Q4 2021 hedge fund letters, conferences and more Another Strong Year For Read MoreBut like all brand-new technologies, EVs and sustainable energy deal with an uphill battle. Still, the future is clear; eco-friendly energy and electric vehicles are on the increase.
To get more information about how these new technologies can be refined to improve and lower costs effectiveness, we talked with Dan Brdar and Tim Burns of Ideal Power (Nasdaq: IPWR) to discover how they see these markets progressing over the next couple of years and the role their business aims to play.
Q: What are a few of the major inefficiencies facing emerging industries like electric cars (EVs) and eco-friendly energy?
A: They both have cost and energy losses as ineffectiveness. Both of those will continue to enhance gradually.
Electric cars are still being offered in small volumes compared to combustion engine-based automobiles, so they dont yet have the exact same supply chain economies of scale. As electrical car technologies grow, well see enhanced batteries, semiconductors, and automobile manufacturing methods that will drive higher performance, greater lorry variety, and lower expense.
With renewable resource, the costs for wind and solar energy have actually dropped significantly over the last 10 years, but there is still the issue of intermittency. The sun is not always shining, and the wind is not always blowing. You require to think about highly effective energy storage to take full advantage of the value and readily available kilowatt-hours from eco-friendly energy. The quickly declining expense of batteries and innovative methods to their usage can largely mitigate the intermittency concerns.
Q: How can these ineffectiveness be resolved?
A: One method is by improving power conversion innovations because both renewable resource and electric vehicles require power converters to transform direct current (DC) energy to rotating existing (AIR CONDITIONER) and AC to DC. The semiconductors for the power conversion innovation that enters into these items are some of that.
That conversion process from direct existing to alternating present isnt 100% efficient since some energy is lost. The way to improve that is to improve the semiconductor gadgets in those power converters so that they can pull out more beneficial energy caught from the sun or kept in batteries.
The exact same holds true with electric automobiles. Semiconductors are the second-largest expense in an electrical automobile after the batteries. They are utilized in the drivetrain, onboard charger and lots of other locations. Improving the performance of these semiconductors can substantially improve the series of an electrical lorry.
Q: What is Ideal Powers approach to resolving these problems?
A: Weve created an actually distinct, high-efficiency semiconductor power switch. It truly is targeting that conversion action from DC to AC, AIR CONDITIONER to DC or altering the DC voltage more effectively. As an outcome of that, these products will become lower cost and more effective. Part of minimizing the cost is that if you could convert power more efficiently, theres less thermal management and less waste heat to handle, which allows the items to be smaller sized, lighter and less costly. Our technology is inherently bidirectional, so the energy can stream in both instructions.
Q: What is the general effect that resolving these problems might have on the broader EV and renewable energy industries?
A: If you think about electric vehicles, among the best problems that clients have is variety anxiety. If you were to utilize Ideal Powers Bidirectional, Bipolar Junction Transistor (B-TRANTM) innovation in the drivetrain, you could really enhance the variety of the vehicle by 7% to 10%. Thats a huge effect in terms of the actual useful range you can leave the automobile. If you wish to concentrate on reducing the expense, you could actually have less batteries on the automobile for the same variety since you can have more efficient power conversion by using things like B-TRANTM. In terms of its visibility to the end user of electric lorries or eco-friendly energy, the impact could be considerable.
Q: How do you believe fixing these issues would impact the mass adoption of these innovations?
For sustainable energy, it takes the kind of helpful kilowatt-hours. If you could bring an innovation like our B-TRAN ™ to these applications, you could possibly decrease their expenses and get more helpful energy out of them, dealing with both the range and ineffectiveness challenges. It makes these innovations more competitive and more attractive, and it minimizes the viewed risk of both brand-new technologies for the consumer.
Q: What was the preliminary concept behind the Bidirectional, Bipolar Junction Transistor (B-TRANTM)?
A: We saw that the standard semiconductor devices used to make bidirectional switches were just not effective. Especially with the adoption of batteries for energy storage, theres going to be an increasing need for bidirectional switching since batteries need to charge and then release energy. Hence, energy has to flow in both instructions to and from the battery. We were trying to find a more efficient semiconductor gadget that you might use to make a bidirectional power switch. Thats where we created B-TRANTM as a method that could enhance both the conduction and switching losses associated with controlling the circulation of energy in either direction in a circuit.
Q: What is the B-TRANTM and how does it work? What are a few of its applications?
A: The B-TRANTM is a semiconductor gadget that is used to form a switch to manage the circulation of energy. A light switch controls all the energy flowing to a light. It offers you the ability to switch energy on and off thousands of times per second, which permits you to do a lot of things with energy products and power conversion.
Applications include things like electric vehicles; electrical vehicle charging; renewable energy, solar and wind power, which can be paired with energy storage; standalone energy storage; solid-state circuit breakers for energy transmission and circulation systems; military applications; and things like uninterruptible power supply systems for data.
Q: What can you tell us about Ideal Powers work with the U.S. Navys ship electrification program?
A: Were dealing with Diversified Technologies, Inc., which has knowledge in developing solid-state circuit breakers, as part of a program moneyed by the U.S. Navy to develop a solid-state circuit breaker for the ship electrification program. The Navy wants to decrease the amount of liquid fuels it uses to run ships by putting a direct present infrastructure in the ships that uses batteries and other technologies to lower the amount of fuel it must transfer throughout the world. The Navy likewise wants to make its ships quieter and more effective, however so far, it hasnt had the ability to do that because you require a fast-acting, efficient, solid-state circuit breaker to control the circulation of energy around the ship.
Standard semiconductor devices are too inefficient. Conventional semiconductors produce too much energy in the type of waste heat. Along with Diversified Technologies, we were awarded a task by the Navy to produce a solid-state breaker that relies on our B-TRAN ™ technology for a large-scale demonstration with the Navy later on this year.
Q: What challenges do you expect Ideal Power to deal with in the next 12 to 18 months, and how do you plan to overcome them?
There are very large worldwide auto manufacturers, and there are big solar companies involved in the power converters for solar and energy storage. As a small business with brand-new innovation, youve got to make them conscious of the innovation. I believe a lot of it is just talking to the ideal people at these prospective users, getting them comfortable with the technology, educating them about it, and getting them to spend time and resources to evaluate it.
We put out whitepapers that describe the innovation. We have an active outreach with possible clients where our organization development group is informing them about the technology and getting their engagement in regards to how they could utilize it. Were getting involved in trade convention. A great deal of it is really just essential instructional work in regards to outreach to make the neighborhood mindful that there is this brand-new technology that they require to be taking a look at.
Upgraded on Jan 12, 2022, 4:01 pm
Two significant growth industries in the U.S. and worldwide are electrical lorries and renewable resource. As governments and services worldwide get more serious about climate change and the requirement for a sustainable energy grid, these two emerging solutions are being thought about necessities for human civilization.
Q4 2021 hedge fund letters, conferences and more Another Strong Year For Read MoreBut like all new technologies, EVs and sustainable energy face an uphill fight. You require to believe about extremely effective energy storage to maximize the value and readily available kilowatt-hours from sustainable energy. If you could bring a technology like our B-TRAN ™ to these applications, you might possibly reduce their costs and get more useful energy out of them, dealing with both the range and ineffectiveness difficulties. Particularly with the adoption of batteries for energy storage, theres going to be an increasing requirement for bidirectional changing since batteries need to charge and then release energy. It provides you the ability to switch energy on and off thousands of times per 2nd, which permits you to do a lot of things with energy items and power conversion.
