Climate in the 21st Century

Here is stuff policy makers can use, just the cheap batteries for energy storage and EVs are all that is required at this point. We have the means to generate the power from renewables for the most part, solar in particular for most of the global population. The world's poorest people, in tropical and subtropical countries should benefit the most by using solar and batteries and it will be cheapest for them too.


A new study by the Mercator Research Institute on Global Commons and Climate Change (MCC) indicates that affordable and eco-friendly energy options have gotten much cheaper to install in the last 10 years — so much so that they might just be all we need by 2050, Interesting Engineering reports.

It’s an optimistic prediction but not unfounded. The Berlin-based climate research institute just released its study results, which showed that thanks to a growing industry and improving technology, there’s been an 87% drop in the cost of solar panels and an 85% drop in the price of battery storage.

Batteries and energy-storage sites are essential in a system that relies on clean sources like solar and wind for power since they only produce energy when there’s enough light or wind.

With the falling price of the solar panels themselves and the improved performance of both, this means that the largest costs associated with solar energy have become almost 90% less costly, making it much easier for individuals, businesses, and governments to adopt the technology.

“Some calculations even suggest that the world’s entire energy consumption in 2050 could be completely and cost-effectively covered by solar technology and other renewables,” Felix Creutzig, lead author of the study, said in a press release. Creutzig heads the MCC working group Land Use, Infrastructure, and Transport.

That’s the shortest time possible, and a full transition will probably take longer. Still, any steps in that direction will be helpful. Solar panels and other clean energy sources save users money — in fact, some people even make money selling energy back to the grid via net metering.

Meanwhile, solar, wind, water, and similar energy sources don’t produce heat-trapping air pollution like oil, gas, and coal do. Switching to these clean options is crucial if we’re going to stop the Earth’s rising temperature and the unstable weather that goes along with it.

“This is an extremely optimistic scenario — but it illustrates that the future is open,” said Creutzig. “Climate science, which provides policymakers with guidance in its scenario models, must reflect technical progress as closely as possible. Our study is intended to provide input for this.”

I'm not selling solar power stations! I was looking at how much power they claimed to output and was thinking that something like that might be particularly suited to Canada for the home and farm market. Everything is included in the container and with some insulation and sodium batteries it could operate at under -30 degrees C. Some assembly required, but the container can serve as the foundation for a seasonally adjustable solar array. The batteries and electronics in the container store and manage the power for the home and EV a simple solution packed in a container and deployed on site with a minimum of fuss. Only a portion of the container needs to be used for batteries and power management, just one end, the rest could be a garden shed. Once they have cheap sodium batteries and even better and cheaper solar panels, I wonder how much one of these would cost from China in 5 or 10 years with no tariffs. Sodium batteries work much better at -20 and 30 where today's LI-ion batteries are useless.

When you consider the expense of installing a solar system on your roof and the difficulty of snow removal, this one stop solution could be an attractive and more economical solution for many rural and even suburban customers. This one can provide a 200-amp entrance, enough to charge a couple of small EVs and run a home. This particular product is aimed at recharging EVs in remote locations, but it can easily be adapted to run a house or small farm. It could be designed as plug and play after unpacking the solar panels and supporting structure from the container and assembly, then just plugging cables into connectors should be all that is required.


EV Charging Station | Mobile Modular

Canada to invest C$1bn in Umicore plant

First of its kind in North America

The government of Canada and the province of Ontario have announced they will be investing C$1 billion into a unit of Umicore’s battery plant, Ottawa.

The plant will manufacture cathode active materials (CAM) and precursor active materials (pCAM), which are critical components for EV batteries. It is the first of its kind in North America.

The Government of Canada is offering an investment of up to C$551.3 million, and the Government of Ontario is investing up to C$424.6 million.

The Honourable Doug Ford, Premier of Ontario said: "Umicore's investment represents another strong vote of confidence in our rapidly growing electric vehicle and battery supply chain. Together, with our government, industry and labour partners, we're putting our auto sector back on the map, attracting billions of dollars in new investments, creating thousands of good-paying jobs and ensuring the cars of the future will be made in Ontario, from start to finish."

Mathias Miedreich, CEO of Umicore said: "Umicore is proud of, and delighted with, the unwavering support and financial backing of Canada and Ontario. Their readiness to co-fund our investment coupled with the announcement of our first customer contract for the Loyalist plant mean we can forge ahead with the construction. We are committed to being a reliable transformation partner for the automotive and battery industry and a trustworthy neighbor for communities in Ontario."
In the project's first stage, the company says it will employ 600 people, with an additional 700 co-op positions for students will be created throughout the project. This will make Umicore one of the largest private employers in Eastern Ontario.

The full project has the potential to produce enough battery materials to support the production of over 800,000 EVs per year.

"Canada to invest C$1bn in Umicore plant" was originally created and published by Just Auto, a GlobalData owned brand.

I think the weak link the petroleum fuel system will be gas stations they make the least amount of profit from the system and are on the consumer end. Depending on the country, as EV sales increase gas stations will gradually go out of business, except for those who sell diesel to truckers and other businesses will probably sell gas too. Norway has gone almost completely EV or hybrid for light vehicles and gas stations should be getting rare there and gasoline demand for the country is very low. European countries import all their gas from abroad and driving distances are generally shorter, so EVs are more practical there. The next generation of batteries that offer better power densities, lower costs and better low temperature performance should finish off ICE light vehicles in most places. The rise of EVs over the next decade will affect gas prices and availability, charging points will be more common than gas stations and charging will be fast, at least for a compact car.

The daily average commute is not that far and as far as getting to work and doing local running around an EV should do just fine for the vast majority of people. As batteries and performance increase so will range, however even a solar recharged car could meet the daily range requirements of most people using the sun alone, as long as the EV was efficient enough. Doubling the power density of the batteries halves their weight and vastly improves the efficiency of the EV and with solar cell improvements should lead to compact cars that can recharge off the sun and many people in warmer places would never need to plug them in.


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The Daily Average



Therefore, the average daily driving distance for passenger vehicles alone by country are:
Australia is 34km.
The US is 42km.
The UK is 32.8km.
The EU is 32.9km.
Canada is 37.9km.
and Japan is 25.4km.

Improved cheaper and more flexible solar cells will be coming in the next decade and it is very likely we will see batteries exceed 1000Wh/kg with a corresponding increase in volumetric energy density. These two factors will make solar rechargeable EVs of a more conventional design feasible. Such a compact car could generate an average of a Kilowatt for an average of 10 hours a day giving its battery a charge of 10kWh. If such a compact EV got 10km/kWh, it would have a solar recharge range of 100km, far more than the average daily commute which is less than 50km, even in America. Such an EV would meet the basic needs to 80% of the population or more, even in America, and people in warmer climates would never need to plug it in. In Canada you might have to plug it in every second day during winter for a few months depending on the weather and how much you drove.

A compact hatch back for a reasonable price that requires no charging and represents free transportation in a very low maintenance vehicle sounds like a winner to me. The lighter and more powerful batteries get the more feasible such a vehicle becomes, especially if it has a 5 to 800km fully charged range. A battery with a gravimetric energy density of 1000Wh in a vehicle that got 10km/kWh would weigh 100kg (220lb) and have a 1000km range, and a 50kg (110lb) battery for 500km or range. BTW, less battery less materials and less cost. Right now, some EVs are so heavy with battery weight that they wear out their tires faster.

Currently, the biggest hurdle for electric vehicles, or EVs, is the development of advanced battery technology to extend driving range, safety and reliability.

New research has shown how a novel lithium-based electrolyte material (Li9N2Cl3) can be used to develop solid-state batteries that charge faster and store more energy than conventional designs. Experiments revealed the solid-electrolyte was not only stable in normal air environments, but it also inhibited the growth of dendrites — dangerous, branchlike formations that cause batteries to catch fire.

Oak Ridge National Laboratory scientist Jue Liu conducted neutron experiments to observe how lithium moved through the material.

“The material’s dry air stability, efficient lithium-ion transport, and high compatibility toward metallic lithium are crucial advances. It’s the best of both worlds,” he said. “It offers all the performance benefits of liquid-electrolyte batteries that we use every day, but it’s safer and more reliable.”

Lithium-compatible and air-stable vacancy-rich Li9N2Cl3 for high–areal capacity, long-cycling all–solid-state lithium metal batteries

Originally published on the Oak Ridge National Laboratory website. By Jue Liu, Neutron Scattering Scientist

If in 5 years, it costs you 50 cents for the solar panels to generate a kilowatt of power, does it make sense to pay 16 or 20 cents a kilowatt from the utility? I mean storing it might cost $50 a kilowatt for a battery that last 25 years, but the cost of the system can be amortized over its lifetime vs how many kilowatts you would consume for the home and transportation with an EV. It seems to me a lot of private utilities could be in trouble as their prosumers become more empowered with energy and politically. This looks disruptive to utilities as well as oil companies because the model is starting to make economic sense for more people as still cheaper and better solar come online along with mass produced batteries which EV production are stimulating, because there is a big home battery & power system market too. The PV, batteries and electronics are all dropping in price with new tech and mass production. This stuff will appeal to home and apartment building owners the most and it can at least offset energy costs for a home or building.

I figure utilities will feel the effects from their rural and semi-rural customers first, rural power rates are higher, and they have the land or rooftops for solar, but there is plenty of PV capacity on suburban roof tops too. Including transport in the picture is important too because just home power replacement or even supplementing might not be worth it but add in charging an EV or two then the kilowatts used go way up.

Why would they even need government money for this to make economic sense. With government money they are paying 3 million to save a half million a year in energy cost, a 7-year payback time on a PV system with a 25-year life expectancy.


Here, with no land available for a solar farm, city planner Joe Seaman-Graves looked to an unused 14-acre reservoir in his town, according to a PBS report. A floating solar energy system is slated to be completed in Cohoes, which has a population of about 17,000, this year at a cost of about $6 million to $6.5 million. PBS reported that the federal government and other incentives are covering about half the cost.

The price tag to get a floating system running is higher than other solar operations, and experts are studying aquatic ecosystems to ensure the projects don’t impact life under the water. Once completed, however, the returns can be great. The solar energy system in Cohoes could power the town’s government buildings and street lighting, realizing a $500,000 yearly savings, all per PBS.

Here is your world

Here is your climate change

People won't transition to green tech unless it makes sense to do so and if affordable. At the moment it doesn't make sense for most people, but it soon will, and batteries will be the key and I figure will beat the expert projections, just like solar did and is doing. Better batteries are essential for practical EVs, now their batteries are so large and heavy they wear the tires out faster than on an ICE vehicle, the large weight makes their overall efficiency suck, but it looks like we will be able to get the same amount of power for a quarter the mass and volume for EV applications while dropping the costs of other battery types used in stationary applications. Several recent studies have shown that PV and other renewables can do the job or a lot of it and that makes good cheap batteries even more imperative. There is so much battery R&D going on globally that it is hard to keep track and breakthroughs are happening all the time. These are not just new chemistries, but ways of improving existing batteries or converting existing plants and the volume of research coming out of the field is staggering, new companies are forming while factories go up with mega corporations betting the farm on the future.

Batteries, batteries and the engineering struggle to keep vehicle weight down because of them, radical designs and expensive materials are required. Lighter more power dense batteries mean more conventional designs and materials can be used, but bigger heavier EVs will always use more energy and take longer to recharge no matter how good batteries get.


Let's talk about the timeline for the truck of the future....

If you look at the past 20 years not much has changed technologically except for faster computers and better cellphones and networks as the communication revolution becomes entrenched. The next 20 years will be a lot different, and we are at the very beginning of an energy revolution that will change the way we power our society. From the cars we drive to the power source for all our domestic needs will be electric and by 2040 a lot of people globally will be making and storing their own. Smaller solar recharged cars should be popular for purely pragmatic and economic reasons as battery technology improves. A lot of farming will also be electric, as farmers take advantage of their land and buildings to generate solar or wind power. They and other people will do this because it makes economic sense to do so and by then it will have been well over a decade since it was that way, it already is now in many cases.

Of course they are, CEOs are paid on the basis of short-term gain, and they make money from acquisitions too, not long-term investments, they will have made their fortunes and will be long gone in a few years at most. The incentives are all wrong and we continue to subsidize the fossil fuel industry to the tune of tens of billions a year while they make hundreds of billions in profit. If the incentives given to fossil fuel were put into green energy, we would be fully converted in no time at all. The problem is we are not there with the battery technology yet and the renewables industry could not absorb the massive amount of money, yet.

Technology usually has a propensity to concentrate money and power, but renewables, EVs and new battery technologies promise to break some of that concentration and redistribute wealth more. Some people pay for NG or oil to heat their homes and hot water, electricity for lights and appliances and gasoline for their car. All those energy sources will soon be rolled into one that many people can generate and store themselves, or a significant portion of the electric energy they use. These technologies should disrupt oil and utility companies by removing many of their customers or by empowering electrical prosumers for a better deal from utility companies. Especially those who produce more power than they consume, charging them for anything will be difficult and nonprofit or cooperate utilities should do much better in such an environment.

Most electricity can be made by renewables and light vehicles will be EVs with trucks and trains to follow. Green steel can be made by green hydrogen and that is getting cheaper all the time using solar and or PV electric catalysts that drive up efficiency. Likewise, there are green ways of making cement with far fewer CO2 emissions. Even short haul civil aviation can be electrified, and we appear to be on the cusp of having the batteries to do it. If half the number of ships on the sea by switching to renewables, many of those left could be run by alternative means., but global shipping emissions are halved by not transporting oil for fuel, or nearly as much of it like that used to fuel jet aviation. Smaller local vessels like ferries, coastal shipping and fishing boats can be more easily converted to electric then transoceanic vessels.

There are ways of reaching the CO2 targets, but it needs the batteries to be deployed and incrementally improved to their theoretical limits or as close to it as we can get. Just a fraction of the subsidies given to oil companies every year would finance much of the conversion to a green economy, but the industry must be scaled up to absorb it efficiently which is happening now. Several recent studies have demonstrated the feasibility of going renewable, especially solar, batteries are the main bottleneck and an improved smart evolved grid with long distance HVDC interconnectors and able to manage local distributed generation and storage by suburban, light industrial and rural prosumers.

welp last was a doozey for Acapulco, Mx.........started as a tropical storm and in less than 24hr turned into a monster CAT 5, some are saying it was the largest one in history hitting that area......

71% of Americans believe the climate crisis is harming people now, poll shows

Let's talk about water, ice, and Antarctica....


Here is the impact of a 10-foot seal level rise.

Blue is under water and reds and oranges are vulnerable areas, vulnerable to storms and further seal level rise.

The breakthroughs in battery R&D continue regularly these days as massive amounts of money is being poured into research by governments automakers and others.



Lithium ceramic for batteries can be synthesized at low temperatures without the need for sintering.
A lithium ceramic could act as a solid electrolyte in a more powerful and cost-efficient generation of rechargeable lithium-ion batteries. The challenge is to find a production method that works without sintering at high temperatures. In a paper recently published in the journal Angewandte Chemie, a research team has introduced a sinter-free method for the efficient, low-temperature synthesis of these ceramics in a conductive crystalline form.

The Evolution of Electric Vehicle Batteries
Two factors dominate the development of batteries for electric vehicles: power, which determines the vehicle range; and cost, which is critical in the competition with internal combustion engines. The US Department of Energy aims to accelerate the transition from gasoline-powered vehicles to electric vehicles and has set ambitious goals for reducing production costs and increasing the energy density of batteries by 2030. These targets cannot be achieved with conventional lithium-ion batteries.