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Solid-State Battery Has 2x the Energy–and No Anode

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31–40 of 218 posts

Re: Solid-State Battery Has 2x the Energy–and No Anode

#32
post #6

Solid state might share the fate of Betamax. There was a post a while ago about a small scale battery manufacturer named Amprius, which reported 500Wh/kg batteries: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35276709 Thing is, the company is producing 450Wh/kg batteries NOW and they're planning on scaling up their manufacturing capacity to 5GWh: https://www.convertingquarterly.com/ConvertingQuarterly/Indu... This solid sta…

5 GWh in what time? Gigafactory 1 was at 30 GWh per year in 2019 and they planned to ramp up to 54 GWh, according to Wikipedia. So probably per year? Which would make their production capacity 570 kW. Also according to Wikipedia, a production of 35 GWh per year which is 4 MW was estimated to require 300 MW of energy input.

Re: Solid-State Battery Has 2x the Energy–and No Anode

#33
post #2

Nice, when can we use them for phones and laptops lasting 72% longer and without fire risk? Genuine question, because optimistic battery articles have been popping up for decades, but here we are still with lithium ion in practice.

I have a genuine question too. I've never been worried about phone battery life; I charge once a day and I almost never run out, nor do I consciously conserve battery. Is worrying about phone battery life a problem relevant to certain phones, or is it a problem with usage styles?

Re: Solid-State Battery Has 2x the Energy–and No Anode

#34
post #5

Surprised how "dead" this industry is. I remember having Lithium-Ion batteries since I was in high school which was more than 20 years ago (and some Li-Po until then). Everything is leaps and bounds since then but not the batteries. Seems like a massive disconnect to me but I'm no chemist or researcher in this field.

It's definitely not "dead". As commented above me, there have been massive improvements. 20 years ago laptops had two hours of battery life. Today a MacBook has 20+ hours of battery life. Obviously many components have become more efficient, but battery improvements have also contributed to that large increase in battery capacity.

The iBook G3 had a 45Wh battery which is only slightly less than a M2 air, and barely under half of the maximum you can take on a plane. Battery development has led to smaller, lighter and cheaper batteries in laptops but not really to an increase in capacity.

Re: Solid-State Battery Has 2x the Energy–and No Anode

#35
post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Energy density is ~8 times higher than in 2008 at 1/10th the price. That's more progress than we've made in single-core performance in the same timeframe. Sources: https://www.energy.gov/eere/vehicles/articles/fotw-1234-apri... https://www.iea.org/data-and-statistics/charts/evolution-of-... https://mlech26l.github.io/pages/2020/12/17/cpus.html

Did you mean 'more progress'?

Yes I did.

Re: Solid-State Battery Has 2x the Energy–and No Anode

#36
post #24
post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure about Toyota, because up till now they've been hydrogen evangelists and they don't have a great record on pure battery EVs.

Well H2 is a hedge. It's a green-ish fuel and has potential as a replacement to lng for japan. but more power to toyota. can't wait to get an electric hilux. hopefully it's cheap.

> Well H2 is a hedge. It's a green-ish fuel and has potential as a replacement to lng for japan.

Is it though? Can't be a hedge if it doesn't really work well fundamentally.

Although I'll admit to being largely ignorant of the Japanese car market.

IMO, it'd be much more practical to invest in automotive LNG tech and combine that with synthesizing LNG from the atmosphere (or at least developing the tech to do so).

Practically, both H2 and LNG are both "dirty", since H2 is made though natural gas reforming these days.

Re: Solid-State Battery Has 2x the Energy–and No Anode

#37
post #20
post #6

Solid state might share the fate of Betamax. There was a post a while ago about a small scale battery manufacturer named Amprius, which reported 500Wh/kg batteries: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35276709 Thing is, the company is producing 450Wh/kg batteries NOW and they're planning on scaling up their manufacturing capacity to 5GWh: https://www.convertingquarterly.com/ConvertingQuarterly/Indu... This solid sta…

Some applications still require higher energy densities than what LFP can provide. Are you saying silicon anodes are more promising than solid state for those applications?

My position is as follows:

-LFP wins on price where it fits the use case, so grid storage, current-gen EVs.

-Silicon anode competes for market share with solid-state in areas where LFP can't, namely aerospace and next-gen EVs or even aviation, should they ever reach 1kWh/kg. The former has easily a decade lead considering that they're already selling packs and the latter exists largely in the lab or on paper.

I also believe even 400Wh/kg at pack level is already good enough to be a serious proposition as replacement for internal combustion in land transportation, provided pricing is adequate.

Re: Solid-State Battery Has 2x the Energy–and No Anode

#38
post #6

Solid state might share the fate of Betamax. There was a post a while ago about a small scale battery manufacturer named Amprius, which reported 500Wh/kg batteries: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35276709 Thing is, the company is producing 450Wh/kg batteries NOW and they're planning on scaling up their manufacturing capacity to 5GWh: https://www.convertingquarterly.com/ConvertingQuarterly/Indu... This solid sta…

You are right. The company you mention is focusing on the aviation industry. Drones and light airplanes. Weight matters a lot there. To the point where saving weight is worth a lot to manufacturers.

Basically every kilo you save is more useful load and range. It's also a very conservative market. Most of the planes in the process of being certified, or already certified (like the Pipistrel trainer) are using batteries that are quite unimpressive in terms of wh/kg. That's because the technology is typically at least half a decade old by the time a plane gets through the certification process.

Manufacturers can't just switch battery supplier without triggering a lot of re-certification activity and most of them would have locked in their supplier many years ago; long before even starting the certification process.. It's their next models that are being designed now that would get something that is state of the art now. Like this battery. We won't see those in the market until 6-7 years from now.

The exception to this is probably going to be experimental aircraft. I think that should become a growth market pretty soon. A 500wh/kg battery of say 100kwh would weigh about 200 kilos, give or take. That should get you some usable range and be light enough to put in a small plane. And it would put a nice little dent in the cost of what used to be a 100$ hamburger flight. Fuel cost is high and planes use a lot of it. 5-10 gallons per hour typically. And combustion engine maintenance on planes is very expensive. All that goes away with battery electric. Servicing becomes a lot simpler, less moving parts that can break and the few remaining ones last a lot longer.

Irresistible for a lot of private pilots, I would imagine. This is a market that doesn't currently exist but I don't think it should take long for people to start experimenting with battery electric.

Re: Solid-State Battery Has 2x the Energy–and No Anode

#39
post #32
post #6

Solid state might share the fate of Betamax. There was a post a while ago about a small scale battery manufacturer named Amprius, which reported 500Wh/kg batteries: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35276709 Thing is, the company is producing 450Wh/kg batteries NOW and they're planning on scaling up their manufacturing capacity to 5GWh: https://www.convertingquarterly.com/ConvertingQuarterly/Indu... This solid sta…

5 GWh in what time? Gigafactory 1 was at 30 GWh per year in 2019 and they planned to ramp up to 54 GWh, according to Wikipedia. So probably per year? Which would make their production capacity 570 kW. Also according to Wikipedia, a production of 35 GWh per year which is 4 MW was estimated to require 300 MW of energy input.

What is the point of comparing 300 MW energy use for production with 35 GWh/year (which is technically 4MW indeed) new battery capacity though?

These are technically the same units, but they don't measure the same things.

Re: Solid-State Battery Has 2x the Energy–and No Anode

#40
post #32
post #6

Solid state might share the fate of Betamax. There was a post a while ago about a small scale battery manufacturer named Amprius, which reported 500Wh/kg batteries: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35276709 Thing is, the company is producing 450Wh/kg batteries NOW and they're planning on scaling up their manufacturing capacity to 5GWh: https://www.convertingquarterly.com/ConvertingQuarterly/Indu... This solid sta…

5 GWh in what time? Gigafactory 1 was at 30 GWh per year in 2019 and they planned to ramp up to 54 GWh, according to Wikipedia. So probably per year? Which would make their production capacity 570 kW. Also according to Wikipedia, a production of 35 GWh per year which is 4 MW was estimated to require 300 MW of energy input.

> Which would make their production capacity 570 kW.

I understand where you got this number, but I would rather stick to units which are easy to interpret.

Yes, 5GWh per year or 570kW - in a sense.

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