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Comment by kennysmoothx | Hacker News Reader

Can someone please Explain This Like I'm 5 - The potential Graphene has when compared to the Lithium batteries we have in the market today, and if Graphene is going to make it's way into our batteries any time in the near future?

Thanks

-- EDIT --

Pardon my ignorance! It seems I was very confused about the topic in question, and mistakenly asked about super capacitors. Thanks for pointing it out!

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The article isn't about energy storage, it's about graphene superconductivity. When it becomes superconductive, it allows the free flow of electrons without resistance which produces heat. One of the limiting factor of today's chips is heat dissipation; if no heat was generated, we could make them higher clocked and faster.

You might be thinking of supercapacitors, which store energy. http://physicsworld.com/cws/article/news/2010/nov/26/graphen...

I think this is not linked with battery storage. Superconductivity allows a material to conduct electrons without any resistance, thus losing less energy and generating less heat. I could be wrong though, I am no expert.

You can use superconductors for energy storage. An inductor stores energy, but can not be used for long-term energy storage due to resistance. A superconducting inductor can be used to store energy, as there is no loss due to resistance.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superconducting_magnetic_energ...

Just to be sure, first, are you clear that your question has nothing to do with the article in question? Calcium-doped graphene superconducting at 4K means nothing for your phone battery.

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