the biggest battery search ever

[Michael Goebel]

Using a computer, it should be possible to construct a program

that sequentially simulates every type of electrochemical cell

possible and tests it for performance. Working with roughly

60 possible (usable, practical)chemical elements and allowing, say, 3
elements for

the first electrode, up to three elements again for the electrolyte

and 3 for the second electrode, this gives 60^9 = 10,077,696,000,000,000

possible battery types, not an insurmountable number of calculations

for a computer network or modern supercomputer.

Many of the elements and compounds generated by the permutator

could be immediately discarded, such as the inert gases for instance

and rare elements such as astatine, osmium, iridium etc, also many

compounds such as sodium cloride could immediately be skipped,

compounds for electrodes that are not conductive would similarly be

discarded along with combinations where the electrodes are corroded

by or soluble in the electrolyte.

The chemistry of all existing batteries is well-known, easily computed and
the

performance (eg power and energy densities, cell voltage etc) also readily

calculated. Surely a program of this type may yield a battery chemistry

that has not been hitherto discovered. It's accuracy, prior to launch, could
be tested by

plugging in existing cells and comparing it's output results against known
measured

parameters.