{"id":34754,"date":"2019-11-21T08:24:34","date_gmt":"2019-11-20T21:54:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.solarquotes.com.au\/blog\/?p=34754"},"modified":"2019-11-21T08:24:34","modified_gmt":"2019-11-20T21:54:34","slug":"dnvgl-2019-battery-scorecard","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.solarquotes.com.au\/blog\/dnvgl-2019-battery-scorecard\/","title":{"rendered":"DNVGL 2019 Battery Performance Scorecard: Cheaper, Better, Maybe Safer"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"DNVGL

DNV-GL tested a whole lot of batteries to see how they really performed. Here’s what they discovered.<\/p><\/div>\n

When it comes to battery technology the rate of change is hectic.\u00a0 Chemistries are constantly being tweaked and changed to improve battery performance and lifespan.\u00a0 They’re also getting cheaper at the rapid rate of around around 10% per year<\/a>.\u00a0 This is similar to solar cells and if it keeps up, in 7 years packs of battery cells will cost half what they do now.<\/p>\n

The rapid changes have left a lot of people confused.\u00a0 Not just household consumers but also the companies that buy battery cells to make items such as home solar energy storage, electric cars, or environmentally friendly concrete vibrators<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Lucky for us, the giant Norwegian standards company, DNVGL<\/a>, is out there busting confusion in its chops like a champ.\u00a0 They have tested 16 different battery cells from various manufacturers and published the results in their 2019 Battery Performance Scorecard<\/a>.<\/p>\n

One way they’re making money with this report is by giving us test results but not telling us which manufacturers’ cells they are for.\u00a0 If you want that information you’ll have to pay for it and agree not to tell anyone else.\u00a0 Also, if you want your batteries tested you have to pay for the privilege.\u00a0 They haven’t tested a random sample of cells.<\/p>\n

Despite not telling us who got what results, the Scorecard report still contains useful information on battery cells and how well they handle various kinds of abuse.\u00a0 So in this article I’ll summarize their test result information and I’ll also give a quick overview of what they say on battery safety.\u00a0 If you want all the details you can download the full report from this page<\/a>.<\/p>\n

But first I’ll look at some battery trivia they provide in their introduction that made me wonder what the authors were smoking – because it’s so inaccurate it may as well have been written by an Imperial Stormtrooper<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The World Is Going Big On Batteries — But Not That Big!<\/h2>\n

The report gives some information on Global Storage Markets, but I don’t know how much effort they put into it because they state:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

I think Norway needs to get its internet pipe cleaned because clearly by the time the ones and zeros reach them from Australia they’re full of rubbish.\u00a0 Residential battery sales in Australia have been abysmal compared to the endless over-optimistic estimates we received, which mostly came from self serving battery sales people.\u00a0 When South Australia, the state with the highest electricity prices, has a home solar battery subsidy of up to $6,000 and the take up is a tiny fraction of expectations<\/a> that’s not a strong market.<\/p>\n

While home solar battery systems are falling in price and, in South Australia at least, Virtual Power Plants are starting to offer interesting deals, what they should have instead written in the interests of accuracy is:<\/p>\n

“Unlike most places, in Australia a market for residential energy storage exists.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

While home solar batteries<\/a> have been slow to take off here because they don’t make financial sense for normal families (at the moment), if what DNVGL writes about the rest of the world is correct then the battery storage business is about to boom.\u00a0 They state:<\/p>\n

“…the United States alone is poised to witness 270+ GWh of energy storage markets opening in 2020.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Wow!\u00a0 That 270+ gigawatt-hour figure is massive!\u00a0 But while a casual reader looking at that sentence might think it means there will be that much battery storage in the US next year, it won’t be anywhere close.\u00a0 The US Energy Information Administration (EIA<\/a>) says there will be under 2.5 gigawatt-hours of utility scale battery storage<\/a> in the US in 2021.\u00a0 Even if we add in all the portable storage in 1.6 million electric cars<\/a>, and all devices such as laptops, mobile phones, and hand-held concrete vibrators, there will only be a total of around 10 or so gigawatt-hours next year.<\/p>\n

All they are really saying is at some unspecified point in the future there will be a giga-shitload of battery storage in the United States.\u00a0 But instead of stating it like staid and boring Norwegians, they acted like battery spruikers instead.\u00a0 If they had simply stated:<\/p>\n

“Total US battery capacity is increasing rapidly and we predict it will exceed 10 gigawatt-hours in 2020.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I would have forgiven them for their Australia gaffe, since we all make mistakes, and wouldn’t be wondering if I have to double check everything in the report.\u00a0 This section on global energy markets reads like it was written by an American company rather than a Norwegian one.\u00a0 But there might be an explanation for that…<\/p>\n

Battery Cells Tested In Rochester, New York<\/h2>\n

While DNVGL headquarters are in Norway, it’s a global company and the battery cell testing occurred in New York State’s city of Rochester.\u00a0 It’s one of the worst cities in the US but it’s only about the 34th worst<\/a>, so it’s not even good at being bad.\u00a0 No one likes the mediocre<\/a>.\u00a0 They need to either pull up their socks and become a decent city or refuse to change their socks for months at a time and bust into the list of top 5 worst cities in America.<\/p>\n

\"\"

What the hell, Rochester! You can’t solve every problem by popping a cap in someone’s ass with your gat<\/a>.<\/p><\/div>\n

They are, unfortunately, a bit fond of the old ultraviolence<\/a> in Rochester, as the above graph shows.1<\/a><\/sup>\u00a0 But oddly enough, from the air, Rochester looks a bit like Adelaide.2<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n

Tested Battery Cell Types<\/h2>\n

Fortunately, the team in Rochester managed to somehow<\/a> survive long enough to test 16 battery cells that were made with 5 different basic chemistries.\u00a0 Fifteen were lithium based while one was a mystery chemistry simply described as “non-lion”.\u00a0 (So, like a tiger<\/a> then?)<\/p>\n

\"Tested<\/p>\n

I’ve quickly noted some characteristics of the different chemistries below, along with how many of that type were tested:<\/p>\n