Electricnick, The EV Revolution

Electric vehicles, EV rely on batteries alone to propel them, but battery technology could use a little help.

The gist, if you have been reading our blog, you know about the use of ultracapacitors in EV and hybrids, HEV.  Think of a car that would minimize the use of regular batteries by tapping on the ultracapacitors to deliver quick bursts of accelerations.  Why is it so important?  Because you would maximize the life of regular batteries.  Ultracapacitors also have the good taste to charge quickly, which is a plus for regenerative braking, are lighter and more energy dense than lithium battery.  And yes, discharge as quickly making it a good idea to combine them with regular batteries.  One kicks in while the other goes off-line, giving it some rest.  Sounds like the holy grail?  Maybe.

Hybrid batteries will be part of the future, and CleanTech Media sees it a also.  Think of AFS Trinity’s amazing feast of squeezing 150 mpg with SUVs with lithium batteries lasting 180,000 miles.  Not too many gas company can claim their engines lasting that long.

Ultracapacitors Joins Force With Other Batteries.  Dileep Agnihotri, CEO of Graphene Energy believes that: “The combination of ultracapacitors and batteries is the future,”.  The company has been working on ultracapacitor using graphene, a planar form of pure carbon and has built experimental cells with hopes of prototypes in a few months.  The plans are to deliver them to car makers in the near future.

The Players.  So far the players are EEStor who is providing them for the ZENN car, as well as Freescale working with McLaren on a Kinetic Energy Recovery Systems for Formula 1 and APowerCap Technologies.

This is good news hearing more about the use of ultracaps in EVs.