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Stimulus Could Kickstart US Battery Industry
Al sends along a Technology Review piece that begins "Provisions in the Congressional stimulus bill could help jump-start a new, multibillion-dollar industry in the US for manufacturing advanced batteries for hybrids and electric vehicles and for storing energy from the electrical grid to enable the widespread use of renewable energy. The nearly $790 billion economic stimulus legislation contains tens of billions of dollars in loans, grants, and tax incentives for advanced battery research and manufacturing, as well as incentives for plug-in hybrids and improvements to the electrical grid, which could help create a market for these batteries. Significant advances in battery materials, including the development of new lithium-ion batteries, have been made in the US in the past few years; but advanced battery manufacturing is almost entirely overseas, particularly in Asia."
Can someone tell us what the stimulus *will* actually do?
It *will* increase the deficit.
Other than that, the jury is still out.
Why, without your clothes, you're naked, Miss Dudley!
Please stop making false claims that would have taken you 3 seconds to check.
http://www.toxco.com/
There you go they recycle. Besides if no one recycled them why would the recycling centers and such pay so much for old lithium batteries?
As an R&D type who has spent way too much time in the business world I can tell you that Obama, despite having thrown gargantuan amounts of money at this, is going to have a hard time making it stick.
Western business has a sickness which one might call "middle man disease". For every $1 put into battery factories, 90c will go on financiers, accountants, marketers, "business development" and whatever else the middle men of today choose to call themselves.
It is folklore that in certain parts of the world nothing gets done without bribing the right people. We have the same thing in the West except its a legalised, lobby-driven, slick form of bribing.
For example in my native UK whenever the govt has some new "initiative" its remarkable how the same usual self-promoting suspects are quick to get around the trough. Despite inventing nothing (and contributing very little) this is where the vast majority if the funding gets creamed off. When the oxbridge/city/public school set have had their fill what little is left is passed on to their mates the next stratum down.
And so on and so forth. On and on, down and down until the likes of you and me see a pitiful salary and a budget so tight nothing of value can be done and under terms and conditions so punishing (think: ownership of arising intellectual property) that nobody in their right mind would even think of getting out of bed to do it.
Its a systemic sickness and Obama needs to get a clue real quick that between his lofty goals and the poeple doing the actual work lurk the layers upon layers of talentless parasites that got us here in the first place.
It makes me mad that ANOTHER generation is lost to the same ivy-league/power/money/military-industrial complex.
But, would you like to pay $5 a AA battery? That's what the result would be. As much as we hate pollution and forced Chinese labor, we also hate high prices even more. Also, what would you do with Mexicans and Canadians smuggling batteries across the border. That's what will happen, like it or not.
Exactly, I mean a factory that employs 50 people and makes millions of batteries per year would experience significant savings if they could pay Chinese wages.
Wait a minute: Union wages x 50 employes / millions of units = very very small labor premium per unit. Turns out maybe battery manufacturing is probably dominated by the material costs, which aren't really any cheaper in China after all. All in all, it will probably add a few cents to the cost of "Made in USA" batteries.
But I'm just /. spewing right? Anyone can pull numbers out of their ass!! If only there was some American AA battery factory out there so we could see the reality. Lucky us:
"All Panasonic Alkaline batteries are made in the U.S.A. at our state-of-the-art manufacturing facility in Columbus, Georgia."
Of course, those are "Panasonic Industrial Alkalines" those are gonna cost you a fortune:
Panasonic Industrial AA Batteries 24/carton - $9.60
Works out to $0.40 per battery. I think we'll cope.
I accept your apology.
Cites:
Made in USA claim:
http://www.panasonic.com/industrial/battery/oem/chem/alk/
Panasonic Industrial AA's for sale:
http://www.jirehsupplies.com/cgi-bin/commerce.cgi?preadd=action&key=PI-AA