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CATL has announced a new “condensed” battery with 500 Wh/kg

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Re: CATL has announced a new “condensed” battery with 500 Wh/kg

#311
post #133

I just realized how much energy efficiency is being squeezed out of a Tesla. It's incredible. A normal diesel fueled sedan such as the Chevy Cruze diesel runs at about 31mpg, which is 13.2 km/l or 15.3 km/kg. Diesel has a mind-boggling 12700 Wh/kg energy density[1], which translates to an efficiency of ~827 Wh/km for the Chevy. By contrast, the Tesla Model S, has a ~540 kg battery[2]. At 272 Wh/kg (from the posted ar…

How the hell a Chevy Cruze gets 31mpg with a diesel??? A VW Passat TDI will easily get 60+ imperial MPG, I've had it get close to 70 on long runs(that's 50 and 58 American MPG respectively). Are American diesels this inefficient?? Looking at pictures online the Chevy cruze doesn't seem like a bigger/heavier car than a Passat, so what gives??

I think they were citing city fuel economy. Some trims of the Cruise did get 50+ US MPG highway (when it was still sold here)

Although I completely forgot it existed. There are not many diesel passenger cars on US roads. Diesel is consistently more expensive than petrol here.

Re: CATL has announced a new “condensed” battery with 500 Wh/kg

#312

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In fairness the fluid ounces are also different, an Imperial (english) fluid ounce is 28.41306mL, while a US Customary fl oz is 29.5735mL. So the Imperial floz is 96% the US customary, not enough to account for having 25% more of them in a gallon, but it does lead to the Imperial gallon only being 20% larger than the customary gallon. But wait there’s more! The US also has the “food labelling” fluid ounce which is no…

And yet we claim to live in a science based society. I mean, there are a million things, that do not need universal standards, but standards are imposed anyway. But where one standard would be really helpful, like scientific values, we have many. And some people would rather go to prison, than adopt. (I think that happened in the UK, after they force switched to metric)

Keep digging and all the imperial standards are just an arbitrary conversion from metric at this point.

1 ft = exactly 30.48 cm; One pound is exactly 0.45359237 kilograms as in 0.453592370000000000… kilograms.

Re: CATL has announced a new “condensed” battery with 500 Wh/kg

#313
post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The cheap EVs aren't here yet, but the technology has the potential to eventually become cheaper than ICE. 30% of EV cost is currently in the battery, and this will drop.

This! I mean, we saw the same with computing: the first PCs cost thousands of dollars, but by the start of the nineties they were much more affordable already. Mostly because of technology advances and mass production, but of course also because of moving chip/board production to cheaper countries. Same with mobile phones, smartphones, laptops etc. etc.

PCs still cost thousands of dollars. If you are interested in AI/machine learning then $2k is the bare minimum.

Re: CATL has announced a new “condensed” battery with 500 Wh/kg

#314
post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Could you help us understand why you would like to keep buying gasoline cars? (Edit: I see that you are being down voted. Perhaps elaborating on your desire to continue to be able to buy gasoline cars might help clarify your position better)

Some people like freedom of choice, I guess. Like in a democracy, where you can vote whatever candidate you like, except here is with your wallet. Others like dictatures.

ICE produce proven carcinogenic pollutants.

Your freedom to intoxicate other people goes against their freedom to remain unharmed.

(Not to mention noise, environmental damage, geopolitical risks surrounding oil... all well proven stuff)

Re: CATL has announced a new “condensed” battery with 500 Wh/kg

#315
post #239

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Less of the "S". With current flight patterns you need multiple gigawatts. Calculations based on 737s leaving Gatwick: Energy density of the fuel: 9.6kWh/L 900 flights per day = one flight every 96 seconds 26024.706L per flight Total energy per flight: 9.6 x 26024.706kWh = 250MWh give or take = 900GJ Total power supplied from Gatwick in the form of aviation fuel: 900GJ/96s = 9.375GW. That's not only outside the range…

Oof. Jet engines are 35% efficient, I'd assume electric planes would be double that, does that change the calculation? Naively I'd say we 'only' need 4.5GW?

I feel like the back of the envelope calculation must have slipped a decimal point somewhere. 9GW is approximately 1/4 of the total electrical consumption in the whole of the UK. From memory aviation as a whole is only 2% of global emissions (although it might have an extra forcing effect due to being released directly into the upper atmosphere) where as electricity generation is 20-40% of emissions.

Re: CATL has announced a new “condensed” battery with 500 Wh/kg

#316
post #302

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The big reason for this is thermodynamics. A conventional internal combustion engine car has to convert chemical energy to kinetic energy - the absolute best theoretical efficiency of this might be 70%, but in practice it's more like 30%. Electric cars have to pay the same thermodynamic penalty, but they pay it at the power station (In practice, thanks to renewables, not all the electricity used to charge a car will…

Though that makes me think that hybrids have a real future. Or hydrogen fuel cells. Anything that doesn't require charging directly from the grid all the time, because although parts of the USA and Norway are ready for that, it's very tricky to get right globally. Maybe hybrids like the Prius get to be so efficient that such cars will have a truly negligible impact on global warming.

Hybrids that emit carbon will still have a huge effect on global warming, simply because there are so many cars. There isn't a huge amount of headroom for efficiency increases, so you're only going to get anywhere near "net zero" by charging from a renewable grid nearly all the time.

Re: CATL has announced a new “condensed” battery with 500 Wh/kg

#317

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Average US flight trip is about 800 km (~500 miles). If even half of all flights were powered by electricity, the impact on emissions would be huge.

Furthermore, the energy needed for takeoff is significantly higher than the energy for cruising. For an hour's flight, it's close to 50/50. The impact is disproportionately skewed towards shorter fkights

Wondering if we could build devices that assist with takeoff - like it's done on aircraft carriers. Could save some energy that way.

Re: CATL has announced a new “condensed” battery with 500 Wh/kg

#318
post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

BMW claim that a diesel 3 series will get 61mpg. Volkswagen reckon a Golf 2.0 TDI will do 68mpg. Electric is still significantly better, but you didn't need pick a terrible diesel car as an example.

This has the 2022 BMW 3-series pegged at between 22-28 mpg for city driving. US gallons, since the site is Houston site, I suppose. https://www.advantagebmwhouston.com/2022-bmw-3-series-fuel-e...

All the models listed are petrol(gas) powered so of course they get much worse mpg.

Re: CATL has announced a new “condensed” battery with 500 Wh/kg

#319
post #178
post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or we'll just go full circle and gasoline will be available at pharmacies: https://radair.com/blog/2011/11/10/automotive-history-benz/

Wondering… Is it possible to make tiny refineries for say a town or area? So locally produced or is that a environmental nightmare?

It's not economic and it's both an environmental and safety nightmare.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buncefield_fire "largest peacetime explosion in Europe"

I live in Edinburgh, and there's regular complaints about flaring from the Mossmorran refinery, which lights up the night sky, produces smoke, and is incredibly loud.

Re: CATL has announced a new “condensed” battery with 500 Wh/kg

#320

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Many engines can be converted to run on ethanol.

This gets thrown out quite a bit but I don't really buy it. If it is not designed for alcohol, it probably isn't going to work. Alcohol has too many weird interactions with stuff like aluminum.

Many countries are running on part-ethanol already; the UK is on "E10" (up to 10%)
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