Silicon will blow lithium batteries out of water, says Adelaide firm
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Chairman Kevin Moriarty says 1414 Degrees' process can store 500 kilowatt hours of energy in a 70-centimetre cube of molten silicon – about 36 times as much energy as Tesla's 14KWh Powerwall 2 lithium ion home storage battery in about the same space.
Put another way, he says the company can build a 10MWh storage device for about $700,000. The 714 Tesla Powerwall 2s that would be needed to store the same amount of energy would cost $7 million before volume discounts.
A race is underway to develop new types of batteries and, for the foreseeable future, there is room for a number of competing technologies. The reason for this is the pace of innovation is slower than in other sectors but also because energy storage is required for widely differing sectors. Batteries need to be small and light for handheld devices, big and have almost infinite recharging capabilities for utilities and need highly efficient power to weight ratios for transportation. That suggests there is ample potential for a number of different technologies to play roles in all of these sectors.
The 1414 battery is a utility scale battery and it could potentially be more efficient than Tesla’s Powerwall because Tesla’s technology was originally designed for transportation. There are a number of technologies competing in the utility sector because the argument for streamlining power production makes compelling financial sense for the sector. In the current system utilities have to maintain a great deal of spare capacity to cater to peak demand cycles. Storage has the potential to change that dynamic which would reduce emissions but also boost profits for utilities.
However because utility batteries sacrifice low density for scale they are often inappropriate for transportation which is an equally competitive emerging field and one in which Tesla/Panasonic have a significant competitive advantage now that the gigafactory is up and running.
Tesla has risen sharply to test the upper side of its three-year range since announcing the gigafactory was completed on time. Since the announcement it was building the factory contributed to the loss of momentum in the share price three years ago, the question now is how well it can capitalise on that investment as focus turns to the delivery schedule for the Model 3.