7 ms·

> 750 Wh/kg is great. To put it mildly. Energy density in the current leaders in that category, lithium ion batteries, 250-270 wh/kg. So, provided a similar o

> 750 Wh/kg is great. To put it mildly. Energy density in the current leaders in that category, lithium ion batteries, 250-270 wh/kg. So, provided a similar or better ratio of watt-hours to unit of volume, we’re basically looking at tripling the energy storage of EVs or significant weight reduction, in the ideal scenario of this design being a safe and cost effective replacement for current batteries.

hinkley 3y ago
For mobile applications wh/kg and wh/liter both matter, and they can vary independently. With the titanium electrode you’ve got a lighter battery per unit of volume. That said, a vehicle battery has to propel itself, so a lighter battery requires less capacity and thus a bit less volume.
dangus 3y ago
I think for the EV skeptics it’s easy to forget how fast battery chemistry has been evolving. There’s an common assumption that the EV status quo of 300 mile range at barely-affordable prices will continue forever, and therefore with all the woes surrounding charging and bad weather affecting range, EVs are dead in the water. Ten years ago $30k got you 75 miles of range out of a Nissan Leaf. Fast forward to present day and you will spend less money before adjusting for inflation and get 259 miles of range in the same class of vehicle (Chevy Bolt EV). When many automakers say they will only sell EVs by ~2035, it sounds a bit far-fetched, but in the context of the past 10 years it’s hard to deny the high probability that gasoline vehicles will make basically no sense by the 2030s on the basis of value. Gasoline cars will simply cost more to own, end of story.
- hinkley 3y ago
  Are batteries still on a roughly 3-4% annual rate of improvement? Or has that shifted? So,e of that will have been aerodynamics (the industry is slowly boiling the frog on styling vs aerodynamics) and motor efficiency, which has climbed a lot in the last 15 years.
  - jackmott42 3y ago
    energy density hasn't really changed for 15 years, price dropped a lot though, but price drop has also paused recently. There is no telling if any progress will be made or not. Maybe! Maybe not.
    - Detrytus 3y ago
      Actually, when demand for EVs goes up, lithium mining won't be able to keep up, so in the next decade or so we'll see steep increase in battery prices.
      - hinkley 3y ago
        In the next decade you will see more reliance on technology that becomes cheaper than simply throwing lithium at the problem. It's the same thing with many techs. In the 70's we thought we would run out of oil by 2000, and a lot of asshats in the 80's and 90's crowed about how stupid those so-called experts were. What happened in the 80's and 90's was ground sensing radar found more oil, horizontal drilling found ways to access more of what was there, and zeolites saw widespread use as a catalyst to increase the amount of gas and diesel recovered from a barrel of oil. And over time production of zeolites made that process work better and better. It's very much like when Apple went to non-replaceable batteries. Battery life doubled in that model because 3 different parts of the problem got improvements. Density, volume, and power management all contributed almost 30% each. Between "Oh Shit" and "Told Ya", we could produce twice as much fossil fuel as we knew how to do at the time. The same will happen with Lithium. Reduce, Reuse, Recycle and Replace.
        tadfisher 3y ago
        That's not what Peak Oil means, but I think you know this. The cost of oil will never return to pre-2000s levels because meeting demand necessitates more expensive extraction technologies like shale and offshore. In that sense (the correct one), the prediction of peak oil by 2000 was remarkably accurate.
- linuxftw 3y ago
  I remain skeptical until the products are real and affordable. No reason to buy an electric car now if they'll have potentially double the range in a few years.
  - xsmasher 3y ago
    By that logic it never makes sense to buy a computer. It'll be obsolete in 18 months! Electric cars are cheaper to operate that gas RIGHT NOW, with less maintenance. No reason to hold off just because they're going to get better.
    - lostlogin 3y ago
      For a Leaf the dealers response to ‘where do I go to get it serviced?’ was ‘don’t bother, nothing to service. That’s a slight exaggeration but not by much (diff oil needs changing and the tyres need rotating). It’s amazing.
    - linuxftw 3y ago
      Companies literally made this calculus decades ago during the boom years of Moore's law when it came to purchasing computer hardware. > Electric cars are cheaper to operate that gas RIGHT NOW, with less maintenance. My timeline for owning a vehicle is 15+ years. I'm not going to buy something that is instantly obsolete. I'm also not going to buy all this vendor lock-in nonsense all these EVs come with. If they were basic rides with an electric drivetrain, sure, but they try to make everything the millennium falcon. You should look up how much fun it is getting service and parts on a new vehicle nowadays. You're rolling the dice that you won't burn down your home and/or have a lawn ornament because you can't get parts.
    - Turskarama 3y ago
      I bought a Kia Rio, the cheapest EV I can buy in my country (Australia) is an MG4 for around twice the price (~$20k for the Kia, ~$40k for the MG). I don't drive very much, under 10,000 km per year. I've done the maths and for me an EV is more expensive over an expected 10 year lifespan. Granted I drive significantly less than average, but fuel costs here are a fair bit higher than in the US so for a lot of people buying at the bottom end of the market it may still not be true that an EV is cheaper.
- iamatworknow 3y ago
  To me it all still comes down to charging infrastructure. The current state of batteries is good enough for me, but I live in an apartment and can't charge at home, and the availability/reliability local charging stations are a crap shoot, nevermind charging on a road trip. But when (if?) I own my own house and can charge at home, I'll be in even with the current state of batteries.
  - kd5bjo 3y ago
    My primary concern with the charging infrastructure is how well it will handle a large number of people taking emergency trips at the same time. How do you evacuate south Florida with an incoming hurricane, for example, when most people have switched from gasoline to electric cars? That scenario pushes the existing fuel delivery infrastructure to its limit already, and electric chargers provide significantly fewer passenger miles per fueling minute than a gasoline pump does. In practice, a lot of emergency plans will need to be completely overhauled to not assume most people will be able to drive themselves out of the danger zone.
    - snowwrestler 3y ago
      This is a good point and I think the answer is that solutions for in-place charging will need to be regulated or subsidized into existence in step with the shifting market share of electric cars. The typical range of a fully charged electric car these days is sufficient to get out of the way of almost any predictable natural disaster. So the trick is just keeping them all fully charged at home. Any homeowner can in theory have a charger off their home power grid, but for folks in apartments and condos there will need to be a lot more than just a few chargers in the corner of the garage. There may even need to be street-side solutions. But it’s all doable and the engineering is straightforward. People allow gas cars to sit with nearly empty tanks because it is so fast (and expensive) to fill them up. Electric cars are slow and cheap to “fill up” so the mindset and culture about it will change over time.
      - kd5bjo 3y ago
        > The typical range of a fully charged electric car these days is sufficient to get out of the way of almost any predictable natural disaster. Maybe, and maybe not. The one time I had to do this myself, I started with a full gas tank and still ended up stopping to fill a couple of times. An evacuation is hardly the ideal condition for range, with lots of stop-and-go traffic. You need to not only get out of immediate danger but also find some safe place to lodge overnight that doesn’t interfere with the people behind you that also need to get out.
- gorjusborg 3y ago
  Are there EV skeptics? I don't think so. There are average people and EV fanboys. It's just that fanboys call the other people skeptics. EVs are in early adoption still, from my point of view. Try to pump it all you want, but EVs offer far less utility for a higher price, and they are more inconvenient. Until the industry standardizes on batteries and stations offer pre-charged battery swaps, I'll hang on to my ICE machine.
  - AtlasBarfed 3y ago
    EVs are quieter, smoother, higher torque, better accelerating, for simpler drivetrain, less maintenance. I've seen so many TCO reports on Teslas being cheaper than new ICE cars, and that was before the Tesla price cuts and the insane inflation in new car costs in ICE. As for the "new car cost", I suspect Tesla is already at cost-per-vehicle parity with an ICE, but Tesla is keeping a high margin on their cars. With sodium ion and high density LFP chemistries coming to mass production this year, ICE cost advantage's days are numbered. Supply constraints will keep ICE marginally cheaper for probably 5 years in some consumer car classes. But "far less utility for a higher price and more inconvenience" is pretty much bunk. But I would keep an ICE if I was in the Midwest.
    - tooltalk 3y ago
      >> As for the "new car cost", I suspect Tesla is already at cost-per-vehicle parity with an ICE, but Tesla is keeping a high margin on their cars. << You are thinking last year when the auto market was out of whack due to COVID related shortages. Tesla's operating margin is down to 9.6% in 2Q 2023; compared that to Hyundai's 9.5% and Kia's 12.5%. >> With sodium ion and high density LFP chemistries coming to mass production this year, ICE cost advantage's days are numbered. << LFPs are still limited to entry-level, low-range EVs because of low energy density and weight. The cost of LFP's is't that attractive when the price of lithium is above $20K.
  - djaychela 3y ago
    >Are there EV skeptics? I don't think so. Lots of them. They're really gaining traction in the UK (where I live) - so much so that I hear compete b****s every day about EVs, and I'm tired of hearing it. I'm on my phone so can't type all the examples but essentially I've heard every advantage of them being said to be untrue, and that ice cars are better for the environment, etc. The right wing press in this country has a lot to answer for.
- Turskarama 3y ago
  This depends on if battery production can continue to be scaled up by another order of magnitude. That's a very short period of time for monstrous growth in multiple industries, it's by no means a sure thing.
condour75 3y ago
According to a quick googling, this would be enough density for for short range commuter aircraft to become viable. https://theicct.org/aviation-global-expecting-electric-jul22/ https://theicct.org/aviation-global-expecting-electric-jul22...
oblio 3y ago
At that energy density, can't they just wrap the entire smaller battery in 2 layers of ceramic and steel or something and just side-step the entire safety discussion OP is mentioning? Yes, I know it's probably a silly solution :-)
- jackmott42 3y ago
  Not silly at all, and that might be exactly what they do!
- roomey 3y ago
  If they could coat, or layer it, in a reactant or catalyst that made the hydrogen sulphide has less harmful or toxic it may work, so if the battery is damaged some of the toxic gas will be reduced to something less harmful. Maybe a chemist would know if this is possible
- sheepshear 3y ago
  The premise is that the enclosure is already somehow breeched. Squeezing a battery is bad and it makes bad situations worse.
  - oblio 3y ago
    The thing is, batteries can weight half a ton. At triple the energy density they could almost armor plate it to tank levels. I imagine most of us aren't under Javelin attack during road trips :-p
    - sheepshear 3y ago
      Funny but there's still corrosion, cracking, and holes to connect wires to the battery.
alostpuppy 3y ago
Out of curiosity, What is the wh/kg for petrol?
- ultrarunner 3y ago
  Wikipedia says 13000 Wh/kg, but you have to keep in mind that due to physics, wear considerations, and emissions regulation, most cars are only 20-40% efficient. At a 20% efficiency, that's 2600 Wh/kg. This is further constrained by gear ratios, meaning not all power is available at all times.
  - dreamcompiler 3y ago
    Exactly. Gasoline is much, much more energy dense than Li-Ion batteries, but in terms of dollars per mile, an electric car is 2x-4x cheaper to drive than an ICE car. That's because an internal combustion engine wastes the majority of gasoline's energy as heat, while electric motors use most of the battery's energy to move the car.
    - Detrytus 3y ago
      > an electric car is 2x-4x cheaper to drive than an ICE car It hugely depends on the cost of electricity. Last year some European countries (Netherlands IIRC) had those so high, that it was actually more expensive to drive EV than ICE.
      - wcoenen 3y ago
        You can optimize this with the right electricity contract. Time of day pricing ("dynamisch tarief" in the Netherlands) combined with charging during the cheapest times can make a big difference. And as a bonus to society, you help to balance the grid.
    - tomp 3y ago
      > That's because an internal combustion engine wastes the majority of gasoline's energy as heat, while electric motors use most of the battery's energy to move the car. I guess that depends on your perspective and/or where you live. I rented a Tesla in December once and was freezing the whole drive. A gasoline engine generates extra heat you can use to heat the cabin, whereas an electric car needs extra heaters (which IME weren’t working that well in that old Model S)
AtlasBarfed 3y ago
It's within range of some of the sulfur techs I've seen in papers though. The sulfur techs appear safer and more abundant. Both aren't commercialized either... For some reason, I suspect sulfur techs will go to market sooner. What is apparent is that in 10 years battery tech will be in a much better place than it is now: 2x - 3x the density, safer, 1/2 or less the (inflation adjusted) cost. Sure that's not Moore's law rate, but that will be nonetheless revolutionary. 240 wh/kg has already been commercialized by Gotion in LMFP chemistry, so that's cobalt-free/nickel-free. 160 wh/kg sodium ion should utterly revolutionize city transportation, you don't even need lithium for that and it should be a 200-300 mile car (EPA not WLTP) or better. IMO most car companies are probably chasing the high density LMFP and Sodium Ion for the next 5-7 years, and leaving nickel-cobalt for things that truly need it. The issue with nickel-cobalt is that the safety systems consume so much at the pack level that 200+ wh/kg LFP is basically the same density. And Gotion's 240 wh/kg will probably be functionally more dense at Cell-to-Pack densities as well as cheaper. We still need that high density breakthough through, the US Market will probably demand 400 mile ranges (see Tesla range "fraud" story) for true mass market stupid driver adoption, especially for all those men that just have to drive a full size pickup and then buy things for it to tow.
morepork 3y ago
Because weight affects range, you could keep the same amount of energy and increase range at the same time as the battery would only weigh 1/3 as much and be maybe 400kg lighter
bboygravity 3y ago
400 Wh / kg is the threshold that makes VTOL high altitude (20+ km) electric aircraft feasible according to Elon Musk in one of his interviews (from memory, I might have some of that wrong). Advantages: no runways needed at airports, can get back some energy on the way down through regenerative braking, more efficient propulsion and less air resistance at higher altitude (electric motors don't need oxygen to function), no pollution from combustion. Sounds amazing.
- jillesvangurp 3y ago
  The state of the art for VTOL right now is around 100-150 miles with much lower density batteries. The most efficient ones actually have wings and transition to flying like a regular plane. Larger batteries will of course help and they are actually hitting the market this year at around 500wh/kg. Bigger batteries will follow in a few years. The future is now.
jillesvangurp 3y ago
Actually CATL announced a 500 wh/kg battery a few months ago. Solid state and aimed at the aviation market. Shipping this year apparently. There are a few other companies targeting that market. For cars, much lower density sodium ion and lfp batteries are what they are producing in volume. Sodium ion especially is becoming popular for the kind of cheap/modestly priced cars Toyota is famous for mass producing. Those higher density batteries are great when cost doesn't matter (like in the aviation market) but cost is the only variable that matters when it comes to mass producing electrical vehicles. The game is not who can build the most ridiculous car for 100K but who can produce the most useful car for 10K. Toyota is going to have their ass handed to them very soon in that market unless they get their act together. People that obsess over range are missing a few important points. With fast charge times, range matters less, and if your car is fully charged every morning, the times when you need to charge before you get home reduce to the rare occasions when you actually drive the cars maximum range in a single day. Which for the average driver isn't that often. The point of having a large battery is reducing those occasions to almost zero. If that matters to you, just spend more money and you'll be fine. There's no need for new batteries for this. The point of a having a smaller battery is that the few times per year that you have to stop to fast charge them isn't worth the price difference in terms of time spent. Especially when that time is basically only around 30-40 minutes. Companies that operate vehicle fleets get this. They get the battery size they need, not the largest one. That's why most electrical vans have batteries that aren't bigger than those in cars. Smaller even sometimes. Smaller battery means more useful load. The reduced range is fine. Toyota doesn't need a new science fiction battery, it needs battery production infrastructure producing batteries by the twh per year. Nothing else is going to enable them to mass produce cars at the same rate they are producing ICE cars. They are not building those factories yet. I'm not sure what they are waiting for at this point. But they are running out of time. Cheap EVs are going to be on the market pretty soon. They already are on the market in China. The main constraint for that is battery production volume. Some companies are investing in that as fast as they can; Toyota so far isn't.

hinkley 3y ago

For mobile applications wh/kg and wh/liter both matter, and they can vary independently. With the titanium electrode you’ve got a lighter battery per unit of volume. That said, a vehicle battery has to propel itself, so a lighter battery requires less capacity and thus a bit less volume.

dangus 3y ago

I think for the EV skeptics it’s easy to forget how fast battery chemistry has been evolving. There’s an common assumption that the EV status quo of 300 mile range at barely-affordable prices will continue forever, and therefore with all the woes surrounding charging and bad weather affecting range, EVs are dead in the water. Ten years ago $30k got you 75 miles of range out of a Nissan Leaf. Fast forward to present day and you will spend less money before adjusting for inflation and get 259 miles of range in the same class of vehicle (Chevy Bolt EV). When many automakers say they will only sell EVs by ~2035, it sounds a bit far-fetched, but in the context of the past 10 years it’s hard to deny the high probability that gasoline vehicles will make basically no sense by the 2030s on the basis of value. Gasoline cars will simply cost more to own, end of story.

hinkley 3y ago
Are batteries still on a roughly 3-4% annual rate of improvement? Or has that shifted? So,e of that will have been aerodynamics (the industry is slowly boiling the frog on styling vs aerodynamics) and motor efficiency, which has climbed a lot in the last 15 years.
- jackmott42 3y ago
  energy density hasn't really changed for 15 years, price dropped a lot though, but price drop has also paused recently. There is no telling if any progress will be made or not. Maybe! Maybe not.
  - Detrytus 3y ago
    Actually, when demand for EVs goes up, lithium mining won't be able to keep up, so in the next decade or so we'll see steep increase in battery prices.
    - hinkley 3y ago
      In the next decade you will see more reliance on technology that becomes cheaper than simply throwing lithium at the problem. It's the same thing with many techs. In the 70's we thought we would run out of oil by 2000, and a lot of asshats in the 80's and 90's crowed about how stupid those so-called experts were. What happened in the 80's and 90's was ground sensing radar found more oil, horizontal drilling found ways to access more of what was there, and zeolites saw widespread use as a catalyst to increase the amount of gas and diesel recovered from a barrel of oil. And over time production of zeolites made that process work better and better. It's very much like when Apple went to non-replaceable batteries. Battery life doubled in that model because 3 different parts of the problem got improvements. Density, volume, and power management all contributed almost 30% each. Between "Oh Shit" and "Told Ya", we could produce twice as much fossil fuel as we knew how to do at the time. The same will happen with Lithium. Reduce, Reuse, Recycle and Replace.
      - tadfisher 3y ago
        That's not what Peak Oil means, but I think you know this. The cost of oil will never return to pre-2000s levels because meeting demand necessitates more expensive extraction technologies like shale and offshore. In that sense (the correct one), the prediction of peak oil by 2000 was remarkably accurate.
linuxftw 3y ago
I remain skeptical until the products are real and affordable. No reason to buy an electric car now if they'll have potentially double the range in a few years.
- xsmasher 3y ago
  By that logic it never makes sense to buy a computer. It'll be obsolete in 18 months! Electric cars are cheaper to operate that gas RIGHT NOW, with less maintenance. No reason to hold off just because they're going to get better.
  - lostlogin 3y ago
    For a Leaf the dealers response to ‘where do I go to get it serviced?’ was ‘don’t bother, nothing to service. That’s a slight exaggeration but not by much (diff oil needs changing and the tyres need rotating). It’s amazing.
  - linuxftw 3y ago
    Companies literally made this calculus decades ago during the boom years of Moore's law when it came to purchasing computer hardware. > Electric cars are cheaper to operate that gas RIGHT NOW, with less maintenance. My timeline for owning a vehicle is 15+ years. I'm not going to buy something that is instantly obsolete. I'm also not going to buy all this vendor lock-in nonsense all these EVs come with. If they were basic rides with an electric drivetrain, sure, but they try to make everything the millennium falcon. You should look up how much fun it is getting service and parts on a new vehicle nowadays. You're rolling the dice that you won't burn down your home and/or have a lawn ornament because you can't get parts.
  - Turskarama 3y ago
    I bought a Kia Rio, the cheapest EV I can buy in my country (Australia) is an MG4 for around twice the price (~$20k for the Kia, ~$40k for the MG). I don't drive very much, under 10,000 km per year. I've done the maths and for me an EV is more expensive over an expected 10 year lifespan. Granted I drive significantly less than average, but fuel costs here are a fair bit higher than in the US so for a lot of people buying at the bottom end of the market it may still not be true that an EV is cheaper.
iamatworknow 3y ago
To me it all still comes down to charging infrastructure. The current state of batteries is good enough for me, but I live in an apartment and can't charge at home, and the availability/reliability local charging stations are a crap shoot, nevermind charging on a road trip. But when (if?) I own my own house and can charge at home, I'll be in even with the current state of batteries.
- kd5bjo 3y ago
  My primary concern with the charging infrastructure is how well it will handle a large number of people taking emergency trips at the same time. How do you evacuate south Florida with an incoming hurricane, for example, when most people have switched from gasoline to electric cars? That scenario pushes the existing fuel delivery infrastructure to its limit already, and electric chargers provide significantly fewer passenger miles per fueling minute than a gasoline pump does. In practice, a lot of emergency plans will need to be completely overhauled to not assume most people will be able to drive themselves out of the danger zone.
  - snowwrestler 3y ago
    This is a good point and I think the answer is that solutions for in-place charging will need to be regulated or subsidized into existence in step with the shifting market share of electric cars. The typical range of a fully charged electric car these days is sufficient to get out of the way of almost any predictable natural disaster. So the trick is just keeping them all fully charged at home. Any homeowner can in theory have a charger off their home power grid, but for folks in apartments and condos there will need to be a lot more than just a few chargers in the corner of the garage. There may even need to be street-side solutions. But it’s all doable and the engineering is straightforward. People allow gas cars to sit with nearly empty tanks because it is so fast (and expensive) to fill them up. Electric cars are slow and cheap to “fill up” so the mindset and culture about it will change over time.
    - kd5bjo 3y ago
      > The typical range of a fully charged electric car these days is sufficient to get out of the way of almost any predictable natural disaster. Maybe, and maybe not. The one time I had to do this myself, I started with a full gas tank and still ended up stopping to fill a couple of times. An evacuation is hardly the ideal condition for range, with lots of stop-and-go traffic. You need to not only get out of immediate danger but also find some safe place to lodge overnight that doesn’t interfere with the people behind you that also need to get out.
gorjusborg 3y ago
Are there EV skeptics? I don't think so. There are average people and EV fanboys. It's just that fanboys call the other people skeptics. EVs are in early adoption still, from my point of view. Try to pump it all you want, but EVs offer far less utility for a higher price, and they are more inconvenient. Until the industry standardizes on batteries and stations offer pre-charged battery swaps, I'll hang on to my ICE machine.
- AtlasBarfed 3y ago
  EVs are quieter, smoother, higher torque, better accelerating, for simpler drivetrain, less maintenance. I've seen so many TCO reports on Teslas being cheaper than new ICE cars, and that was before the Tesla price cuts and the insane inflation in new car costs in ICE. As for the "new car cost", I suspect Tesla is already at cost-per-vehicle parity with an ICE, but Tesla is keeping a high margin on their cars. With sodium ion and high density LFP chemistries coming to mass production this year, ICE cost advantage's days are numbered. Supply constraints will keep ICE marginally cheaper for probably 5 years in some consumer car classes. But "far less utility for a higher price and more inconvenience" is pretty much bunk. But I would keep an ICE if I was in the Midwest.
  - tooltalk 3y ago
    >> As for the "new car cost", I suspect Tesla is already at cost-per-vehicle parity with an ICE, but Tesla is keeping a high margin on their cars. << You are thinking last year when the auto market was out of whack due to COVID related shortages. Tesla's operating margin is down to 9.6% in 2Q 2023; compared that to Hyundai's 9.5% and Kia's 12.5%. >> With sodium ion and high density LFP chemistries coming to mass production this year, ICE cost advantage's days are numbered. << LFPs are still limited to entry-level, low-range EVs because of low energy density and weight. The cost of LFP's is't that attractive when the price of lithium is above $20K.
- djaychela 3y ago
  >Are there EV skeptics? I don't think so. Lots of them. They're really gaining traction in the UK (where I live) - so much so that I hear compete b****s every day about EVs, and I'm tired of hearing it. I'm on my phone so can't type all the examples but essentially I've heard every advantage of them being said to be untrue, and that ice cars are better for the environment, etc. The right wing press in this country has a lot to answer for.
Turskarama 3y ago
This depends on if battery production can continue to be scaled up by another order of magnitude. That's a very short period of time for monstrous growth in multiple industries, it's by no means a sure thing.

condour75 3y ago

According to a quick googling, this would be enough density for for short range commuter aircraft to become viable. https://theicct.org/aviation-global-expecting-electric-jul22/ https://theicct.org/aviation-global-expecting-electric-jul22...

oblio 3y ago

At that energy density, can't they just wrap the entire smaller battery in 2 layers of ceramic and steel or something and just side-step the entire safety discussion OP is mentioning? Yes, I know it's probably a silly solution :-)

jackmott42 3y ago
Not silly at all, and that might be exactly what they do!
roomey 3y ago
If they could coat, or layer it, in a reactant or catalyst that made the hydrogen sulphide has less harmful or toxic it may work, so if the battery is damaged some of the toxic gas will be reduced to something less harmful. Maybe a chemist would know if this is possible
sheepshear 3y ago
The premise is that the enclosure is already somehow breeched. Squeezing a battery is bad and it makes bad situations worse.
- oblio 3y ago
  The thing is, batteries can weight half a ton. At triple the energy density they could almost armor plate it to tank levels. I imagine most of us aren't under Javelin attack during road trips :-p
  - sheepshear 3y ago
    Funny but there's still corrosion, cracking, and holes to connect wires to the battery.

alostpuppy 3y ago

Out of curiosity, What is the wh/kg for petrol?

ultrarunner 3y ago
Wikipedia says 13000 Wh/kg, but you have to keep in mind that due to physics, wear considerations, and emissions regulation, most cars are only 20-40% efficient. At a 20% efficiency, that's 2600 Wh/kg. This is further constrained by gear ratios, meaning not all power is available at all times.
- dreamcompiler 3y ago
  Exactly. Gasoline is much, much more energy dense than Li-Ion batteries, but in terms of dollars per mile, an electric car is 2x-4x cheaper to drive than an ICE car. That's because an internal combustion engine wastes the majority of gasoline's energy as heat, while electric motors use most of the battery's energy to move the car.
  - Detrytus 3y ago
    > an electric car is 2x-4x cheaper to drive than an ICE car It hugely depends on the cost of electricity. Last year some European countries (Netherlands IIRC) had those so high, that it was actually more expensive to drive EV than ICE.
    - wcoenen 3y ago
      You can optimize this with the right electricity contract. Time of day pricing ("dynamisch tarief" in the Netherlands) combined with charging during the cheapest times can make a big difference. And as a bonus to society, you help to balance the grid.
  - tomp 3y ago
    > That's because an internal combustion engine wastes the majority of gasoline's energy as heat, while electric motors use most of the battery's energy to move the car. I guess that depends on your perspective and/or where you live. I rented a Tesla in December once and was freezing the whole drive. A gasoline engine generates extra heat you can use to heat the cabin, whereas an electric car needs extra heaters (which IME weren’t working that well in that old Model S)

AtlasBarfed 3y ago

It's within range of some of the sulfur techs I've seen in papers though. The sulfur techs appear safer and more abundant. Both aren't commercialized either... For some reason, I suspect sulfur techs will go to market sooner. What is apparent is that in 10 years battery tech will be in a much better place than it is now: 2x - 3x the density, safer, 1/2 or less the (inflation adjusted) cost. Sure that's not Moore's law rate, but that will be nonetheless revolutionary. 240 wh/kg has already been commercialized by Gotion in LMFP chemistry, so that's cobalt-free/nickel-free. 160 wh/kg sodium ion should utterly revolutionize city transportation, you don't even need lithium for that and it should be a 200-300 mile car (EPA not WLTP) or better. IMO most car companies are probably chasing the high density LMFP and Sodium Ion for the next 5-7 years, and leaving nickel-cobalt for things that truly need it. The issue with nickel-cobalt is that the safety systems consume so much at the pack level that 200+ wh/kg LFP is basically the same density. And Gotion's 240 wh/kg will probably be functionally more dense at Cell-to-Pack densities as well as cheaper. We still need that high density breakthough through, the US Market will probably demand 400 mile ranges (see Tesla range "fraud" story) for true mass market stupid driver adoption, especially for all those men that just have to drive a full size pickup and then buy things for it to tow.

morepork 3y ago

Because weight affects range, you could keep the same amount of energy and increase range at the same time as the battery would only weigh 1/3 as much and be maybe 400kg lighter

bboygravity 3y ago

400 Wh / kg is the threshold that makes VTOL high altitude (20+ km) electric aircraft feasible according to Elon Musk in one of his interviews (from memory, I might have some of that wrong). Advantages: no runways needed at airports, can get back some energy on the way down through regenerative braking, more efficient propulsion and less air resistance at higher altitude (electric motors don't need oxygen to function), no pollution from combustion. Sounds amazing.

jillesvangurp 3y ago
The state of the art for VTOL right now is around 100-150 miles with much lower density batteries. The most efficient ones actually have wings and transition to flying like a regular plane. Larger batteries will of course help and they are actually hitting the market this year at around 500wh/kg. Bigger batteries will follow in a few years. The future is now.

jillesvangurp 3y ago

Actually CATL announced a 500 wh/kg battery a few months ago. Solid state and aimed at the aviation market. Shipping this year apparently. There are a few other companies targeting that market. For cars, much lower density sodium ion and lfp batteries are what they are producing in volume. Sodium ion especially is becoming popular for the kind of cheap/modestly priced cars Toyota is famous for mass producing. Those higher density batteries are great when cost doesn't matter (like in the aviation market) but cost is the only variable that matters when it comes to mass producing electrical vehicles. The game is not who can build the most ridiculous car for 100K but who can produce the most useful car for 10K. Toyota is going to have their ass handed to them very soon in that market unless they get their act together. People that obsess over range are missing a few important points. With fast charge times, range matters less, and if your car is fully charged every morning, the times when you need to charge before you get home reduce to the rare occasions when you actually drive the cars maximum range in a single day. Which for the average driver isn't that often. The point of having a large battery is reducing those occasions to almost zero. If that matters to you, just spend more money and you'll be fine. There's no need for new batteries for this. The point of a having a smaller battery is that the few times per year that you have to stop to fast charge them isn't worth the price difference in terms of time spent. Especially when that time is basically only around 30-40 minutes. Companies that operate vehicle fleets get this. They get the battery size they need, not the largest one. That's why most electrical vans have batteries that aren't bigger than those in cars. Smaller even sometimes. Smaller battery means more useful load. The reduced range is fine. Toyota doesn't need a new science fiction battery, it needs battery production infrastructure producing batteries by the twh per year. Nothing else is going to enable them to mass produce cars at the same rate they are producing ICE cars. They are not building those factories yet. I'm not sure what they are waiting for at this point. But they are running out of time. Cheap EVs are going to be on the market pretty soon. They already are on the market in China. The main constraint for that is battery production volume. Some companies are investing in that as fast as they can; Toyota so far isn't.