Will super capacitors ever replace batteries in our e-boards or in any electronics? There are many people who believe so. One real advantage to super capacitors is their ability to quick charge. That could be a huge improvement in terms of electric vehicles (including e-boards & e-bikes) being able to “refuel” in an instant. The obvious disadvantage at the moment is capacity. A super capacitor of equivalent to say a 5000 mah lipo battery would be huge. Super caps are also measured in Farads. How do Farads and mah translate? I’m sure there’s a calculator online. What are your guys thoughts on the subject?
I think the line between super caps and batteries will blur eventually. There are a lot of promising battery designs unrelated to super caps as well like Lithium-air batteries. It’s definitely an interesting field right now.
Mmm…I’ve never heard of a lithium air batteries. I’ll definitely have to look into that. Are they a common battery, or are they just too new at the moment? Super caps don’t work like batteries do because there’s no chemical reaction taking place (from my understanding). That’s probably the reason super cabs can charge to quickly while batteries generally can’t.
I don’t see it happening any time soon. Not only is there a huge difference in capacity like you mentioned, but capacitors also discharge in a relatively linear curve. Batteries will discharge around their nominal voltage for most of their life span. There’s no range of constant voltage when capacitors discharge so I don’t see how they could replace batteries on e-boards or electronics.
Maybe capacitors could be used with batteries though to provide a small quick charge?
Supercapacitors actually do have a chemical reaction take place called a reduction-oxidation (redox) reaction. The difference is that batteries store their potential energy (voltage) in a chemical form compared to capacitors in an electric field. The chemical form is what allows batteries to store waaayy more energy than capacitors. Batteries need to covert that chemical energy into electrical energy though. Capacitors store the electrical energy directly on the plates which allows the rapid charge/discharge. I believe capacitors also seem so charge so fast since they really don’t store that much energy (yet).
traditionally caps and batteries were completely different in that they were used as power buffers and power sources due to thier different behaviors, but who knows what’s going to happen over the next few years. We have unprecedented energy densities in some of the chemistries that arein the works now. lithium air, carbon nanotubes, developments in not only chemistry but structure and new materials placement…
we could be looking at something similar to both or unlike either at any point within the next 10 years or so.