that it's 100 times stronger than an equivalent sheet of steel, but there are a lot of details to be worked out before it will replace a battery.

Ishmael

They can spread it into sheets one molecule thick. That's just......wow.

 

[rosco rathbone]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y8IkO-G5ai4#t=01m45s

 

[WeedSmoke420]

interesting..

 

[Bad_Doggie]

It last two posts, well done.

Woof!

 

[WeedSmoke420]

funny username ^^

 

[4est_4est_Gump]

Researchers have demonstrated a flat, "stretchy" battery that can be pulled to three times its size without a loss in performance.

While flexible and stretchable electronics have been on the rise, powering them with equally stretchy energy sources has been problematic.

The new idea in Nature Communications uses small "islands" of energy-storing materials dotted on a stretchy polymer.

The study also suggests the batteries can be recharged wirelessly.

In a sense, the battery is a latecomer to the push toward flexible, stretchable electronics. A number of applications have been envisioned for flexible devices, from implantable health monitors to roll-up displays.

But consumer products that fit the bendy, stretchy description are still very few - in part, because there have been no equally stretchy, rechargeable power sources for them.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-21585817

 

[4est_4est_Gump]

AJ, there are many inventions whose initial development were funded by the government that are now being produced profitably by private enterprise.

I could easily point to a dozen or more pharmaceuticals that fit this description. Had we waited for the 1% (those who run the pharmaceutical companies) to invest in them it would have never happened, primarily because at their outset, it was believed, through their "measured studies", that if carried forward, their benefit would apply to too small a percentage of the population to be profitable. In this case, the price paid for their failure would affect far more people than those who made that choice. The government took over and funded development of what were originally orphan drugs, but which now are quite profitable with wider applications. And lots of lives have been saved in the process. Boooo. Bad, evil government.

I don't like the new bulbs either. Didn't I say that? Why are you dissing me for that?

I am NOT in favor of the government "doling out" (as you say) money for research into directed projects (like green tech), but it's stupid to say (as the poster in response to your linked article did) that the results of research are somehow better if it's initially funded by the private sector. Results are results. Their application is the same. Private companies can take those results and run with them (or tweak them a bit to skirt patent law). Once the results are there, once the potential is seen, it can't be hidden again.

If research is driven solely by profit, much research would never begin. You're right. If you feel that only privately funded research is correct, then we'll never reach a middle ground, and we'll never be able to get anything done again as a country, but understand that it's not me sitting stubbornly, unwilling to bend. I see that there can be value in both approaches.

I admit (and have done so many times) that I've learned a great deal that's of value from conservatives in my life. You've changed a basic part of what is now me, and I'm grateful for that. I'm not your enemy, as much as you seem to think I am.

No, economically they are not and that is why we cannot agree on anything.

Liberals could give a rat's ass about the negative effects of the positive interferences of government upon the Middle Class. However, the Libs will go on to great lengths about how it is disappearing and how government need to do more to mitigate the evils of Capitalistic distribution of goods and services and the efficiencies which it provides, which can be easily demonstrated to be greatly injurious to the economy and has been done so repeatedly since the time of Adam Smith, be it Wicksteed, von Humboldt or the Austrians.

As long as you can cherry-pick one or two isolated examples, then you think that makes your argument correct, because all that you see is the hired glazier, not the tailor who did not get an order for a new suit. But you never stop to think, what would have occurred had government not confiscated a portion of the lives (and that is exactly what taxation is, you trade your life for wages and then the government takes your money, and that is precisely where a Liberal stops thinking, it is only money, but it is not, it is a chit upon a portion of your life which you surrendered to have the Capital to improve the quality of your and your family's lives) of the Middle Class and given it to friends of government?

Further reading:
Bastiat - http://mises.org/daily/3804
to Krugman - http://mises.org/daily/5593/The-BrokenWindow-Fallacy