12 ms·

Breakthrough for ‘massless’ energy storage

233 points by reimertz 6y ago

neals 6y ago
There's a check-list floating around here on HN with all the possible reasons why we won't be seeing this in production any time soon, but I can't seem to find it. Hope some fellow HN'er posts it so we can stop being all excited.
- 7373737373 6y ago
  ---------------------------------------------------------------- Dear battery technology claimant, Thank you for your submission of proposed new revolutionary battery technology. Your new technology claims to be superior to existing lithium-ion technology and is just around the corner from taking over the world. Unfortunately your technology will likely fail, because: [ ] it is impractical to manufacture at scale. [ ] it will be too expensive for users. [ ] it suffers from too few recharge cycles. [ ] it is incapable of delivering current at sufficient levels. [ ] it lacks thermal stability at low or high temperatures. [ ] it lacks the energy density to make it sufficiently portable. [ ] it has too short of a lifetime. [ ] its charge rate is too slow. [ ] its materials are too toxic. [ ] it is too likely to catch fire or explode. [ ] it is too minimal of a step forward for anybody to care. [ ] this was already done 20 years ago and didn't work then. [ ] by this time it ships li-ion advances will match it. [ ] your claims are lies. ----------------------------------------------------------------
  - mromanuk 6y ago
    I would love to see a timely spreadsheet with each breakthrough and how it went.
  - C4stor 6y ago
    >Your new technology claims to be superior to existing lithium-ion To be fair, it doesn't. The article is explicit that it's only 20% as mass efficient s lithium-ion battery. On the other hand, it's also true that the vehicle aluminium mass is mostly dead weight, so exploiting it to serve as a battery doesn't seem insane. Except now, they need to know what to do when something hits it, breaks it, etc... So I'm not convinced this is a good idea for cars (or for anything), but at least, it goes in a direction that actually seems new instead of just doing "same but better". I could actually see that used as a support for solar panels so that they would litterally ship "batteries included".
    - azernik 6y ago
      Or even as a supplement to a conventional battery - being able to squeeze in 10% more energy capacity without expanding the battery could be a way to incrementally improve range. And also possibly provide a small backup power source in case of main battery failure.
    - Cthulhu_ 6y ago
      > To be fair, it doesn't Well yeah, there's no check in the checklist, nobody claimed that.
  - JoeAltmaier 6y ago
    * this was already done 20 years ago and didn't work then.* This is a standard wet-blanket unhelpful remark that doesn't belong in the list.
    - jandrese 6y ago
      Maybe it should say "didn't explain why it will work now when it failed in the past"?
  - immmmmm 6y ago
    good points! having worked a bit in a close field i'd add: [ ] is impossible to recycle
  - darksaints 6y ago
    I've seen this checklist before and it is infuriatingly lazy, like taking the famous HN lowbrow dismissal and turning it into a meme, but actually taking the meme seriously. Lithium-Ion batteries are not the most superior battery. They might be the best we have for some use cases, but obviously not all, or they would have 100% market share. They haven't replaced disposable alkaline batteries. They haven't replaced AGP batteries. They haven't replaced Lead Acid batteries. They haven't replaced Lithium Iron Phosphate batteries. There are plenty of reasons why: cost, weight, safety, shelf life, etc. Since Lithium Ion doesn't have 100% market share, a useful comparison does not have to be with Lithium Ion in order for a battery technology to be a meaningful advance. And even if it did, sometimes an advance in just one area can be enough to overcome its disadvantages in other areas. Example: I use Lithium Iron Phosphate in my sailboat. Yes, it has lower energy density. Yes, it has lower power density. Yes, it is more expensive. Yes, it has shorter lifecycle. Yes, it has a slow charge rate. It has one solitary advantage over lithium ion, and that single advantage is the difference between life and death: it is more chemically stable and thermally stable, and less likely to result in fires. If you have a fire in your car, that sucks...but you can just open up your car door and walk 20 feet to safety. You hop on your cell phone and call AAA or a taxi or a friend. If you're on a sailboat in the middle of the ocean, you can't do that. Even if you've planned well, with a ditch kit, a liferaft, and an EPIRB, you are still potentially several hours or even days before someone can get to you to get you to safety. In the meantime, you're floating on an ocean with waves taller than your liferaft, with a limited supply of food and water, and you have a tiny plastic membrane separating you from a place where you would need constant energy to survive and where you are no longer the top of the food chain. So with all due respect, fuck lithium ion. And fuck this list. There is plenty of room for advances in battery technology, and we don't need religious charlatans from the Cult of Musk shitting on every single battery tech announcement.
    - _ph_ 6y ago
      The point isn't that Lithium Ion batteries are that great, but that most of the press articles are hyping something which at best is a few years in the future. There is a huge gap between even the best science and a technology which is ready for production and can be rolled out into large-scale manufacturing. Even if there are for-real samples around for people to play with, it could take years until they make it into a car. And then of course, there is some risk that the initial science isn't even good. That happens too.
geocrasher 6y ago
"Researchers from Chalmers University of Technology have produced a structural battery that performs ten times better than all previous versions" It's 10 times more everything, just like every other battery breakthrough in the last several decades. AND, you get to use it as a building material? - Sounds too good to be true: Check - Sounds like every other "big" breakthrough: Check - Article light on science and heavy on assertions: Check - Skepticism engaged: Check
- callesgg 6y ago
  Presumably that should be read: Better than previous “massless battery’s”. “... produced a structural battery that performs ten times better than all previous versions”
  - TheAdamAndChe 6y ago
    I recommend people read the article, it actually has some information. More info: "The battery has an energy density of 24 Wh/kg, meaning approximately 20 percent capacity compared to comparable lithium-ion batteries currently available. But since the weight of the vehicles can be greatly reduced, less energy will be required to drive an electric car, for example" "the researchers did not choose the materials to try and break records – rather, they wanted to investigate and understand the effects of material architecture and separator thickness." - this implies there may be a lot of room for improvement with this design.
    - ThomPete 6y ago
      then the question becomes how are they solving for the increased heat.
      - TheAdamAndChe 6y ago
        In increased surface area-to-mass ratio would probably make this easier.
vardump 6y ago
I wonder how this compares with Tesla's upcoming structural batteries. They're also supposed to eliminate unnecessary material by making the battery itself a part of car's structural chassis. https://electrek.co/2021/01/19/tesla-structural-battery-pack-first-picture/ https://electrek.co/2021/01/19/tesla-structural-battery-pack... https://techcrunch.com/2020/09/22/future-teslas-will-have-batteries-that-double-as-structure-making-them-extra-stiff-while-improving-efficiency-safety-and-cost/ https://techcrunch.com/2020/09/22/future-teslas-will-have-ba...
- vlovich123 6y ago
  This literally is a structural battery. Says that in the first sentence. This is about making a structural battery that’s 10x more efficient by using carbon fiber. How it compares to Tesla is obviously unknown since both are technically vaporware. The concept does sound revolutionary though so hopefully the engineering pans out.
  - eloff 6y ago
    I would give the OP the benefit of the doubt that they understand both are structural batteries and is wondering how they compare in other battery metrics. From this article, Tesla's blow these ones away - except possibly as a structural element - and they're much closer to being a real product.
    - vlovich123 6y ago
      I tried but this phrase stood out to me: > They're also supposed to eliminate unnecessary material by making the battery itself a part of car's structural chassis. That implies they're believing the article isn't talking about a structural chassis. Why are you treating this like a fanboy competition? It can both be true that Tesla is coming to market with a real product & that this announcement is an important advancement in the state of the art for structural batteries. They are totally different ends of the spectrum with the latter portending where the tech may be heading whereas the former is focused on proving that it's ready for large scale prime time.
asattarmd 6y ago
Since everyone is highly skeptical of this, is there an alternative to Lithium ion batteries that is close to production currently?
- jleahy 6y ago
  No
- scythe 6y ago
  This is a lithium-ion battery. About half of the technologies cited as "replacements" for Li-ion are actually different Li-ion chemistries. Cf. Li-S, "graphene", "nanowire", "solid-state batteries", etc. Sodium-sulfur batteries are in production currently and can compete on density with Li-ion, but lithium is cheaper and the cost trend is expanding the gap. Silver oxide likewise (silver is expensive!). We do have alternatives, but we don't have good reasons to use them.
Causality1 6y ago
Funny that the usability study pop-up doesn't fit on my screen in landscape orientation and totally breaks the site since I can't dismiss it.
intrasight 6y ago
My take is that there is some good science and engineering being done here, so we should look past the marketing-speak. I could totally see carbon fiber cylinders of this material landing in a future bicycle, and I do see an eBike in my future.
the_french 6y ago
This may be rather naive but wouldn't using an energy storage mechanism for structural purposes be a bad idea? That could mean that every fender bender now risks igniting the hood of your car.
- whoomp12342 6y ago
  sounds like a great idea for consumerism.
STRML 6y ago
At 24 Wh/kg, it's going to take a lot of this to produce an amount of storage relevant to the needs of a vehicle, and that's ignoring the very high cost of the material. For instance, the Alfa Romeo 4C had an (expensive) all-carbon tub that weighed 65kg. At this storage efficiency, that's only 1.5 kWh... about enough to drive 5 miles in a standard-size vehicle. Interesting nevertheless, but I can't see getting excited at this density just yet, even if it is true.
- ainiriand 6y ago
  It is infinitely greater than 0 anyway. You need the chassis in any case, right? I think this is not meant as a replacement but as a complement of other parts.
- gameswithgo 6y ago
  "about enough to drive 5 miles in a standard-size vehicle." Are you accounting for the fact that the alpha romeo would no longer have the mass of a separate battery pack? Might it be 10 miles? Still needs improvement! Would it work out better in something like an aptera?
iandanforth 6y ago
If this worked would it be compatible with wireless communication? I know hardly any EE, but I wonder, if there are a bunch of currents in your component housing doesn't that mean it will be hard for an internal antenna to send and receive?
reimertz 6y ago
I understand and value the skepticism but for those who wants the science behind their claim, please read their paper "A Structural Battery and its Multifunctional Performance"(also referenced in the article). https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/aesr.202000093 https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/aesr.202000093
- h2odragon 6y ago
  I'm thinking "backing, bracing, encasing" solar cells... wondering about interactions with heat and insulation; they used to sell "precast wall panels" that were aluminum over foam and cool to work with. This might be "powerwall" bait.
nabla9 6y ago
> Funding has come from the European Commission's research program Clean Sky II, as well as the US Airforce. Carbon fiber structural battery would be ideal for aviation. Of course, scientific discovery is not the same as engineering solution, this is just early stage research.
jdhn 6y ago
I like how they call out that it has 20% of the capacity of a lithium ion battery of the same mass. I'd rather be realistic about technological advances, and then be pleasently surprised when it shows up in consumer products rather than have a glowing press release and then we don't see it in production ever.
JoeAltmaier 6y ago
I wonder about performance/capacity over time as the material is stressed/flexed. If its structural, it'll take mechanical load. Thin films may not thrive.
twobitshifter 6y ago
My concern with structural batteries is that if your battery wears out (like all batteries before) then you not only need a battery replacement but also a replacement of your cars subframe or underbody. I think this would lead to cars being even more disposable.
- Cthulhu_ 6y ago
  And what about small dings? If it's anything like e.g. a li-ion battery, just a small ding will already cause a short. In the best case, that panel will no longer work as a battery. Worst case it starts a fire.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
yayr 6y ago
My main concern would be about reusability. Current battery tech is quite limited with respect to how many charging cycles it supports. So do we need to throw away a bike with structural battery pack then in future, once the charging cycles have expired or someone forgot to regularly keep the battery charged?
mikkelam 6y ago
perhaps the title should reflect that this is not a regular battery per se, but a structural battery, i.e, a battery that can give mechanical integrity.
dcanelhas 6y ago
In applications where the battery is only providing auxiliary power, such as for bicycles this would be really neat.
reimertz 6y ago
A thought. Imagine working and spending your entire scientific career on a specific problem, hoping to create positive change and then to be meet with this type of skepticism. I can't help but feel sad for everyone involved in this scientific research if they end up seeing this. I do value skepticism but it feels somewhat unfair here because they are very transparent with how they relate to current existing lithium-ion technology while discussing their differences and how they could potentially innovate and iterate on their solution. All of of this while referring to their peer-reviewed paper. What more could they have done? Shouldn't we celebrate events like this?
- gameswithgo 6y ago
  Yes we should.
- hannob 6y ago
  > What more could they have done? Oh this one is simple. Be transparent in your communication about the limitations of what you've done. Be clear whether this is early research or something likely to find its way into products any time soon. And above all: Avoide terms like "breakthrough" unless they're really deserved (which is exceptionally rare).
  - jnwatson 6y ago
    But it isn't the researchers doing this. This is university PR.
  - gameswithgo 6y ago
    All of that was clear in the article. It is research, it has way less energy density than a normal battery, and it WAS a breakthrough.
  - polack 6y ago
    It might not be a breakthrough that takes us to Mars, but saying that an 10x improvement over existing versions isn't a breakthrough feels a bit unfair and a bit narrow minded. In this space it's obviously an breakthrough, you just don't happen to be interested or directly affected by it.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
arithmomachist 6y ago
The relatively low energy density means it won't be replacing li-ion batteries in vehicles any time soon. Where I could see this technology shining is in low-power consumer electronics. For example, since it's flexible, it could be used to make an e-ink reader that's paper thin and flexes (somewhat) like paper.
shadowgovt 6y ago
I've been interested for awhile in how structural computing could be done in this vein. Generally less important for cars right now, but as self-driving technology evolves, I imagine auto manufacturers may become increasingly interested in how to tuck away enough processing power without sacrificing an entire trunk.
fabian2k 6y ago
There's an article in German that is very critical of the comparisons they make: https://www.golem.de/news/akkutechnik-das-maerchen-von-der-masselosen-strukturbatterie-2103-155385.html https://www.golem.de/news/akkutechnik-das-maerchen-von-der-m... Essentially the author argues that a comparison with state-of the art cells would mean that they achieve only 8-10% of the capacity per weight of conventional cells. There's a bunch of other specific criticisms in there about comparisons made in the paper.
jliptzin 6y ago
If I remember correctly Tesla already has plans to incorporate their next gen batteries into the structure of the car
OliverJones 6y ago
Batteries are a kind of semiconductor. They're bigger than others, but still semiconductors. Most kinds of semiconductors have a stage in the history of their development where their cost / performance ratio does am exponential Moore's - law plunge. Batteries could get there. So, all sorts of research are good. In the meantime, maybe this kind of tech could be used to combine PV solar panels with electrical storage.
lstodd 6y ago
It will burn pretty.
gloryless 6y ago
Using "massless" instead of "structural" should tell you that this is in sales pitch mode
mekkkkkk 6y ago
If Leif is right in that it will eventually have triple the energy density and stiffness, it might become really useful for electric powered flight. You want to be in a situation were having isolated internal supporting structures made of batteries is enough. With the current specs you'll probably have to replace every single structural component with batteries. Even that might not do it.
agumonkey 6y ago
I was joking the other day but when are we getting regenerative crashing ?
rexreed 6y ago
"Massless" batteries are as much about lack of mass as "Serverless" apps are about a lack of servers.
covfefeblack 6y ago
Carbon fibre. There is nothing it can't do. Except leave the lab.
shireboy 6y ago
Tesla mentioned similar in their battery presser a few months ago. One question that I have with the whole concept is if a "structural battery" means you have to throw out the whole car once the battery is EOL. I would hope Tesla is better than this, but could totally see this happening, since it's the model many laptop manufacturers are going for and it generally benefits them to push consumers to refresh laptops/cars more frequently.
- AstralStorm 6y ago
  Carbon electrode is resilient, you could get away with refurbishing the anode in a process similar to painting or soundproofing the car.
mrfusion 6y ago
Would photons need true massless energy storage?
bjornsing 6y ago
We all know massless energy storage is impossible. Einstein proved it. :P
jonplackett 6y ago
If it's part of the structure, what happens when you have a crash?
netman21 6y ago
Sailboats! Would be easy to embed this in the hull.
elihu 6y ago
> "The battery has an energy density of 24 Wh/kg, meaning approximately 20 percent capacity compared to comparable lithium-ion batteries currently available." > "The new battery has a negative electrode made of carbon fibre, and a positive electrode made of a lithium iron phosphate-coated aluminium foil." Really, it's more like 10% compared to something like the latest Tesla cells. Even when comparing to LiFePo4, recently modern cells I think are in the ballpark of 150 wh/kg versus the 120 wh/kg implied by the article. It's interesting work anyways, though. Even if the energy density isn't enough to be practical yet, it's progress. I don't expect structural batteries to be mainstream in cars anytime soon, but it does at least expand the set of available design options. (I'm currently working on a Mazda RX-8 conversion. If structural batteries were available and competitive in terms of energy density and I had unlimited funding and ability to fabricate one-off parts, one could imagine a structural battery replacing the front and rear subframe and the steel frame member that connects the transmission to the differential in the rear. You'd still need additional batteries to get a decent range, though. Realistically, you'd want to design a car from scratch to really take advantage of structural batteries.) I wonder how bad of an idea it would be to replace the front and rear bumper (by which I mean the steel bumper underneath all the plastic and styrofoam cushioning) with a structural battery?

233 points by reimertz 6y ago

There's a check-list floating around here on HN with all the possible reasons why we won't be seeing this in production any time soon, but I can't seem to find it. Hope some fellow HN'er posts it so we can stop being all excited.

7373737373 6y ago
---------------------------------------------------------------- Dear battery technology claimant, Thank you for your submission of proposed new revolutionary battery technology. Your new technology claims to be superior to existing lithium-ion technology and is just around the corner from taking over the world. Unfortunately your technology will likely fail, because: [ ] it is impractical to manufacture at scale. [ ] it will be too expensive for users. [ ] it suffers from too few recharge cycles. [ ] it is incapable of delivering current at sufficient levels. [ ] it lacks thermal stability at low or high temperatures. [ ] it lacks the energy density to make it sufficiently portable. [ ] it has too short of a lifetime. [ ] its charge rate is too slow. [ ] its materials are too toxic. [ ] it is too likely to catch fire or explode. [ ] it is too minimal of a step forward for anybody to care. [ ] this was already done 20 years ago and didn't work then. [ ] by this time it ships li-ion advances will match it. [ ] your claims are lies. ----------------------------------------------------------------
- mromanuk 6y ago
  I would love to see a timely spreadsheet with each breakthrough and how it went.
- C4stor 6y ago
  >Your new technology claims to be superior to existing lithium-ion To be fair, it doesn't. The article is explicit that it's only 20% as mass efficient s lithium-ion battery. On the other hand, it's also true that the vehicle aluminium mass is mostly dead weight, so exploiting it to serve as a battery doesn't seem insane. Except now, they need to know what to do when something hits it, breaks it, etc... So I'm not convinced this is a good idea for cars (or for anything), but at least, it goes in a direction that actually seems new instead of just doing "same but better". I could actually see that used as a support for solar panels so that they would litterally ship "batteries included".
  - azernik 6y ago
    Or even as a supplement to a conventional battery - being able to squeeze in 10% more energy capacity without expanding the battery could be a way to incrementally improve range. And also possibly provide a small backup power source in case of main battery failure.
  - Cthulhu_ 6y ago
    > To be fair, it doesn't Well yeah, there's no check in the checklist, nobody claimed that.
- JoeAltmaier 6y ago
  * this was already done 20 years ago and didn't work then.* This is a standard wet-blanket unhelpful remark that doesn't belong in the list.
  - jandrese 6y ago
    Maybe it should say "didn't explain why it will work now when it failed in the past"?
- immmmmm 6y ago
  good points! having worked a bit in a close field i'd add: [ ] is impossible to recycle
- darksaints 6y ago
  I've seen this checklist before and it is infuriatingly lazy, like taking the famous HN lowbrow dismissal and turning it into a meme, but actually taking the meme seriously. Lithium-Ion batteries are not the most superior battery. They might be the best we have for some use cases, but obviously not all, or they would have 100% market share. They haven't replaced disposable alkaline batteries. They haven't replaced AGP batteries. They haven't replaced Lead Acid batteries. They haven't replaced Lithium Iron Phosphate batteries. There are plenty of reasons why: cost, weight, safety, shelf life, etc. Since Lithium Ion doesn't have 100% market share, a useful comparison does not have to be with Lithium Ion in order for a battery technology to be a meaningful advance. And even if it did, sometimes an advance in just one area can be enough to overcome its disadvantages in other areas. Example: I use Lithium Iron Phosphate in my sailboat. Yes, it has lower energy density. Yes, it has lower power density. Yes, it is more expensive. Yes, it has shorter lifecycle. Yes, it has a slow charge rate. It has one solitary advantage over lithium ion, and that single advantage is the difference between life and death: it is more chemically stable and thermally stable, and less likely to result in fires. If you have a fire in your car, that sucks...but you can just open up your car door and walk 20 feet to safety. You hop on your cell phone and call AAA or a taxi or a friend. If you're on a sailboat in the middle of the ocean, you can't do that. Even if you've planned well, with a ditch kit, a liferaft, and an EPIRB, you are still potentially several hours or even days before someone can get to you to get you to safety. In the meantime, you're floating on an ocean with waves taller than your liferaft, with a limited supply of food and water, and you have a tiny plastic membrane separating you from a place where you would need constant energy to survive and where you are no longer the top of the food chain. So with all due respect, fuck lithium ion. And fuck this list. There is plenty of room for advances in battery technology, and we don't need religious charlatans from the Cult of Musk shitting on every single battery tech announcement.
  - _ph_ 6y ago
    The point isn't that Lithium Ion batteries are that great, but that most of the press articles are hyping something which at best is a few years in the future. There is a huge gap between even the best science and a technology which is ready for production and can be rolled out into large-scale manufacturing. Even if there are for-real samples around for people to play with, it could take years until they make it into a car. And then of course, there is some risk that the initial science isn't even good. That happens too.

geocrasher 6y ago

"Researchers from Chalmers University of Technology have produced a structural battery that performs ten times better than all previous versions" It's 10 times more everything, just like every other battery breakthrough in the last several decades. AND, you get to use it as a building material? - Sounds too good to be true: Check - Sounds like every other "big" breakthrough: Check - Article light on science and heavy on assertions: Check - Skepticism engaged: Check

callesgg 6y ago
Presumably that should be read: Better than previous “massless battery’s”. “... produced a structural battery that performs ten times better than all previous versions”
- TheAdamAndChe 6y ago
  I recommend people read the article, it actually has some information. More info: "The battery has an energy density of 24 Wh/kg, meaning approximately 20 percent capacity compared to comparable lithium-ion batteries currently available. But since the weight of the vehicles can be greatly reduced, less energy will be required to drive an electric car, for example" "the researchers did not choose the materials to try and break records – rather, they wanted to investigate and understand the effects of material architecture and separator thickness." - this implies there may be a lot of room for improvement with this design.
  - ThomPete 6y ago
    then the question becomes how are they solving for the increased heat.
    - TheAdamAndChe 6y ago
      In increased surface area-to-mass ratio would probably make this easier.

vardump 6y ago

I wonder how this compares with Tesla's upcoming structural batteries. They're also supposed to eliminate unnecessary material by making the battery itself a part of car's structural chassis. https://electrek.co/2021/01/19/tesla-structural-battery-pack-first-picture/ https://electrek.co/2021/01/19/tesla-structural-battery-pack... https://techcrunch.com/2020/09/22/future-teslas-will-have-batteries-that-double-as-structure-making-them-extra-stiff-while-improving-efficiency-safety-and-cost/ https://techcrunch.com/2020/09/22/future-teslas-will-have-ba...

vlovich123 6y ago
This literally is a structural battery. Says that in the first sentence. This is about making a structural battery that’s 10x more efficient by using carbon fiber. How it compares to Tesla is obviously unknown since both are technically vaporware. The concept does sound revolutionary though so hopefully the engineering pans out.
- eloff 6y ago
  I would give the OP the benefit of the doubt that they understand both are structural batteries and is wondering how they compare in other battery metrics. From this article, Tesla's blow these ones away - except possibly as a structural element - and they're much closer to being a real product.
  - vlovich123 6y ago
    I tried but this phrase stood out to me: > They're also supposed to eliminate unnecessary material by making the battery itself a part of car's structural chassis. That implies they're believing the article isn't talking about a structural chassis. Why are you treating this like a fanboy competition? It can both be true that Tesla is coming to market with a real product & that this announcement is an important advancement in the state of the art for structural batteries. They are totally different ends of the spectrum with the latter portending where the tech may be heading whereas the former is focused on proving that it's ready for large scale prime time.

asattarmd 6y ago

Since everyone is highly skeptical of this, is there an alternative to Lithium ion batteries that is close to production currently?

jleahy 6y ago
No
scythe 6y ago
This is a lithium-ion battery. About half of the technologies cited as "replacements" for Li-ion are actually different Li-ion chemistries. Cf. Li-S, "graphene", "nanowire", "solid-state batteries", etc. Sodium-sulfur batteries are in production currently and can compete on density with Li-ion, but lithium is cheaper and the cost trend is expanding the gap. Silver oxide likewise (silver is expensive!). We do have alternatives, but we don't have good reasons to use them.

Causality1 6y ago

Funny that the usability study pop-up doesn't fit on my screen in landscape orientation and totally breaks the site since I can't dismiss it.

intrasight 6y ago

My take is that there is some good science and engineering being done here, so we should look past the marketing-speak. I could totally see carbon fiber cylinders of this material landing in a future bicycle, and I do see an eBike in my future.

the_french 6y ago

This may be rather naive but wouldn't using an energy storage mechanism for structural purposes be a bad idea? That could mean that every fender bender now risks igniting the hood of your car.

whoomp12342 6y ago
sounds like a great idea for consumerism.

STRML 6y ago

At 24 Wh/kg, it's going to take a lot of this to produce an amount of storage relevant to the needs of a vehicle, and that's ignoring the very high cost of the material. For instance, the Alfa Romeo 4C had an (expensive) all-carbon tub that weighed 65kg. At this storage efficiency, that's only 1.5 kWh... about enough to drive 5 miles in a standard-size vehicle. Interesting nevertheless, but I can't see getting excited at this density just yet, even if it is true.

ainiriand 6y ago
It is infinitely greater than 0 anyway. You need the chassis in any case, right? I think this is not meant as a replacement but as a complement of other parts.
gameswithgo 6y ago
"about enough to drive 5 miles in a standard-size vehicle." Are you accounting for the fact that the alpha romeo would no longer have the mass of a separate battery pack? Might it be 10 miles? Still needs improvement! Would it work out better in something like an aptera?

iandanforth 6y ago

If this worked would it be compatible with wireless communication? I know hardly any EE, but I wonder, if there are a bunch of currents in your component housing doesn't that mean it will be hard for an internal antenna to send and receive?

reimertz 6y ago

I understand and value the skepticism but for those who wants the science behind their claim, please read their paper "A Structural Battery and its Multifunctional Performance"(also referenced in the article). https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/aesr.202000093 https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/aesr.202000093

h2odragon 6y ago
I'm thinking "backing, bracing, encasing" solar cells... wondering about interactions with heat and insulation; they used to sell "precast wall panels" that were aluminum over foam and cool to work with. This might be "powerwall" bait.

nabla9 6y ago

> Funding has come from the European Commission's research program Clean Sky II, as well as the US Airforce. Carbon fiber structural battery would be ideal for aviation. Of course, scientific discovery is not the same as engineering solution, this is just early stage research.

jdhn 6y ago

I like how they call out that it has 20% of the capacity of a lithium ion battery of the same mass. I'd rather be realistic about technological advances, and then be pleasently surprised when it shows up in consumer products rather than have a glowing press release and then we don't see it in production ever.

JoeAltmaier 6y ago

I wonder about performance/capacity over time as the material is stressed/flexed. If its structural, it'll take mechanical load. Thin films may not thrive.

twobitshifter 6y ago

My concern with structural batteries is that if your battery wears out (like all batteries before) then you not only need a battery replacement but also a replacement of your cars subframe or underbody. I think this would lead to cars being even more disposable.

Cthulhu_ 6y ago
And what about small dings? If it's anything like e.g. a li-ion battery, just a small ding will already cause a short. In the best case, that panel will no longer work as a battery. Worst case it starts a fire.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

yayr 6y ago

My main concern would be about reusability. Current battery tech is quite limited with respect to how many charging cycles it supports. So do we need to throw away a bike with structural battery pack then in future, once the charging cycles have expired or someone forgot to regularly keep the battery charged?

mikkelam 6y ago

perhaps the title should reflect that this is not a regular battery per se, but a structural battery, i.e, a battery that can give mechanical integrity.

dcanelhas 6y ago

In applications where the battery is only providing auxiliary power, such as for bicycles this would be really neat.

reimertz 6y ago

A thought. Imagine working and spending your entire scientific career on a specific problem, hoping to create positive change and then to be meet with this type of skepticism. I can't help but feel sad for everyone involved in this scientific research if they end up seeing this. I do value skepticism but it feels somewhat unfair here because they are very transparent with how they relate to current existing lithium-ion technology while discussing their differences and how they could potentially innovate and iterate on their solution. All of of this while referring to their peer-reviewed paper. What more could they have done? Shouldn't we celebrate events like this?

gameswithgo 6y ago
Yes we should.
hannob 6y ago
> What more could they have done? Oh this one is simple. Be transparent in your communication about the limitations of what you've done. Be clear whether this is early research or something likely to find its way into products any time soon. And above all: Avoide terms like "breakthrough" unless they're really deserved (which is exceptionally rare).
- jnwatson 6y ago
  But it isn't the researchers doing this. This is university PR.
- gameswithgo 6y ago
  All of that was clear in the article. It is research, it has way less energy density than a normal battery, and it WAS a breakthrough.
- polack 6y ago
  It might not be a breakthrough that takes us to Mars, but saying that an 10x improvement over existing versions isn't a breakthrough feels a bit unfair and a bit narrow minded. In this space it's obviously an breakthrough, you just don't happen to be interested or directly affected by it.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

arithmomachist 6y ago

The relatively low energy density means it won't be replacing li-ion batteries in vehicles any time soon. Where I could see this technology shining is in low-power consumer electronics. For example, since it's flexible, it could be used to make an e-ink reader that's paper thin and flexes (somewhat) like paper.

shadowgovt 6y ago

I've been interested for awhile in how structural computing could be done in this vein. Generally less important for cars right now, but as self-driving technology evolves, I imagine auto manufacturers may become increasingly interested in how to tuck away enough processing power without sacrificing an entire trunk.

fabian2k 6y ago

There's an article in German that is very critical of the comparisons they make: https://www.golem.de/news/akkutechnik-das-maerchen-von-der-masselosen-strukturbatterie-2103-155385.html https://www.golem.de/news/akkutechnik-das-maerchen-von-der-m... Essentially the author argues that a comparison with state-of the art cells would mean that they achieve only 8-10% of the capacity per weight of conventional cells. There's a bunch of other specific criticisms in there about comparisons made in the paper.

jliptzin 6y ago

If I remember correctly Tesla already has plans to incorporate their next gen batteries into the structure of the car

OliverJones 6y ago

Batteries are a kind of semiconductor. They're bigger than others, but still semiconductors. Most kinds of semiconductors have a stage in the history of their development where their cost / performance ratio does am exponential Moore's - law plunge. Batteries could get there. So, all sorts of research are good. In the meantime, maybe this kind of tech could be used to combine PV solar panels with electrical storage.

lstodd 6y ago

It will burn pretty.

gloryless 6y ago

Using "massless" instead of "structural" should tell you that this is in sales pitch mode

mekkkkkk 6y ago

If Leif is right in that it will eventually have triple the energy density and stiffness, it might become really useful for electric powered flight. You want to be in a situation were having isolated internal supporting structures made of batteries is enough. With the current specs you'll probably have to replace every single structural component with batteries. Even that might not do it.

agumonkey 6y ago

I was joking the other day but when are we getting regenerative crashing ?

rexreed 6y ago

"Massless" batteries are as much about lack of mass as "Serverless" apps are about a lack of servers.

covfefeblack 6y ago

Carbon fibre. There is nothing it can't do. Except leave the lab.

shireboy 6y ago

Tesla mentioned similar in their battery presser a few months ago. One question that I have with the whole concept is if a "structural battery" means you have to throw out the whole car once the battery is EOL. I would hope Tesla is better than this, but could totally see this happening, since it's the model many laptop manufacturers are going for and it generally benefits them to push consumers to refresh laptops/cars more frequently.

AstralStorm 6y ago
Carbon electrode is resilient, you could get away with refurbishing the anode in a process similar to painting or soundproofing the car.

mrfusion 6y ago

Would photons need true massless energy storage?

bjornsing 6y ago

We all know massless energy storage is impossible. Einstein proved it. :P

jonplackett 6y ago

If it's part of the structure, what happens when you have a crash?

netman21 6y ago

Sailboats! Would be easy to embed this in the hull.

elihu 6y ago

> "The battery has an energy density of 24 Wh/kg, meaning approximately 20 percent capacity compared to comparable lithium-ion batteries currently available." > "The new battery has a negative electrode made of carbon fibre, and a positive electrode made of a lithium iron phosphate-coated aluminium foil." Really, it's more like 10% compared to something like the latest Tesla cells. Even when comparing to LiFePo4, recently modern cells I think are in the ballpark of 150 wh/kg versus the 120 wh/kg implied by the article. It's interesting work anyways, though. Even if the energy density isn't enough to be practical yet, it's progress. I don't expect structural batteries to be mainstream in cars anytime soon, but it does at least expand the set of available design options. (I'm currently working on a Mazda RX-8 conversion. If structural batteries were available and competitive in terms of energy density and I had unlimited funding and ability to fabricate one-off parts, one could imagine a structural battery replacing the front and rear subframe and the steel frame member that connects the transmission to the differential in the rear. You'd still need additional batteries to get a decent range, though. Realistically, you'd want to design a car from scratch to really take advantage of structural batteries.) I wonder how bad of an idea it would be to replace the front and rear bumper (by which I mean the steel bumper underneath all the plastic and styrofoam cushioning) with a structural battery?