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> Natron says its batteries charge and discharge at rates 10 times faster than lithium-ion, a level of immediate charge/discharge capability that makes the batt

> Natron says its batteries charge and discharge at rates 10 times faster than lithium-ion, a level of immediate charge/discharge capability that makes the batteries a prime contender for the ups and downs of backup power storage. Also helping in that use case is an estimated lifespan of 50,000 cycles. From everything I've read about existing Lithuum battery storage, this is already their strongpoint. Is it helpful to be 10x faster that the current speed?

rangerelf 2y ago
Absolutely. Instead of stopping to charge my car for half an hour (up to 80%), I can stop for 5 minutes? Sign me up.
chefandy 2y ago
I can't think of many things where a 10x improvement in its strongest important metric wouldn't be useful? I imagine dumping a lot of current into something very quickly and recovering it 50k times would be pretty useful in bursty workloads-- industrial processes, solar-powered gates and lifts, alarms, ignition systems, etc. And that's just gravy considering the real selling point is being made from commodity materials. Even if they're too heavy or something for electric cars, it would be great if it was a viable replacement for lead-acid car batteries.
justahuman74 2y ago
Change rates of lithium batteries are a huge negative compared to pumping gasoline
kragen 2y ago
yes, enormously helpful, if true (no figures are given, and they may be comparing to low-power lithium-ion batteries instead of high-power ones). an equally valid way to say '10 times faster discharge rate' is '10 times higher power for the same capacity' or '10 times higher power density' there are available li-ion batteries with a charge and discharge rate of '15c', which is to say, 1 hour ÷ 15 = 4 minutes. they are used in drones. (there are some advertised as '30c' but i suspect those are maybe just a fraud? like the notorious amazon million-lumen flashlights https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ceA5xL6ggEw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ceA5xL6ggEw) if they really reach '150c', you could discharge 10% of the battery in 2.4 seconds, which is closer to a firework rocket engine than a conventional battery. but, a rocket engine that you can recharge 50000 times a charge rate of '150c' would mean you could charge the battery halfway in 12 seconds, and there are a lot of scenarios where that would be useful you could imagine '150c' batteries displacing much larger supercapacitors from many uses, rather than displacing conventional batteries. the number given in the article of 70 watt hours per kilogram is, in si units, 250kJ/kg. if you divide that by the 24 seconds implied by '10 times faster than lithium-ion' you get a power density of 10.4 kilowatts per kilogram. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power_density https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power_density says supercaps are in the 15 kilowatts per kilogram range. quadcopter drone electric motors are typically in the neighborhood of 4–5 kilowatts per kilogram, so this would make the drone battery much smaller than the motor instead of bigger more likely, though, it's a press release lie, where they're saying something that's technically true (there are lithium batteries with a '1c' charge and discharge rate, which have higher energy density than the higher-powered ones, and their batteries reach '10c', i.e., 6 minutes) but creates a false impression of something that would be a huge breakthrough if it were true
hedora 2y ago
For grid storage, it's unclear if faster charge/discharge matters. We ended up sizing our batteries to meet wattage demands for our appliances. I wish we had ~ 2x as many kWh as we do. Anker has a home battery whose main selling point is that you can add kWh without adding peak wattage. For use in vehicles, faster charge rates are a big win. Faster discharge probably doesn't matter much for cars (0-60 times are already ridiculously low). They might for drones / planes though.

rangerelf 2y ago

Absolutely. Instead of stopping to charge my car for half an hour (up to 80%), I can stop for 5 minutes? Sign me up.

chefandy 2y ago

I can't think of many things where a 10x improvement in its strongest important metric wouldn't be useful? I imagine dumping a lot of current into something very quickly and recovering it 50k times would be pretty useful in bursty workloads-- industrial processes, solar-powered gates and lifts, alarms, ignition systems, etc. And that's just gravy considering the real selling point is being made from commodity materials. Even if they're too heavy or something for electric cars, it would be great if it was a viable replacement for lead-acid car batteries.

justahuman74 2y ago

Change rates of lithium batteries are a huge negative compared to pumping gasoline

kragen 2y ago

yes, enormously helpful, if true (no figures are given, and they may be comparing to low-power lithium-ion batteries instead of high-power ones). an equally valid way to say '10 times faster discharge rate' is '10 times higher power for the same capacity' or '10 times higher power density' there are available li-ion batteries with a charge and discharge rate of '15c', which is to say, 1 hour ÷ 15 = 4 minutes. they are used in drones. (there are some advertised as '30c' but i suspect those are maybe just a fraud? like the notorious amazon million-lumen flashlights https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ceA5xL6ggEw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ceA5xL6ggEw) if they really reach '150c', you could discharge 10% of the battery in 2.4 seconds, which is closer to a firework rocket engine than a conventional battery. but, a rocket engine that you can recharge 50000 times a charge rate of '150c' would mean you could charge the battery halfway in 12 seconds, and there are a lot of scenarios where that would be useful you could imagine '150c' batteries displacing much larger supercapacitors from many uses, rather than displacing conventional batteries. the number given in the article of 70 watt hours per kilogram is, in si units, 250kJ/kg. if you divide that by the 24 seconds implied by '10 times faster than lithium-ion' you get a power density of 10.4 kilowatts per kilogram. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power_density https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power_density says supercaps are in the 15 kilowatts per kilogram range. quadcopter drone electric motors are typically in the neighborhood of 4–5 kilowatts per kilogram, so this would make the drone battery much smaller than the motor instead of bigger more likely, though, it's a press release lie, where they're saying something that's technically true (there are lithium batteries with a '1c' charge and discharge rate, which have higher energy density than the higher-powered ones, and their batteries reach '10c', i.e., 6 minutes) but creates a false impression of something that would be a huge breakthrough if it were true

hedora 2y ago

For grid storage, it's unclear if faster charge/discharge matters. We ended up sizing our batteries to meet wattage demands for our appliances. I wish we had ~ 2x as many kWh as we do. Anker has a home battery whose main selling point is that you can add kWh without adding peak wattage. For use in vehicles, faster charge rates are a big win. Faster discharge probably doesn't matter much for cars (0-60 times are already ridiculously low). They might for drones / planes though.