Battery Usage Explosion: Laptop Battery - Battery Charger - UPS Batteries

• The battery industry has been growing at a breakneck pace in recent years. There are a big whopper number of batteries in use today, just think of the: cell phone battery, notebook battery, camcorder battery, the laptop battery, and ups batteries.
• You may be interested to read the article on the battery industry explosion.
• Each year that whopper number of new electronic devices are created. Many of these new electronic devices need unique batteries (like the PDA battery that is needed for all of the new Personal Digital Assistant devices).
• For multi-use rechargeable batteries like the lithium battery, the NiMH battery (Nickel Metal Hydride), and the NiCad batteries (Nickel Cadmium)require some type of battery charger. Some battery chargers are included with devices, and some need to be purchased separately.
• There are batteries which are not chared. These disposable batteries like the alkaline battery and the battery for hearing aids cannot be recharged and so they are disposed when they are depleted. Batteries are hazardous waste and should not be thrown in the trash. If thrown in the trash, they would eventually eventually wind up in our land fills.
• Commercial buildings and personal residences that are protected by security systems are often able to be powered by an alarm system battery. The battery power is for backup purposes only. Alarm systems are designed this way so that the security system will opearae, even in blackout conditions whether intentional or not. In many personal residences, the power can often be easily turned off from the outside breaker panel. If a home alarm system were not powered by a battery, the alarm system would be easily disabled by an intruder.
• The UPS (Uninterruptable Power Supplies), which provides power to computer systems in blackouts, contain a battery or perhaps many batteries (APC battery ). These battery/batteries can often be replaced. Locations with larger computer installations, like data centers for large corporations, often have huge power backup systems that store power in large batteries. These batteries can be free lead acid batteries or sealed lead acid batteries (SLA batteries). In blackout times, the battery power is often run through a power inverter which converts the electrical current (DC) which is output from the batteries into AC current, which is then used to run the computers. If the power to the building is interrupted, an emergency light battery can provide the power needed to light emergency exit routes, etc.
• In distant locations (without easily accessible power lines), like if you lived way out in the boonies, a solar battery charger can be used to charge a battery or battery system. The battery system could then be used to (via a power inverter) to provide AC power to the location. This can allow you to enjoy some of the modern conveniences expected by many... even while living way out in the boon docks.
• A jump starter is used to start a car with a low battery. It is portable and easier to use than driving another car along side and using jumper cables. Jump starters contains sealed lead acid batteries which provide the necessary power to jump start the car.
• In recreational vehicles and watercrafts, batteries are often put in a battery box for the purpose of protecting the battery from the elements. In fact in many water vessels, the battery is actually required by authorities. On the other hand, a motorcycle battery is generally not kept in battery boxes (like a harley davidson battery). The motorcycle battery really isn't subject to as harsh environments as in ocean going vessels.

Other Battery Information from a Battery Expert

Battery Industry Change

I'll just give you one fact that should help illustrate the constant change. The small rechargeable battery industry, whether it's the lithium ion, nickel-cadmium etc. that industry has actually been doubling every year for the last five years worldwide. That's 32 times growth in the last 5 years. You may say "wow" that's a lot. Absolutely it is. Every time a new product comes out in a year, whether it's the Ipod or blackberry, or cell phones a whole new miniature battery industry sprouts up to support the new product. And in recent years many new consumer electronic products come out each year. In my house we've gone from just me having a cell phone to now my wife and every kid in my house has a cell phone. I'm talking out of a wireless phone right now to you and I've got three of those cordless phones in my house. So that's where all the growth is coming from.

Battery Expert? What makes a Battery Expert?

We've got a lot of people who will call us, engineers and such. Sometimes they are looking for answers on the invention or project that they are working on. For example they want to be able to run a particular piece of equipment for so many years or for so many hours per day and they want to be able to recharge it in such and such a manner. They need recommendations on chemistry, capacity, and battery charger type to have this done in a particular amount of time. So people come to us with their battery and power related problems, and we help them to solve their problems. Many will want to talk about what they need to build a back up battery system for their specific need. They have a certain job that needs to be done and it needs to work for so long before the generator can kick in and do its work as and recharge the back up system. We do a lot of battery math for our clients. It's not complicated math, but it does take a solid understanding of the various products to do confidently. Maybe they need to allocate enough battery power to do the work while they don't have AC power. We will make the calculations to convert their DC power through an inverter to get 110 or 220 VAC to a particular piece of equipment. They want to know how long they will be able to run that equipment for and how many life cycles they can expect to get out of it. I'd say that a battery expert needs to be able to confidently help their customers solve those types of problems.

Solar Battery Chargers

We also help people with their solar power/solar panel needs. People will come to us, and they want to put their home on solar. So we help them determine how many panels they need to generate so many watts of power. They know that they need to run a refrigerator, a well, or maybe their whole house on solar. So we calculate their consumption in watts and then provide the appropriate panels that will meet their needs. Many will need to create a battery storage system so they can use electricity at night when there is no sunlight. For the storage systems we are talking about lead acid batteries, in most cases. We could be using nickel cadmium or something else but in most cases it's lead acid batteries are the better and more economical choice. Similar calculations and considerations would need to be done if they wanted to use a generator instead of solar panels. We answer these types of questions quite often.