Energy Department Launches ‘Battery Hub,’ For Battery Manhattan Project

[FBaggins]

Think of it as a Manhattan Project, except instead of secret nuclear bombs, the end result is much better batteries for devices, electric vehicles and the power grid. That’s at least one of the analogies used by the U.S. Department of Energy on Friday when it announced the launch of a new advanced research “Battery Hub,” to the tune of a $120 million, five-year government grant.

The Battery Hub, as most of those involved refer to it — officially named the Joint Center for Energy Storage Research (JCESR, pronounced “J Cesar”) — will be led by scientists at Argonne National Laboratory in Lemont, Illinois (outside Chicago), will include actually include top researchers from a wide swath of some of the most prestigious institutions around the country, among them Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, Sandia National Laboratories, and other universities throughout the state and the Midwest.


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Specifically, Argonne wants the Battery Hub to be able to make a battery with five times the energy storage capacity as the upper limit of current technologies, at one-fifth the cost, within five years, the so-called “5-5-5” plan.

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Argonne’s, and thus the Hub’s focus, is on three specific types of new battery technologies: Multivalent battery systems, chemical transformation of battery reactions, and “flow batteries.”


http://idealab.talkingpointsmemo.com/2012/11/energy-department-launches-battery-hub-for-battery-manhattan-project.php

[Gregorian]

1. Great! But $120 million is Pentagon tip jar money.

Why not bulldoze the pentagon and start fighting the real threat to humanity, and put every resource we've got into this.

OK, I'm a bit histrionic here. But my point still stands. Dump a few military things, and put billions into this.

[FBaggins]

2. It's certainly not "Manhattan Project" in scale.

MP cost over ten times as much... and that's back when $2,000/year was a decent living.