A Vision of the Future Home Power Source
“Panasonic is going to create one of the hottest batteries available to date. The new lithium-ion storage cell should power up a whole house in 2011 when it could be available to the general public. I don’t know about you but I’d want to plug that battery right into my laptop and see how much life it will be able to offer me.
Furnio Otsubo, president of Panasonic said that the new battery should offer sufficient electricity for about one week of use. That’s certainly something I could get used to although I bet the new battery concept is not going to be that affordable.
Panasonic has become Japan’s second-largest electronics manufacturer after it completed the acquisition of Sanyo. It seems that the new giant has all the resources needed for such a bold endeavor. Creating a battery that can power up a house it’s not such an easy thing to do. But once such products become available, people will definitely want to use them.
Solar batteries and fuel cells which some of us already use to power up our homes can’t actually store energy. That’s why a lithium-ion battery that can last for about a week before needing a recharge is something else. Such a battery could help you save some money on that monthly electricity bill and it will also contribute to saving our little planet.
No specific details about the future home battery from Panasonic have been given yet. In two years time we should know more about the device and Panasonic will definitely want to periodically show everyone its progress.
Not only could we end up driving hybrid or electric cars by 2011 but we could also use rechargeable batteries to power all our devices in our homes. What do you say, folks, are you ready to switch to eco-friendlier energy sources? Do you think Panasonic will have a product ready so soon?”
Steve - When I first started working on the concept of the self-supporting solar home in the year 2000, it was obvious that there needed to be some sort of energy storage so that the home could have energy during the non-daylight hours. Beyond the day-light hours, there would be days when the weather turned foul and one had to depend on the energy storage for power to continue powering the home. The first concept was to create hydrogen by electrolysis, store it, and then pass it through a fuel cell to create the household power when needed. But the ultimate goal was a simpler energy storage. That lead one towards the battery. This is the concept that will make a major impact on our daily lives should it come to pass. It is a logical extension of the concept of distributed energy storage for everyone. By the time this concept is adopted by this country the battery storage will be safe and should be affordable. Affordable in the sense that it could be on lease from your electric power distributor who would own and maintain the energy storage and use the storage for their energy transfer planning.
The question to our members is what do you think of the idea and how do you envision our future electric power delivery system will keep our lights on and our heat pumps working?