[HN Gopher] The price of batteries has declined by 97% in the la...
       ___________________________________________________________________
        
       The price of batteries has declined by 97% in the last three
       decades
        
       Author : infodocket
       Score  : 133 points
       Date   : 2021-06-07 21:06 UTC (1 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (ourworldindata.org)
 (TXT) w3m dump (ourworldindata.org)
        
       | halotrope wrote:
       | This is nothing short of remarkable. Now lets hope that inflation
       | does not make them 97% more expensive again.
        
         | ceejayoz wrote:
         | We've had inflation during the entire three decades this
         | decline took place over.
        
           | JohnJamesRambo wrote:
           | We've had inflation yes, but what about second inflation?
        
             | [deleted]
        
           | halotrope wrote:
           | Check out lumber
        
             | ceejayoz wrote:
             | A short term supply shock in one unrelated item seems
             | unlikely to change the trend in battery prices.
        
             | bananabreakfast wrote:
             | That's not inflation. Inflation doesn't just affect a
             | single commodity, it affects all commodities.
        
       | stevejb wrote:
       | I just bought a 12v 200ah battery for $2300 AUD. It could be done
       | for less, but this was a premium model. Hopefully when I purchase
       | a second one in a year or two, it will be a bit cheaper.
        
         | megablast wrote:
         | Ive seen them on ebay for $850. Seem premium too. From a
         | company that has been around for 12 years.
         | 
         | I wanted to get one for my boat, but they are the wrong size.
         | They seem to make them longer, instead of wider, so can't drop
         | in replace the 2x100ah I have now.
        
         | quickthrower2 wrote:
         | What's the application? Sounds like the capacity of a standard
         | $200 (yes AUD) car battery. I guess you want to hold onto that
         | energy for a long time?
        
           | CameronNemo wrote:
           | Lead acid batteries can emit fumes, so they are not useful in
           | the same settings as li-ion batteries.
        
             | zabzonk wrote:
             | Aren't most lead-acid batteries sealed? The one in my
             | mobility scooter certainly is.
        
       | quickthrowman wrote:
       | I've been buying 18650 cells for 6 years and they're always the
       | same price _shrug_
        
         | colechristensen wrote:
         | Has the capacity gone up?
        
       | cm2187 wrote:
       | That's not the price of batteries in general, that's the price of
       | Li-Ion batteries. Were Li-Ion batteries mass produced in 1991?
        
         | reportingsjr wrote:
         | The first commercial/mass produced lithium ion batteries came
         | out in exactly 1991 as a matter of fact! They were used in a
         | Sony camera.
        
         | HarryHirsch wrote:
         | They were not. In 1998, the second edition of
         | Greenwood/Earnshaw's chemistry textbook came out, a magisterial
         | survey of inorganic chemistry. They state that the major use
         | for lithium is in lithium grease, but "looking to the future,
         | Li/FeSx battery systems are emerging as a potentially viable
         | energy storage system ... and a ... source of power for
         | electric cars". The 1991 edition did not talk about batteries
         | at all.
        
         | xkjkls wrote:
         | There's a graph there on market size, which shows the market
         | size has grown 50,000x since 91.
        
           | colechristensen wrote:
           | This is a sort of meaningless metric, you can adjust your
           | time frame to make the market size arbitrarily small because
           | it was 0 before 1991.
        
         | elihu wrote:
         | The other commenter says that they were first introduced as a
         | commercial product in 1991.
         | 
         | According to Wikipedia, they were preceded by two years by the
         | first commercially-available nickel-metal hydride cells in
         | 1989, so that would be an interesting point of comparison. Also
         | nickel-cadmium and lead-acid have been around for a very long
         | time.
         | 
         | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nickel%E2%80%93metal_hydride_b...
        
           | stormbrew wrote:
           | I remember a lot of stuff having NiMH for a long time
           | throughout the 90s, seemed like it took LiIon a lot longer to
           | catch on.
        
       | sanj wrote:
       | This is very close to 10% per year.
        
       | dukeofdoom wrote:
       | Thanks to all the lonely women out there. Mass producing good
       | vibrations has gotten cheaper.
        
       | squarefoot wrote:
       | Although Li-Ion cells are getting cheaper and cheaper every year,
       | it still is worth salvaging the good ones from depleted laptop
       | battery packs. When a laptop battery pack is gone it's almost
       | always the case of one, max two, 18650 elements that failed, not
       | the whole pack. I've built some good power banks using empty
       | shells (very cheap on Ebay, Aliexpress etc.) and fitting inside
       | the good cells salvaged that way. They last just like new ones
       | once one discards the bad ones. The only caveat is that cells
       | taken from laptop battery packs are not individually protected,
       | that is, they don't employ the small pcb containing a protection
       | against excessive charge, discharge, temperature, short circuit,
       | etc. because the needed circuitry is already contained in the
       | laptop battery pack. Power bank shells do indeed contain such
       | protection, so no problems, but care must be taken into
       | insulating the cells contacts so they cannot short, and before
       | fitting them the user must charge each of them to a known
       | identical voltage, so that once they're put in parallel
       | (remember: no individual protection) the strongest ones won't
       | discharge their energy on weaker ones.
        
         | orhmeh09 wrote:
         | Does this require special knowledge and experience? I would be
         | afraid to try it myself as I suspect that I or my devices would
         | be harmed, either in the process or later on.
        
           | squarefoot wrote:
           | Yes, it does. It's not rocket science, but one must know what
           | he is doing, and as with everything that can become really
           | dangerous, it is better to err on the side of safety.
           | 
           | To my knowledge, this is the best informational site around
           | regarding various battery technologies (including Lithium),
           | and how to use them safely.
           | 
           | https://batteryuniversity.com/learn/
        
         | quickthrower2 wrote:
         | Does this come with a "know what you are doing" caveat? I'd be
         | scared of creating an electric firelighter in the process.
         | 
         | Also assuming money is no object. Is it as good for the
         | environment to recycle the old battery and buy a refurbed one.
        
           | Syonyk wrote:
           | > _Does this come with a "know what you are doing" caveat?_
           | 
           | Yes, and I'll suggest that a disturbingly large fraction of
           | the people doing this on YouTube don't know what they're
           | doing, and are being brutally unsafe with the batteries, even
           | if it works.
           | 
           | I've done battery pack rebuilding semi-professionally for a
           | few years (I was rebuilding ebike packs for most of North
           | America from about 2015 to 2018), and the people screwing
           | around with the used/recycled cells scare the hell out of me.
           | In no particular order:
           | 
           | * They don't care to invest in a spot welder and they solder
           | directly to the terminals. Every datasheet out there for
           | 18650s that mentions soldering says the same thing: "DO NOT
           | solder directly to our terminals." You spot weld a strip on
           | and then solder to that. Soldering to the terminal puts a ton
           | of heat into the end of the battery which then flows into the
           | cell windings. The separator is usually plastic. You really
           | don't want to weaken it. With a spot welder, I can put my
           | finger on the terminal immediately after spot welding, and I
           | can spread out the welds in time. If I want three welds (six
           | spots) on a terminal, I can do one weld on each cell, then
           | come back for the rest, and keep the temperature "comfortable
           | to a fingertip." I cannot do that soldering.
           | 
           | * They tend to take a single snapshot of cell capacity,
           | _maybe_ internal resistance, and then assign cells that way.
           | Unless they organize them by wrapper color for aesthetics,
           | ignoring the cell capacity and behaviors. Some cell
           | chemistries will degrade far faster than others, and you 'd
           | ideally like to not have a mess of stuff in the same pack.
           | 
           | * They recharge dead cells with no idea how long they've been
           | dead. Lithium cells are physically stressed at full charge
           | and fully empty, and a cell that has been empty for a while
           | may have very real internal physical damage, such that it
           | will fail later. I won't charge anything under 2.5V unless I
           | know _exactly_ how and when it got there, and if it 's much
           | below 2.0V, I still won't put voltage to it. The risk of a
           | lithium battery runaway and fire is too high for my tastes.
           | Lithium battery runaways, beyond lighting stuff on fire, tend
           | to emit things like HF, which you very definitely don't want
           | to breathe. It doesn't hurt a bit while it's killing you,
           | because it destroys the nerves first. Health-wise, you're
           | actually better off if the battery venting is flaming,
           | because the mixture of gases coming off that is somewhat less
           | toxic. Again, it depends on the particular chemistry what you
           | get. It's never anything friendly.
           | 
           | Unfortunately, "recycling" lithium batteries isn't really
           | established yet, and most of what seems to pass for
           | "recycling" is the cells getting shipped to China, having new
           | ends put on to hide the spot welds, and then getting a shiny
           | wrapper and sold with impossible capacities to vapers for
           | $0.75 or something silly. The highest capacity 18650s are
           | around 3600-3800mAh, and don't source an awful lot of amps in
           | the deal. Anything claiming higher (again, in the 18650 form
           | factor) is certainly a lie.
           | 
           | You can do it, if you're careful, but by the time you've
           | properly characterized the batteries, I'm not convinced it's
           | worth the time/effort. Those who claim it is tend to skip a
           | lot of checks and be really, really casual with their packs.
           | To their credit, they rarely catch fire, but the whole "DIY
           | Powerwall" crowd using scavenged and abused cells is not a
           | good example to follow.
        
           | strbean wrote:
           | I replied with some questions about the safety of this, as I
           | had some concerns when reading it.
           | 
           | Aside from the issue I mentioned in reply, the only real
           | caveat would be "know the basics of working with electronics
           | without shorting things or electrocuting yourself" and "check
           | out some youtube videos on rebuilding 18650 packs so you
           | don't do it in a horribly wrong way".
        
             | Syonyk wrote:
             | > _" check out some youtube videos on rebuilding 18650
             | packs so you don't do it in a horribly wrong way"._
             | 
             | Bad idea, because about 90% of what they do is fine, and
             | 10% is very, very wrong. Unless you know what you're doing,
             | it's almost impossible to tell which is which.
        
               | strbean wrote:
               | Fair enough. I haven't seen any of the 10%, but I'm sure
               | they're out there. As an alternative to saying "go find
               | info", how's this:
               | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3KDiecphUk8 ?
               | 
               | I just gave it a quick skip through, but the guy seems to
               | know the correct approach.
        
               | Syonyk wrote:
               | If someone on YouTube is soldering directly to terminals,
               | in any form, they're badly wrong and I wouldn't trust the
               | rest of their judgement.
               | 
               | I'm not going to evaluate someone's YouTube video on
               | battery repair, sorry. There's no way I can "skip through
               | it" and have any sense of what they're doing, and I
               | generally try to avoid YouTube as a source of
               | information. You'll find far better material on Endless
               | Sphere, though there are plenty of dangerous ideas there.
        
           | squarefoot wrote:
           | Yes, sorry for not stressing this enough: extra care must be
           | taken when dealing with Lithium cells. They pack a lot of
           | power in a small space, and can be extremely dangerous if
           | mistreated; even physical damage with no heat involved can
           | turn them into fireworks, so always treat them the right way.
           | Never ever short them or apply excessive charge or discharge,
           | use only good quality chargers and never ever let them
           | unsupervised during charge. If a cell catches fire
           | accidentally, don't attempt to extinguish it with water or
           | sand as they are 100% ineffective, keep a specific safety
           | container for Lithium cells at hand and if you feel you can
           | can fit the cell into it to contain the fire _in a bunch of
           | seconds_ hold your breath and do it, otherwise get the f out
           | of there because the fumes are extremely toxic and would
           | seriously harm you before even getting a burn.
        
             | Syonyk wrote:
             | > _... because the fumes are extremely toxic and would
             | seriously harm you before even getting a burn._
             | 
             | I mentioned it elsewhere, but
             | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydrofluoric_acid_burn is a
             | very relevant read on the nature of "toxic." Most of the
             | rest of the stuff isn't much friendlier.
        
         | analog31 wrote:
         | Do you know a good source of info on how to test these cells?
        
         | strbean wrote:
         | I was under the impression that mixing and matching cells (by
         | model or by age/number of charge cycles used) can be sketchy.
         | For example, if you have a very heavily used battery in series
         | with new battery, everything may look okay externally, but you
         | may end up over-discharging the older battery.
         | 
         | What are your thoughts on this? Haven't had any issues? Or do
         | you take steps to mitigate it?
        
           | ed25519FUUU wrote:
           | Match them based on internal resistance and capacity after
           | running some tests. Most people don't even really bother with
           | the resistance.
        
             | Syonyk wrote:
             | You'd be far better off matching them based on percent of
             | original capacity and internal resistance. A 3200mAh cell
             | worn to 2600mAh is in far worse shape than a 2800mAh cell
             | worn to 2600mAh, though you'd probably also see a big
             | difference in internal resistance between them. You might
             | also consider checking IR at various states of charge, if
             | you're being comprehensive.
             | 
             | ... and at that point, short of massive automation in a
             | fireproof area, you're almost certainly going to come out
             | ahead buying new cells.
        
           | danhor wrote:
           | Since he mostly talked about having them in parallel, this
           | might not be an issue for him. I also _think_ a bms can solve
           | that issue
        
             | squarefoot wrote:
             | Yes, I can confirm. I use them only in parallel, and they
             | usually come from the same battery pack. A series
             | connection would require extra care to select them for
             | identical characteristics, and the use of a BMS to keep
             | them balanced, avoiding the strongest ones to discharge at
             | reversed polarity through the weakest ones, which would be
             | a recipe for disasters. BMS circuits however can't do
             | miracles; too different cells shouldn't be used together
             | anyway.
        
       | graton wrote:
       | I don't think this applies to Duracell or Energizer alkaline
       | batteries unfortunately :(
       | 
       | Of course reading the article they are talking about Lithium Ion
       | batteries.
        
         | blibble wrote:
         | you're paying for the brand, shelf position and other
         | advertising
         | 
         | cheap and reputable supermarket brand ones last just long
        
           | fspeech wrote:
           | GP meant price for alkaline batteries did not come down.
           | 
           | Another point to consider is if you leave the alkaline
           | battery in for too long will the chemical leak and ruin your
           | device? The damage to your device from a broken battery could
           | easily exceed the cost differential. I don't have solid
           | evidence that brand names work better in this regard but I
           | have definitely experienced repeatedly generic batteries
           | having white corrosive crystaline stuff formed all around
           | them.
        
             | lostapathy wrote:
             | People should quit buying alkaline batteries anyway. NiMH
             | batteries are great for just about every application you'd
             | use a throway for, and you only have to recharge them about
             | twice to "get your money back."
        
           | adventured wrote:
           | No question. Same thing you see in the generic pain relief
           | aisle (ibuprofen, acetaminophen, et al), and many common
           | grocery items.
           | 
           | 10 pack of AA Rayovac batteries at Walmart: $3.20
           | 
           | Eight pack of AA Duracell: $7.47
           | 
           | Pretty ridiculous. For $7.78 you can get a 24 pack of ACDelco
           | AA batteries (granted I don't know how that brand stands up
           | on quality).
        
           | Dylan16807 wrote:
           | Looking at a couple stores, the difference is around 50 cents
           | per AA vs. 70 cents per AA at moderate pack sizes. That's
           | good in comparison but it's about the same price it was a
           | decade ago. Even comparing to 1990, when "alkaline" wasn't
           | yet the default, they were about the same price. "Alkaline:
           | These cost about $2 to $3 a pair for C or D flashlight cells,
           | and about half that for the AA and smaller AAA penlight
           | batteries."
           | 
           | At best you can say they've dropped along with inflation,
           | which is a factor of 2.
        
           | jl6 wrote:
           | How do you tell the difference between a battery brand that
           | is more expensive because the battery has greater capacity
           | ("heavy duty", "extra long life", etc.) and a brand that is
           | more expensive because of the brand name? Last time I looked
           | in the supermarket there were no comparable metrics printed
           | on the packaging.
        
             | buescher wrote:
             | You can't, and you don't know who is private labeling what,
             | either. If you can get a data sheet, the better companies
             | have more detailed data sheets.
             | 
             | Personally, I like the Energizer (primary, i.e. disposable)
             | lithiums for nice things like my old HP logic dart that
             | will sit in a drawer for a long time between uses, and
             | Panasonic (formerly Sanyo) Eneloop NiMH batteries for most
             | other things, and the cheapo Costco batteries for when I
             | really don't care.
             | 
             | The three major US brands of alkaline batteries all have
             | warranties for corrosion damage. I don't know of any other
             | brands that do. I have seen corrosion in every brand of
             | alkaline battery I've ever bought but have never tried to
             | collect on any warranty.
             | 
             | "Energizer will repair or replace, at our option, any
             | device damaged by leakage from Energizer MAX(r) Alkaline
             | batteries either during the life of the battery or within
             | two years following the full use of the battery."
             | https://www.energizer.com/about-batteries/battery-leakage
             | 
             | "Duracell guarantees its batteries against defects in
             | materials and workmanship. Should any device be damaged due
             | to a battery defect, we will repair or replace it at our
             | option." https://www.duracell.com/en-ca/technology/battery-
             | care-use-a...
             | 
             | "In the unlikely event of alkaline battery leakage, any
             | battery operated device that is damaged by RAYOVAC(r)
             | Alkaline Batteries will be repaired, replaced or refunded,
             | at our option, as long as the batteries have not expired or
             | been mixed by expiry date and/or battery type."
             | http://www.rayovac.com/support/warranties-and-
             | guarantees.asp...
        
         | tamaharbor wrote:
         | I used to get free batteries (size of my choice, I always chose
         | the more expensive rectangular 9v ones) as an official member
         | of the Radio Shack Battery of the Month Club.
        
           | stevesimmons wrote:
           | Ah what memories. Tandy Radio Shack in Australia operated the
           | same "Battery of the Month" club in the mid 1980s.
           | 
           | I always got the 9V too, which I used for my "150 in 1"
           | electronics kit.
        
         | oh_sigh wrote:
         | I would just buy some Panasonic eneloops(NiMH - not an ad, just
         | the battery I have went with after researching this quite a
         | bit) whenever you need to buy alkaline batteries. They are
         | about twice as expensive but are rechargeable 2000+ times, hold
         | their charge for over a year, and don't degrade very much.
         | Eventually all of your devices will have eneloops in them and
         | you will stop buying batteries altogeher.
        
           | summm wrote:
           | NiMH have 1.2v instead of 1.5. That ist sometimes a problem
           | for cheaper devices that don't have a good voltage regulator.
           | For example Flashlights are notably dimmer.
        
         | aendruk wrote:
         | > unfortunately
         | 
         | Sounds good to me. Single-use, landfill bound products
         | typically shouldn't be as inexpensive to the consumer as we're
         | used to.
        
         | retrac wrote:
         | It's not nearly as dramatic. But they've surely gotten cheaper.
         | As evidenced by how they have displaced carbon-zinc cells in
         | almost all applications.
         | 
         | I checked Radio-Shack's 1981 US catalogue. $2.79 for a 4 pk of
         | store-brand AA alkaline cells. That's $8.20 or so today. You
         | can today, apparently get an 8 pk of Duracell from Wal-Mart at
         | $7.50. Or an 8 pk of store brand from Wal-Mart for $3.20.
        
       | [deleted]
        
       | oblio wrote:
       | This is really cool, but could anyone familiar with the domain
       | estimate how far we are along the S-curve?
       | 
       | I.e. it took a long time for things to ramp up, then they
       | accelerate really quickly and then they slow down again. Think
       | Moore's Law, which is dead now.
       | 
       | What would be the price estimate for 2030, for example. I think
       | we're now around $100 per kwh (or something like that), what
       | should we expect for 2030? $60? $20?
        
         | eloff wrote:
         | > Think Moore's Law, which is dead now.
         | 
         | Look again. Moore's law in terms of single threaded performance
         | is dead. In literal terms of number of transistors on a wafer,
         | it's still increasing exponentially, just slower. And in terms
         | of what mattered when people cited Moore's law, the decrease in
         | price/performance, it's still exponential, just slower and
         | multi core.
         | 
         | It will end, as all exponential trends must end lest they
         | consume the universe, but the end is not yet in sight. Recently
         | chips have started to go multi chip and three dimensional. So
         | even when we finally hit that scaling limit, we haven't quite
         | reached the end of exponential progress.
        
           | cogman10 wrote:
           | With the current silicon manufacturing processes, I'd say the
           | end is in sight. Every node shrink is taking longer and
           | longer and getting more and more expensive to fabricate.
           | 
           | We've been reliant on node shrinks to push things further.
           | That hard limit is 0.2nm (silicon atom size) we are at ~2nm
           | gate features.
           | 
           | It remains to be seen if we can get to that 0.2nm size, I
           | honestly don't think we can push much further past the 2nm
           | size (I'd imagine 0.5nm will be the limit).
           | 
           | That, to me, is very much being "in sight".
        
           | bin_bash wrote:
           | hasn't it always referred to transistor count and not
           | performance?
        
             | jeffbee wrote:
             | It has always referred to the minimum of the cost-
             | complexity curve for integrated circuits. The progress of
             | Moore's Actual Law has never stopped.
             | 
             | The thing people mean when they are talking about the
             | deceleration of single-threaded CPU performance is actually
             | Dennard scaling. Dennard said that density and power
             | efficiency were complementary in such a way as to keep
             | areal power constant. That was true until it suddenly
             | stopped being true. If Dennard scaling had continued you'd
             | be using a 20GHz CPU right now.
        
             | sova wrote:
             | Oxford Dictionary says: "the principle that the speed and
             | capability of computers can be expected to double every two
             | years, as a result of increases in the number of
             | transistors a microchip can contain."
             | 
             | Which notably mentions performance. I have often
             | interpreted Moore's Law to be the fact that doubling
             | improvements in performance will continue roughly every
             | 16-18 months, but not always directly proportionally to
             | transistor count -- other ways to squeeze out doubling
             | performance gains arise and often in unexpected places.
        
             | eloff wrote:
             | Did you read the whole comment? I edited it, but that part
             | was in there from the beginning, just in different words.
        
               | bin_bash wrote:
               | I agree with you, I just think you weren't making your
               | case strongly enough by implying that Moore's Law
               | referred to more than just transistor count.
        
               | klodolph wrote:
               | > ...I just think you weren't making your case strongly
               | enough...
               | 
               | I get where you are coming from, but this is one of the
               | most aggravating types of comments.
        
           | lanstin wrote:
           | I am sure there is some sci fi novel where species compete
           | for neutron stars because they are a very dense compute
           | substrate.
        
             | Hjfrf wrote:
             | Asimov's "The Last Question" is close, though the focus is
             | on entropy rather than any kind of space wars.
        
             | Isinlor wrote:
             | In the Perfect Imperfection by Jacek Dukaj [0] has
             | something called "Remy's curve" [1].
             | 
             | On the curve you can find:
             | 
             | - Ultimate Computer is the computer using the best hardware
             | as allowed by the physical constants of our universe. See
             | also physics of computation.
             | 
             | - Inclusions are in essence 'pocket universes'. They are
             | created for specific entities to run hardware in a
             | dedicated universe with physical constants different from
             | ours, allowing for better performance than those in our
             | universe
             | 
             | - Ultimate Inclusion is the inclusion with the best
             | possible set of physical constants in the entire multiverse
             | 
             | Seth Lloyd wrote a paper "Ultimate physical limits to
             | computation" [2].
             | 
             | [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perfect_Imperfection
             | 
             | [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perfect_Imperfection#/med
             | ia/Fi...
             | 
             | [2] https://arxiv.org/abs/quant-ph/9908043
        
             | arthurcolle wrote:
             | Isn't Three Body Problem kinda like this?
        
             | kevml wrote:
             | Not neutron stars specifically, but Accelerando by Charles
             | Stross covers this.
        
         | coderintherye wrote:
         | NREL has a great report on that, although it is focused on
         | utility-scale battery storage:
         | https://www.nrel.gov/docs/fy20osti/75385.pdf
        
         | ortusdux wrote:
         | It looks like $156 in 2019 & $137 in 2020. Estimates are
         | $100/kwh by 2023-24 and $58/kwh by 2030.
         | 
         | I do wonder how a dramatic shift towards Li powered cars will
         | effect the price. We may see demand outpace supply for a decade
         | or more. I hope it is the other way around because cheap
         | lithium batteries flooding the market would have many positive
         | implications.
         | 
         | https://about.bnef.com/blog/battery-pack-prices-cited-below-...
        
         | cogman10 wrote:
         | If musk is to believed, (and I think he's on point with this),
         | $50/kWh will likely come within the next 5 years.
         | 
         | So next 9 years? My expectation is beyond Tesla, the rest of
         | the industry will have hit on that sub $50/kwh price point.
         | That is going to make a lot of things really interesting. $2000
         | for a 30kWh home battery backup? Who wouldn't get one?
         | 
         | To further this, with climate change leading to more and more
         | extreme weather, I'm expecting that power outages are going to
         | be semi-common (assuming the grid doesn't invest in battery
         | backup).
        
           | ben_w wrote:
           | > $2000 for a 30kWh home battery backup? Who wouldn't get
           | one?
           | 
           | Very few of the people that would currently benefit from a
           | domestic backup battery could afford $2k, and most of the
           | people who do have $2k to spare don't live in places with
           | unreliable electricity.
           | 
           | The overlap isn't zero, but... for example, I visited Kenya
           | with an ex of mine, we met a local friend of hers, that
           | friend would've benefited from a more reliable electricity
           | bill, but her monthly rent and utility bills combined was
           | equivalent to about $85 and she couldn't afford to move.
        
             | cogman10 wrote:
             | > Very few of the people that would currently benefit from
             | a domestic backup battery could afford $2k, and most of the
             | people who do have $2k to spare don't live in places with
             | unreliable electricity.
             | 
             | My expectation is that with climate change, unreliable
             | electricity is going to affect a lot more places. The polar
             | vortex that knocked out the Texas grid is likely to be a
             | more frequent and more extreme event. ACs running more
             | frequently will likely lead to more brown outs.
             | 
             | Assuming our grids don't get major updates (I'm pretty
             | pessimistic about this), we are looking at more and more
             | outages in the future. It's certainly possible that smart
             | grids could significantly reduce outages, but that will
             | take too many actors working together to ever really fly.
             | 
             | For example, if the grid could coordinate with your heating
             | and cooling, you could distribute AC usage to avoid
             | tripping the grid.
             | 
             | Barring such a grid, homes having batteries would allow
             | owners to skate through brown outs. Further couple that
             | with solar and they could survive even major outages (hours
             | or even days).
             | 
             | > The overlap isn't zero, but... for example, I visited
             | Kenya with an ex of mine, we met a local friend of hers,
             | that friend would've benefited from a more reliable
             | electricity bill, but her monthly rent and utility bills
             | combined was equivalent to about $85 and she couldn't
             | afford to move.
             | 
             | A 1kwh battery would probably be a pretty positive impact.
             | Add on a 300W solar panel and you'd have something that
             | would extend the amount of electricity the have. That'd
             | come in at ~$400 (assuming $50/kwh). Not enough to run an
             | AC, but enough to keep the lights on and maybe run a
             | fridge.
             | 
             | Otherwise... yeah... not much good news for places that
             | can't afford such batteries.
        
           | quickthrowman wrote:
           | I would rather spend a few thousand more for a natural gas
           | generator, it will run indefinitely as long as you have
           | natural gas.
        
             | dylan604 wrote:
             | And when the natural gas runs out you use what?
        
             | cogman10 wrote:
             | https://www.texastribune.org/2021/02/16/natural-gas-power-
             | st...
             | 
             | If the whole grid goes down, your gas likely won't be
             | there.
        
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