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> Well we're probably going to see flow batteries take over

Its unlikley, they are a massive pain to manage compared to lithium, expensive and have poor round trip efficiency. Oh and terrible energy density.

I'm not saying its impossible, but I'd be surprised.

I think the biggest two factors that play against them is that they round trip efficiency is something like 70-80% compared to 90%+. but the real pain in the arse is the charge managment. From what I understand, you need to charge them to full, and then discharge them fully. I don't believe that you can charge from halfway.

Most power markets work in 30miunute chunks, so managing charging/discharging would be really hard.

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I thought the prospects for flow batteries were becoming fairly dire due to the decline in cost of Li-ion cells.

LFP promises better fire behavior than older Li-ion technologies, I think.

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>> LFP promises better fire behavior than older Li-ion technologies, I think.

LFP's thermal runaway threshold is higher than other lithium ion battery types, but once TR starts, LFP generates more hydrogen gas that can explode if not air-vented out fast enough.

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I suspect for extremely large batteries or seasonal shifting (summer->winter) flow batteries will still have a place, but I could be wrong.
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Thermal batteries make more sense for that, but they need to be super-cheap. One possibility:

https://austinvernon.site/blog/standardthermal.html

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Flow batteries aren't any good for seasonal shifting; the capex per kWh-capacity is much too high. Granted, ordinary batteries aren't good for that either.
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"Ferb, I know what we're gonna do today"
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