this post was submitted on 11 Jan 2024
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A huge battery has replaced Hawaii's last coal plant::undefined

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[–] aeronmelon@lemmy.world 39 points 8 months ago (3 children)

The child in me just wants there to be a larger-than-life D-cell battery looming on the horizon.

[–] blandfordforever@lemm.ee 5 points 8 months ago

Hawaii, I hope you all got that larger than life D.

[–] Da_Boom@iusearchlinux.fyi 3 points 8 months ago (2 children)

The question is, what brand? Duracell?, Eveready?, Energizer?

Oh my pkcell...

[–] StefanT@lemmy.world 1 points 8 months ago

It reads "158 Tesla Megapacks". But yeah, these could contain Duracell :D

[–] NickwithaC@lemmy.world 1 points 8 months ago
[–] Fridgeratr@lemmy.world 2 points 8 months ago

The fabled Z cell

[–] NeoNachtwaechter@lemmy.world 20 points 8 months ago (2 children)

the batteries react far more quickly, with a 250-millisecond response time.

Probably also a world record for the most powerful power switch.

Just imagine you press that button, and 185 Megawatts start to flow :-)

[–] DoomBot5@lemmy.world 9 points 8 months ago

They didn't say react all at once. I bet you it's a much slower ramp up.

[–] OriginalUsername7@lemmy.world 7 points 8 months ago (2 children)

"I cast lightning bolt"

Flicks switch

[–] Pxtl@lemmy.ca 4 points 8 months ago
[–] Amir@lemmy.ml 1 points 8 months ago

I tap two islands...

[–] Colour_me_triggered@lemm.ee 19 points 8 months ago (2 children)

Why did Hawaii have coal plants to start with? The place is literally made of volcanoes!

[–] DaCrazyJamez@sh.itjust.works 16 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Geothermal energy requires a very stable heat source near the surface. Unfortunately, while volcanoes meet both the "heat source" and "near surface" criteria, they are not at all stable.

[–] paholg@lemm.ee 1 points 8 months ago

It's still wild to me that I visited Hawaii as a kid, and then several years later. When I went back, a road I had driven on as kid was covered in lava.

[–] andrew_bidlaw@sh.itjust.works 12 points 8 months ago

Ohana means coal industry.

[–] Motavader@lemmy.world 2 points 8 months ago (1 children)

This is awesome, but now we need better battery tech that doesn't rely on lithium and cobalt. Getting that up to this scale will be hard, though.

[–] rockSlayer@lemmy.world 10 points 8 months ago (1 children)

There's some promising headway with molten sodium-sulfur batteries. Not only are they at similar capacity as lithium, but their molten nature allows for the batteries to store energy long-term. The downside is a low cycle rate and the heating requirement. Another promising battery tech is sodium ion batteries, which can use iron as a cathode to output similar power and cycling as lithium

[–] DoomBot5@lemmy.world 3 points 8 months ago (2 children)

This application needs the opposite of that. They need lots and lots of cycles, easy to maintain, and density is not much of an issue.

[–] rockSlayer@lemmy.world 8 points 8 months ago

Sodium-sulfur batteries are designed for the role of grid storage.

[–] Zoboomafoo@slrpnk.net 1 points 8 months ago

Iron-Air batteries will fill that role

[–] obinice@lemmy.world 0 points 8 months ago (1 children)

How much electricity do the batteries produce vs the previous power plant?

[–] SlopppyEngineer@lemmy.world 10 points 8 months ago

None. But still it gives power when it's dark and solar panels stop producing power. It's a miracle.