Panasonic moves closer to home energy self-sufficiency with fuel cells

This is why the "loss per vehicle" measure is such a misleading measuring stick.
It implies that if another car is sold, Tesla looses another $217 dollars, which is not the case.

So you removed R&D. What happens if you remove capital expenditures, such as the gigafactory?

Companies in rapid growth do this, it is typical to not make a profit while the company is rapidly expanding.
If done correctly, the rapid expansion pays off with larger profits.

 

I only threw out some examples of would could be operating losses being applied to the Model S directly by the article to come up with how much each car is losing. But operating losses covers things not directly related to the car.

Some of the R&D costs can be applied to the Model S, but some of the developments from that spending will also be applied to the Model X and 3. The initial R&D investment also isn't an ongoing cost for the Model S, so the more sold the tinier the R&D portion that can be deducted from each one. This is the same story as with the Volt and Voltec, and Prius and HSD.

Building out the Supercharger network is an operating loss. This was probably pricy for Tesla, because they built it out quick, but after the initial rollout, Tesla can slow down build rate, if it needs too. This cost is being carried by the Model Ses sold to date by the article. It soldn't be because the network will support all of Ses to be built, and future car models from Tesla. Same story with the Supercharger R&D.

The Model S, Volt, and Prius all made a profit per car when they first went of sale. They weren't profitable until their invest costs were recovered. How long that takes varies. A straight electric drivetrain likely costs less than meshing electric motors and an engine together, and the luxury segment has higher margins in general. Any R&D for following generations will also be less.

Compliance BEVs could be sold under cost, because it is cheaper to do so than buy ZEV credits, and the company can write off the loss as a fee for doing business in the Golden State.

 

Where does the carbon go? There is no chemical reaction that will convert CO2 and sunlight into O2 and H2. If the Carbon ends up being burnt, it is the same as a PV panel would do. Storing hydrogen is problematic, and needs a lot of work before it will even be as good as batteries.
merged

No. I am heating my house for the winter, now. Solar hot water is being stored in the thermal mass in my basement. Circulation energy is solar as well, and that is also heating the basement thermal storage.

Not sure how hydrogen fixes the storage issue. Home use would probably be an above-ground compressed gas storage tank.

"...above-ground compressed gas storage, which should be considered for storage times of several hours to several days."
(Carpetis 1994; Oy 1992).
merged, use multiquote

Because an electric heat pump works at 300-400% efficiency.

 

The cells Panasonic shows in the video have two parts; one part photolyzes water to oxygen and hydrogen, and the second part takes the hydrogen and CO2 to make an organic compound, formic acid in this case.

The system in the OP just has the first part.

Why not buried tanks like with propane? Concerns of hydrogen getting trapped in the soil, and becoming an explosion risk in the event of a leak?

 

A quick perusal of uses for formic acid, indicates that it is all being used in short cycles. The carbon may be taken from the air, but it ends up back there is a few months at most.

I expect short lifespan (and thus cost) was the issue. Burying small tanks probably doesn't actually increase the recommended cycle rate (i.e. make it useful for *seasonal* storage).

 

It might be possible to make other compounds by adjusting the catalyst used in the reaction. Panasonic's ultimate goal with this is make compound that is a valuable feedstock to making other stuff. Making just formic acid by this method, even with it returning to CO2, is still an advancement for reducing CO2 emissions. Right now, the majority of formic acid is made from methanol and carbon monoxide. Both of which are made from fossil fuels in mass quantities.

 

Sure. Though I doubt formic acid production is driving fossil fuel production rather than the other way around. It could be a better option. Fractional distillation of crude oil is a black enough art even before one adds economics of byproduct markets into it.

 

If those efficiency numbers are comparable to the ones used for PV, then this system is about 14% efficient once the hydrogen is turned into electricity through a fuel cell.

 

Except the PV are much more efficient when directly powering the house, and any losses for being off grid are only when the sun don't shine. The 14% for this system is all the time.

You can also get heat cogen with a liquid cooled PV system.

 

And a solar system can use a heat pump water heater with 3 times the efficiency.

 

There was an MIT start up that had similar ambitions. Unfortunately the system ended up costing about $7/kg hydrogen, and with cheap natural gas, its cheaper to truck it somewhere in the US. It was bought by lockheed last year, so there still is a chance. We have panasonic, and some other mit start ups, and a lot of DOE and METI funds to find this.

Unfortunately I still consider it future tech, until someone can make it cheaply. Now we have on grid and off grid. If you are on grid, no reason for batteries to buffer your solar, it costs what it costs and you plug in and let the grid buffer. The key again is net fossil burn, not being selfish, overbuilding and going off grid for some pride thing. If you are off grid, and not near a on grid charger a bev is a bad idea. Get a phev and go to a gas station if your house doesn't supply enough power, or you take a long trip. Sure you can be off grid with a tesla, and have a small wind turbine and solar panels, and some battery back up, but we are talking a $200,000 system between a 70D (you need a big battery to buffer that night wind), and that turbine and the solar, etc, that only the rich or super proud can afford if you don't get a grant. You probably build your mansion with rain water collection for irrigation and geothermal heat pump too.

Get one of these solar to hydrogen converter things working sure why not. You probably will want a small battery and some solar PV too, as I'm guessing that will be cheaper than all hydrogen. No reason not to build a hybrid - PV, Solar to hydrogen, hydrogen storage, battery, electrolyzer, fuel cell. The problem with taking this hydrogen and ruining it in a fuel cell vehicle is going to be the cost of the compressor and pump. I would guess you would get together with your neighbors to share this resource as it would likely cost more than that turbine/solar/tesla system above for a single family. Maybe you could build your own small grid.

If Panasonic or anyone else can figure out how to do this cheaply, they can sell a lot of them.

 

It seems to me that this is changing rapidly. In 2-3 years you won't need a Tesla 70D but can get by with a Bolt or Model 3 for under $40,000.

You would be presumably doing this whether grid-tied or off-grid if it weren't a big battery BEV then it would be a PHEV or 100% gasser at similar cost so I'm not sure this needs to be considered part of total cost unless you want to run detailed long-term operating costs numbers for each scenario.

Then let's say you need 20 kW worth of panels to generate 100 kWh a day so you can drive an average of 150 miles a day plus power your house. That's about 100 panels which cost about $200 each so $20,000. Next, you need a 100 kWh Tesla Powerpack at $25,000 or a string of 7 or so daily cycle power walls at $3,000 each. Those are wholesale prices so double the price plus add $10-20k for installation.

That seems more like $100,000 minus $10-20k in gasoline savings over time so $80,000? But a substantial part of that system cost was necessary anyway if you had to be off-grid or if it made sense to install grid-connected solar?

Perhaps my estimate is too low because I'm forgetting some components or costs since I'm not very knowledgable in solar PV pricing or maybe I'm over-specifying some sizes. But, $200,000 seems like an exaggerated cost estimate.

 

Welcome to the world of professional price guessing. Even the pro's get it wrong. Most often, they underestimate by a factor of 2.
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The off grid lunatocracy makes my head hurt, but if your PUC is not evil (I know some are) and you are near the grid then there must be some emotional reason to be off grid. I am not including those that live in remote locations where the grid is expensive to hook, these folks normally want it cheap and are happy with fossil fueled cars.

I am talking about the fairly wealthy that want to be off grid, but don't want to use fossil fuel and want to be off grid. So yes in the future if there are other long range bevs than tesla that increases choice, and even the model III will reduce costs. If you are solar only though you probably want a phev, and set up a still or biodigester and modefy that thing to run cng, methanol, or ethanol (cheap at that) and grow your crops and make your ethanol, methanol, or methane from the crops, or sewage, or food waste, and put that in the phev if the sun doesn't shine enough. You have land and money for a wind turbine (cheap to rent for 5 or 10 years on grid, but expensive if doing it off grid) you want that big battery.

I thought 20 kw cost around $75,000-$100,000 installed depending where you live and tax breaks, roof, etc, but sure if you can get it for $20,000 its a great deal. That is much cheaper than my wind. That is the big difference in our costs. Power packs you need the 7kwh to use daily at 2 kw, you probably need 7, so $21,000+installation. Still don't you want that wind turbine and smaller batteries outside your car? I mean what if you throw a party? What if you have two cars that both need long trips the next day? Then you need what 140kwh (20 batteries just for the cars). That's how I get to $200K including a nice car, but you need to be rich to go for it.

If you grid connect you don't need as much solar on the house or the batteries. I wasn't think 20kw when you are grid tied. Say you needed 5 kw for grid tied without the cars, and you have 2 cars going 30,000 miles/year @89mpge (lowball estimate) = 31 kwh/day or about 6 kw if grid tied. Now you only need 11 kw system. Its a lot cheaper, and if you make extra electricity you can sell it back to the grid. Off grid if panasonic can make it work that system would help in addition to solar pv and batteries.

 

I'm certainly not disputing that grid-tied makes a lot more sense....

 

The people off the grid with PV and batteries likely don't have a BEV because of the remote location of their homes, and the fact they want to save that battery bank for running lights and appliances. If they have the means of going off grid with a long range BEV, they also have the means to make power beyond just PV, wind, and batteries. Instead of the bank of batteries, they can have an anaerobic digester making methane for for a small generator of even a fuel cell for power during times when the others aren't providing.

People with PV and a plug in are going to be grid tied. So they won't have these battery storage losses. While accounting like yours will deny them claiming 100% renewable with a large enough PV system, being grid tied means they are reducing non-renewable electric use in their community.

Reducing GHG emissions in a meaningful way is going to take a group effort. Going off grid for GHG reasons just lets a person feel smug while doing less to actually lower GHG than if they were grid tied.

 

I don't know, but it would seem more probable that it's a matter of cost. In our Montana days, we knew folks that were beyond power lines. They had batteries for night time but they were charged from generators. It's just a cheaper way to go, just like buying a low mileage used truck is less expensive than buying an equal sized hybrid.