{"id":9350,"date":"2017-02-16T19:55:55","date_gmt":"2017-02-16T09:25:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.solarquotes.com.au\/blog\/?p=9350"},"modified":"2024-01-30T19:57:19","modified_gmt":"2024-01-30T10:27:19","slug":"tesla-powerwall-2-vs-ampetus-super-lithium","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.solarquotes.com.au\/blog\/tesla-powerwall-2-vs-ampetus-super-lithium\/","title":{"rendered":"Tesla Powerwall 2 Vs Ampetus Super Lithium"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Ironman

Can Ampetus’ Super Lithium battery beat Elon’s Powerwall 2?<\/p><\/div>\n

—<\/p>\n

Note: As of 29 May 2018 Ampetus Energy Pty Limited have been placed in liquidation<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

—<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

A lot of attention has been paid to the Tesla Powerwall 2<\/a> lately on account of how it promises to dramatically cut the cost of home battery storage<\/a>.\u00a0 And when I wrote “promises” I chose that word carefully on account of how that’s all we got at the moment.\u00a0 We won’t know what it’s capable of until next month when Tesla promises the first installations will be done.<\/p>\n

But there is a battery being sold in Australia which, at this point in time, appears to beat the Powerwall 2 on price.\u00a0 It’s called the Ampetus<\/a> “Super” Lithium battery.\u00a0 According to the information I have been given, its cost per warranted kilowatt-hour<\/a> comes to 18.7 cents a kilowatt-hour when cycled once per day.1<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n

This is better than what Tesla offers and is around 11% cheaper than the DC<\/a> version of their Powerwall 2.\u00a0 But the Ampetus “Super” Lithium battery is most impressive when it is cycled 1.4 or more times per day.\u00a0 Under these circumstances its warranted cost per kilowatt-hour of storage falls to 13.6 cents2<\/a><\/sup>, which is less than two thirds that of the DC Powerwall 2 when cycled in a similar way.<\/p>\n

\"\"

Round 1 to Super Lithium<\/p><\/div>\n

Before everyone gets too excited, I will point out that it is just a battery and at those prices it doesn’t come with any additional hardware.\u00a0 It’s not like the AC<\/a> version of the Powerwall 2 which has a built in battery inverter<\/a> and is (hopefully) all ready to be wired into a home switchboard.\u00a0 A better comparison would be with the DC Powerwall 2, as both it and the Ampetus “Super” Lithium battery will need a multimode mode inverter<\/a> (also known as a hybrid inverter) to be used for home energy storage.<\/p>\n

Most homes are likely to cycle their battery systems once or less per day, but if you have an application where the battery needs to by cycled more often, then the Ampetus battery could be very cost effective.<\/p>\n

It also has an advantage over the Powerwall as its usable capacity is only 2.7 kilowatt-hours.\u00a0 This is considerably less than the 13.5 kilowatts of storage of the Powerwall 2 and this smaller size can make it much easier for the average home to regularly use all its stored energy, which is useful for getting the best economic return.<\/p>\n

Ampetus “Super” Lithium Battery Specifications<\/h2>\n

The Ampetus “Super” Lithium battery has 3 kilowatt-hours of nominal capacity, a recommended depth of discharge of 90% giving 2.7 kilowatt-hours of usable storage, and can supply a continuous 1.5 kilowatts of power.\u00a0 With suitable cabling and other hardware it is possible to add as many individual batteries to a system as required.<\/p>\n

Details of the Apetus “Super” Lithium battery can be found on our battery comparison table<\/a>.<\/p>\n

What It Looks Like<\/h2>\n

This is what the Ampetus “Super” Lithium battery looks like:<\/p>\n

\"Sinlion<\/p>\n

As you can see, the pragmatic, prismatic, brutalist design stands in stark contrast to the sleek white aestheticism of the Powerwall 2.\u00a0 Also, it looks like a rectangular black box with handles.<\/p>\n

It is made to slide into a rack and so looks somewhat similar to a computer server.\u00a0 If you don’t know what a computer server is, they are things that make the internet work and contain the sum total of human knowledge, which is mostly cat videos.\u00a0 However, just because it somewhat resembles a server it doesn’t mean the two are interchangeable, so keep that in mind if you ever get a job in a data center.<\/p>\n

It Is A Lithium Iron Phosphate Battery<\/h2>\n

Lithium batteries come in several different flavors.\u00a0 However, they all taste bad, so don’t try eating them, as they may even taste fatal.\u00a0 The Ampetus “Super” Lithium battery’s particular chemistry is lithium iron phosphate<\/a>, which is the toughest type of lithium battery around.\u00a0 They degrade more slowly than other lithium batteries giving them a long lifespan and they are the lithium battery least likely to catch on fire, which is a useful safety advantage.<\/p>\n

It’s Made In China<\/h2>\n

Ampetus is an Australian company, but the batteries are manufactured in China by the Sinlion company3<\/a><\/sup> in Wuxi<\/a>, a city of 6.4 million just half an hour’s train ride west of Shanghai.\u00a0 China has a massive amount of battery manufacturing capacity and there is a good chance it will end up dominating world production.\u00a0 The country apparently produced over 100,000 electric buses in 2016 and that alone represents a lot of batteries.<\/p>\n

There are definitely people who would prefer it if the battery were were made in Australia.\u00a0 But when you think about it, the battery is lithium iron phosphate and what does Australia export to China?\u00a0 Lithium, iron, and not phosphate.\u00a0 And two out of three ain’t bad.<\/p>\n