Different battery's

[BernieQ2]

Was talking to some people the other day (trying o sell me) a solar battery setup .
The battery's are Base Oxide , Cotton , and Salt water , they are modular and can be soc'ed down to 75/80 % depth of charge .
Anyone know of these ?
Bernie .

[T1 Terry]

Are these for residential grid tie or off grid use? They sound like Aquion cells, the brain child of Professor Jay Whitacre and supported by some of the biggest names in global green financing like Bill Gates, Bright Capital, Foundation Capital and a number of others. Far too heavy for RV use but certainly promising for residential grid back up and off grid. http://aquionenergy.com/homeowners/solar-battery/

[BernieQ2]

Yes grid only Terry I should have mentioned that bit, the small offer says 7.2KW hours storage .
As we have solar I was thinking of off grid maybe?
Bernie .
Just heading off to meet Kay so will be gone for a bit .

[BernieQ2]

Yep your right Terry Aquion is on the pamphlet .
Any thought on off grid , what sort of KW hours needed ?
Bernie .

[T1 Terry]

Yep your right Terry Aquion is on the pamphlet .
Any thought on off grid , what sort of KW hours needed ?
Bernie .

What price are they quoting per kWh of storage? To figure out how much you need, look at your last power bills over the last 12 mths to get an idea of your highest daily useage, 1 1/2 to 2 times that is about the base requirement, then consider how many days you get long stretches of cloudy over cast days, if more than 2 days in row you need a days standby capacity for each extra day.... or a generator to top up the batteries when there is no sun.
How much solar do you have?

[BernieQ2]

I have 3kw of solar Terry 12 panels .
They don't give a price on the pamphlet , cunning I guess but that's what they do to suck some in . They do say as little as $25 per week , but that's to buy the whole lot panels and all .
Still waiting for my last bill (3 weeks now) have spoke to them but they just say its in the system .....yer haha .
We don't really get a bill just the receipt as we have a account with them . Bills usually around the $200 mark .
We also read our own meters they just send the paper work we fill in the numbers and post back .
Bernie .

[T1 Terry]

So look at the highest use period, divide by the number of days for the period to get a daily use pattern. 3kW of solar will give you around 8kW to 10kW battery charging per day in mid winter full sun days, double that or more in summer. If you feel adventurous you could take readings at sun down and again at sun up each day so you know how much you use over night, from there you can calculate if you have enough solar to go off grid or if you need a grid back up. Unless you use very little electricity I doubt 3kW will be enough for off grid

[BernieQ2]

Thanks Terry it was just a thought .
How do these batteries work ?
Bernie .

[T1 Terry]

Thanks Terry it was just a thought .
How do these batteries work ?
Bernie .

ummm....... They are still an ion transfer battery similar to the lithium batteries, but they use a different combination of chemicals from each end of the periodic table and salt water as the electrolyte. It is the ions in the salt that carry the charge or discharge from one plate to the other. Salt water is a bit of a misleading claim as the immediate assumption is the salt water is sea water, but it is a different combination of salts, some of each salt found in sea water but in very different concentration to create the ion exchange.
Most of the battery is built from recycled material and all the components are fully recyclable so they are a "green" battery, the price in the US makes them very competitive with lithium but I think transport costs and possibly a tad of price gouging makes them more expensive than lithium in Australia..... well a battery built from individual cells with a control system attached rather than some of the lithium batteries available from the commercial suppliers, lots of price gouging occurring there.