Stupid Questions May 2015

Gondolinian

This thread is for asking any questions that might seem obvious, tangential, silly or what-have-you. Don't be shy, everyone has holes in their knowledge, though the fewer and the smaller we can make them, the better.

Please be respectful of other people's admitting ignorance and don't mock them for it, as they're doing a noble thing.

To any future monthly posters of SQ threads, please remember to add the "stupid_questions" tag.

Please be respectful of other people's admitting ignorance and don't mock them for it, as they're doing a noble thing.

To any future monthly posters of SQ threads, please remember to add the "stupid_questions" tag.

Yes, there is.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithium#Terrestrial gives reserves of 13 million tonnes, ie 13 billion kg. I think these are "proven" reserves, ie economical to mine at current prices.

The amount of lithium in a Li-ion battery is not that much, roughly 500g/kwhr. So a 10 kW Tesla Power Wall would contain about 5 kg of lithium. We can make 2.6 billion Power Walls... and E. Musk said at the launch that 2 billion would be enough to convert the entire planet's energy usage - including industry and transport - to renewable electricity.