I have always thought that low current solid state batteries with thick electrodes (minimizing non-energy containing components in the batteries- fewer current collectors etc.) would be a good way to lower costs of materials and potentially make these good grid or home storage technologies. C-rates are insignificant for home solar storage. For instance, suppose you have a 200 kWhr battery for home solar and wind storage. Once fully charged you would have (assuming 10kW per day usage) you have a battery that can supply 20 days of electricity. With 24 hours in a day, that is a C/480 rate. In cars we need C-rates of 1 or C/2. The solid state electrolytes may not be capable of these vehicle requirements, but they should have no problem with home solar storage. Also, thick electrodes are more capable at low C-rates too. It is largely diffusion limitations that make simply thickening the electrodes not a viable method of increasing energy density and lowering cost for automobiles, since they require high currents, but again home storage can be low current, which minimizes the diffusion limitations issue. Big changes to our energy systems are scary for those that are already making the money, but we should act in the best interest of the people, however we don't, because money can buy influence.

"..smooth stripping-deposition of lithium.."
This allows a lithium anode, which increases energy density further without dendrite formation. Solid state eliminates the sulfide migration.

@BrotherKenny and Nick
I think Brotherkenny has a good point. Yes, the cost of batteries is too high for that now, but if the capacity is 16x the current capacity for Li-FEPO4, then the price will be much lower per kWhr. I could see these batteries costing $5000 - $10000. Although I have no data for that other than other chemistry's that are cheaper per kWhr when hey have higher specific energy. I think we can take this one step further. While vehicles currently need higher C rates, that's because the packs are so small. If you make an 800 mile vehicle, you want something like 100kWh of pack. Again, when you get to that level, you don't need the high C rates anymore. So if the price comes down enough, this battery works for vehicles also.

@Guetenburg, your idea about bigger batteries not requiring high C rates is generally correct, but the numbers are off a bit.

For a very efficient vehicle like the BMW i3 which uses about 272 watt per mile, you would need a battery of 217 kWh to go 800 miles. The good news is, passenger cars almost never drive 800 miles without a break, unless the driver wears astronaut diapers. Even if you drive 8 hours straight at an average speed of 65 mph that's only 520 miles.

If you drive four hours at 65 mph that's 260 mi - almost exactly what a Tesla Model S is capable of today. A meal break at the mid-point of an 8 hour trip is probably a good trade-off for a fuel cost savings of ~ $35 on that trip. (Maybe there is a free lunch!)
(above model compares gas at $2.50/gal to electricity at $.012 per kWh. When gas goes back up to $4gal the fuel cost savings will be ~$66.)

You could see a 260 mile battery for $5,000 - $10,000 by 2017. That's about $75-$150 per kWh.

Davemart, your fixation on my identity is a little creepy. Get over it old man.

As energy density goes up (e.g. doubles) the materials cost will decrease by half, assuming reasonably priced or even cheaper materials - like sulfur for example. That's true not only for the anode and cathode materials, but also for things like casings and monitoring/balancing electronics. Even the effective cost of production equipment will drop as the total kWh throughput doubles on the assembly line.

This is assuming that exotic materials or processes are not introduced, but much of the promising research we've read about over the past few years does not use expensive materials or processes.

Whether these costs fall on the low side of that estimate or the high side by 2017 is almost irrelevant. The cost curve is going the right direction. Within the next few years an all-electric drive train will leave very little room for ICE or H2 to be competitive on a TCO basis.

I agree with ECI, $100 per kWh is where we're headed in the next 3-4 years, driven mainly by Mr Musk's big workshop. After that, costs will fall more slowly, but progress in battery size and mass (at the pack level) will continue with good pace.

Continued from above:
To be fair, those BEV owners can also invest the yearly savings on fuel cost, over those 15 years.
So, HEV fuel cost $14,000 over 15 years, or $933 per year.

BEV electricity cost assuming 10% fast charging at higher rates of $0.36 and at 0.8 charging efficiency ($0.36 / .8 = $0.45/kWh). (54,000 kWh x $0.14) + (6,000 kWh x $0.45) = $10,260 /15yrs = $684 .

Saving in fuel cost of BEV over HEV, $933 - $684= $249 per year. If this is invested yearly, for 15 years, at the above calculation, "Investment return totals $6,117 after 15 years."

So, $14,278 return from investing $6,000 principal for 15 years, vs. $6,117 return for yearly cumulative investment of $249 from fuel cost savings, the difference is: $8161 in favor of owners of HEV who had wisely investing the cost differential between a BEV and HEV. Both BEV and HEV buyers forked out $30,000 out of pocket initally.

What about the economics of PHEV like the 4-seat Volt, at $34,000 with questionable profitability, vs the 5-seat Prius at $24,000 at assured profitability, the Prius being best-selling models in California and Japan for several years? Well, you can the run the same calculation like above to see for yourself.
Even if the Volt's price differential of $10,000 vs the Prius will be reduced by half, which will require a major miracle, the cost differential of $5,000 will still favor heavily the Prius, especially the 20% of the time that the Volt will be driven on gasoline, with poorer efficiency than the Prius, 37 mpg vs 50 mpg!

@Roger

Real world case: Last summer I got a car for my daughter as a graduation present. The Prius had a $5K premium over the Leaf after factoring in tax incentives. I don't see anywhere where you factor in tax incentives. I opted for the Leaf.

Nissan pays the fees for charging network memberships as well as charges for power from those networks for the first couple of years.

Charges vary per network but $0.25 / KWHr of FC is more realistic....at least here in Northern California. You may want to adjust your calculations.

I believe that later this year we will see that the default choice for those who are fuel cost conscious will be the 2016 Volt which after tax incentives will essentially be the same cost as the 2016 Prius but will have much lower fuel costs. If the Prius wants to remain viable it will have to become a plug in and offer battery range approaching that of the Volt. Less than 30 mAER won't cut it.

Roger, always nice to see you weighing in, especially with a thoughtful argument. But as Gasbag points out, you've omitted the tax and rebate incentives given to those who choose to drive a zero emission vehicle.

In California, it's $10,000. In Georgia, it's $12,500, making that state one of the highest per-capita adopters of ZEVs in the country. If you lease you can get those incentives up front, so that you can drive $0 down and less than $200 per month for a very well appointed brand new car.

My fundamental premise is that the cost curve for BEVs and PHEVs is going down rapidly. There will be an inflection point. That inflection point is being acellerated by the low cost and favorable cost curve of solar, which savvy homeowners can use to create very low cost transportation fuel with very stable prices.

Gasoline and Hydrogen will not be able to compete with those advantages.

As much as you'd like to speculate about low cost hydrogen, nothing about its manufacture, distribution or dispensing is cheap or easy. The likelihood you'd be able to get a permit for a rooftop system that compresses to 12,000 PSI (required for dispensing) within the next ten years is virtually nil.