Dave K.

Battery Investing for Beginners

Hi John good article on batteries but you missed a number of disruptive technologies arising from the ultra-capacitor research market. I am bringing them to your reader’s attention as they are potentially disruptive to the battery industry and for that reason, have to be closely monitored by investors. The technologies are at the development stage and 1- 3 years from manufacture, of course should they work as intended.
Both are disruptive, but different ultra-capacitor technologies, which are targeting batteries with cost of manufacture in the $50 to $150 per kwh range. The low voltage technology is under development by a Japanese company EAMEX and their web link is www.eamex.co.jp/capa2_... and then there is the company I work for website 1-LTL.com whose technology is a high voltage electrostatic technology with a similar cost of manufacture. EAMAX has serious attention from the automotive companies and I expect a lot of money is being poured into research on their technology. LTL is talking to a number of organizations interested in funding its next stage of development.
The web page www.1-ltl.com/capaciti... has a energy storage table with active links to pages that explains the different technologies. Feel free to e-mail me with any updates to battery technologies or costs, as my goal is to keep the table current. Only public information will be entered.
There are a few other companies working in the electrostatic capacitor area but their work is more disruptive to the existing double layer ultra-capacitor manufacturers such as Maxwell. Yes there is EESTOR but they are so far off of meeting their delivery dates I believe they have been dismissed by most investors. An interesting footnote about EESTOR is that LTL believes it may have a critical controlling piece of IP over them and a free, except for our IP, work-around to their technology. LTL’s IP is for manufacturing process for high voltage ultra-capacitors. This has been the company’s strategy all along to own the manufacturing equipment for high voltage ultra-capacitors.
Summary, all battery makers intending to survive long term have to get their cost of manufacture below $250 per kwh range within 3 to 5 years and ideally to less than $150. The green tech and battery market should be seen as similar to the DOT COM era with a number of big winners and losers emerging within 5 years. The market will be very dynamic and expect a few disruptions. That is why forums such as this will be a valuable source of information for investors over the next few years. Dave