I'm thinking they're going to be distinguishable for a while longer.

LOL, yes. But from an application perspective where you’re choosing between the two, which is admittedly rare, a 10X improvement might tip the scales toward the super caps.

 

LOL, yes. But from an application perspective where you’re choosing between the two, which is admittedly rare, a 10X improvement might tip the scales toward the super caps.

There are already quite a few applications where the scales are tipped toward the supercap option, although I suspect in many cases it is more because of a particular disadvantage of using a battery as opposed to a particular advantage of the supercap.

But, as they continue to improve, the array of applications for which this is the case will almost certainly enlarge.

 

Here's an interesting one.

http://www.greencarcongress.com/2018/03/20180319-rr.html


There's a thread here somewhere on supercapacitors and how they're becoming hard to distinguish from batteries. I'll post this in that thread if I can find it

That's a subject that I definitely want to explore in another thread in the near future. Thanks for sharing!

 

That's a subject that I definitely want to explore in another thread in the near future. Thanks for sharing!

I would like to see that too! Because I don't even come close to comprehending fully about the interchangeability in applications.


kv

 

An alkaline AA battery (14 mm in diameter, 50 mm long, and weighs 24 g) can deliver about 2 AH (aka 7.2 kC) of charge while dropping from about 1.5 V to 0.8 V. To match that, a super cap would have to be about 10 kF.

Mouser has a 4 kF / 2.5 V supercap for over $300. It's 76 mm in diameter, 165 mm long, and weighs 1.3 kg.

I'm thinking they're going to be distinguishable for a while longer.

EDIT: Slight reorganization.

What happens when one overcharges a 4 kF 1.3 kg supercap? (I don't know -- never played around with them.)

But I figure the energy has to go somewhere, no? Is it as potentially spectacular as an overcharged Li(X)?

 

What happens when one overcharges a 4 kF 1.3 kg supercap? (I don't know -- never played around with them.)

But I figure the energy has to go somewhere, no? Is it as potentially spectacular as an overcharged Li(X)?

I don't know -- it might. The energy definitely has to go somewhere. But the stored energy isn't all that much, when all is said and done.

A 4000 F cap charged to 2.5 V has 12.5 kJ of energy. This is just 3 Calories (3 kcal), or right at 1.5 Tic Tac mints.

I suspect the battery being overcharged is much more spectacular because you probably have a much more energetic chemical reaction going on. But I don't know that that isn't the case with a supercap. After all, tantalum capacitors can be quite entertaining -- far beyond the tiny amount of electrical energy they have stored.

At $300 each, I'm not going to be playing around with them to find out (as interesting and entertaining as it might well be).