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TL;DR: Battery demand grows. Best current tech uses nickel and cobalt. Their prices grow and at the current growth trends demand outstrips supply within 20 year
by ptero 8y ago
TL;DR: Battery demand grows. Best current tech uses nickel and cobalt. Their prices grow and at the current growth trends demand outstrips supply within 20 years. We should fund research (in the author's area) to find better alternatives (e.g., using iron and silicon). This is valid but not surprising and hardly catastrophic. This is not "10 years left to find an alternative".
But what turned me off is scaremongering and naive justifications. For example, "In Africa, some mine owners exploit child workers and skimp on protective equipment" (this is true, is a problem, but has no relation to the article; they do not even claim that children mine Ni or Co), etc.
My 2c -- the title is clickbait-y and the content is lacking for nature-caliber writeup (I only read it because it referenced nature.com).
- xigma 8y agoTo the point, the prices are so damn low that only by the worst production methods is extraction even economically feasible. Higher prices will lead to production in less reckless environments, which is a good thing.
- Kagerjay 8y agoI thought nickel-colbalt has a significantly lower specific energy / energy density than other lithium-polymer batteries. They might be cheaper to make (or maybe not so much anymore), but they have a large space form factor. I don't know of any laptop today that's using a nickel cobalt battery. Those ones usually allowed you to remove the battery pack from the laptop. Now there all based on lithium-polymer now. Same with smartphones. I did some research in lithium polymer batteries a few years back. I distinctly remember there being almost 10 or so variations of lithium polymer mixes being used in battery production.
- hwillis 8y agoNo, LiPo (which really means li-ion with gel or polymer electrolyte) has a lower specific energy (kWh/kg) but higher specific power (kW/kg). > I don't know of any laptop today that's using a nickel cobalt battery. Those ones usually allowed you to remove the battery pack from the laptop. Now there all based on lithium-polymer now. Same with smartphones. They all use NMC (nickel manganese cobalt) cathodes. LiPo batteries have the exact same cathodes and anodes as normal li-ion, just a different electrolyte. > I did some research in lithium polymer batteries a few years back. I distinctly remember there being almost 10 or so variations of lithium polymer mixes being used in battery production. There are ~10 main chemistry families, but hundreds of mixes.
- Kagerjay 8y agothanks for the clarification