
Scientists create quick-charging hybrid supercapacitors - jonbaer
http://phys.org/news/2015-04-scientists-quick-charging-hybrid-supercapacitors.html
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jcoffland
This sounds great but eggheads have been claiming they've created such devices
for years. The article contains very few real numbers. Does anyone know
anything more about these supercaps that may legitimize or discredit this
research?

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fit2rule
Its one thing to research a product, and get it in a demonstrable form. This
occurs time and again. Its another thing to have the ownership of the
technology in the right hands, such that the technology can then be funded.
Its then another thing to get the funding required to actually make the
product happen.

Too often, those who would lose the most, are the ones with the biggest
presence at each stage of this process. If you look, you'll see that petro-
chemical/military-industrial giants have, in their portfolios, sufficient
actually working technology to make major changes in the world. Its just not
as profitable for them - nor as safe - as weapons manufacture, ramping up
existing oil-infrastructure, etc.

Until we start controlling these entities properly - taxing oil and weapons
manufacture at levels that make it more viable to let go of these antiquated
economic control mechanisms - nothing will change.

That can't change, until you and I change, and stop depending on oil and
weapons as a fundamental aspect of our culture. And the way I see it, the only
viable way for that to occur is for the grass-roots to keep inventing new and
feasible ways to disconnect from the petro-/military- industrial complex. The
day we can grow our own batteries in a simple garden fish-tank .. we'll either
have almighty peace on earth, or hellfire from above. Either way, keep trying
to find that sweet spot.

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rebootthesystem
Using taxation for behavior modification is wrong. This is how we've ended up
in the mess of taxes we have today. Despite what politicians keep repeating,
"good manufacturing jobs" are never coming back, and taxes and excessive
regulations are near to the top of the list of reasons behind this. Don't
believe me on this one, Steve Jobs himself told this to Obama directly. Just
google it.

Taxes should only be used to raise money to support essential government work
and worthy, efficient, well-justified, regularly reviewed programs with
automatic expiration dates of no more than five years. The latter to make sure
we get used to re-evaluate everything and make sure we run government as
efficiently as possible.

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baq
the first comment under the article claims energy density of about 10% of li-
ion batteries, so it's not a battery replacement. still quite useful, though.

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raverbashing
I bet there are several applications where you can charge frequently and the
battery is there for the baseline

Hybrid Cars seems to be one, or even purely electrical ones on a combined
approach (You have the supercapacitor for fast charges/discharges - read
breaking/acceleration - and the battery for main storage)

