Every day it feels like we’re getting closer to battery revolution. It really makes you wonder how different the world will be once we have these incredible batteries actually working at consumer level.
They’re coming off a pilot production line and have shipped to vehicle manufacturers to see if they want to incorporate these into upcoming models.
Problem will be the price for the first run of this tech. They’re targeting “ultra premium” vehicles until they can scale and optimize manufacturing.
The market will segment away from the current tech anyway. CATL Sodium-ion with comparatively low densities but also extremely low prices per kWh will likely win the low-end market and the market for stationary solutions. This is just due to the much lower resource costs. The high-end will be up for things like this battery by Samsung (or other comparable pilot products). The current technology will likely be in a weird middle spot.
And those cheaper batteries may not be as compromising as people think. In terms of kwh/kg, the sodium-ion batteries coming on the market now are about where lithium poly batteries were about 4 years ago. It takes a few years before new batteries make their way into EVs, which means EVs being purchased right now have batteries with a similar kwh/kg of the new sodium-ion batteries. Those batteries are around 30% cheaper and don’t have the same level of fire hazards as some lithium chemistries.
So if EVs on the market today have adequate range for your use, you’ll probably be just fine with a future sodium-ion EV.
There won’t be many charging stations able to output that kind of wattage tho
It will still be a dramatic improvement because these packs will be able to hold the max charge that the charger can support for much longer. E.g., a car that can hold 350kW from 0-90 is much better than one that peaks at 350kW for 2 seconds before dropping to 150 or 100kW for 40-90%.
Can you imagine not having the constant traffic noise played into your ears like tinnitus, being able to maybe actually breathe the oxygen nature provides. That’s probably gonna be what it will be like. But still, ev are just a stop gap, more privately owned cars isn’t the solution in my humble opinion, it is a start towards it.
Totally with you, but tire dust is one of the major pollution particles from cars, maybe even the worst AFAIK. That, sadly will not go away but it is still leagues more desireable to have everything on electric than fossil fuel. Can’t have perfect stop good enough.
The tire noise EVs make is about the same as an ICE car at about 50 kph (30 mph) so it doesn’t make much difference on busy roads. It does make a huge difference in slow traffic.
About noise, above 30km/h electric cars are as noisy as gas powered one.
It’s better but not the panacea either.
Solution: 30km/h speed limit in cities, which is a good idea anyway for safety reasons.
Yes, it’s better for safety and health reason.
Plus 30km/h is in the speed range of bikes, so it become much more accessible to bike around in the city and more people start to do it.
It’s 30mph not kph. City streets should be limited to 20mph anyway.
Building massive production capacity to replace all the cars just locks us in to having cars though
we’re getting closer to battery revolution
If big oil doesn’t buy up the patent and squirrel it away.
I waited 4 years for battery technology to get better before bring an EV last year. The “battery revolution”, with all the news being generated weekly for years, is still not here. I don’t give a fuck about theoretical battery range - give me the actual battery in a car, THEN it’s newsworthy. Now it’s all just theoretical, which we consumers can do fuck all about.
And that’s the thing. As much as we’ve gotten used to it over the past hundred years, progress is absolutely not automatic.
If people don’t buy the current stuff, it reduces the chance of advancement for that tech. Most things will only get better if people are buying the current versions.
We’ve had solar power tech for 50 years. Solar initiatives under Carter were actually pretty good. You know who killed it, or I expect we’d have solar on most roofs today.
I recently visited Switzerland, and the amount of rooftop solar there was insane.
(Solar is of course closely linked to battery tech.)
I totally agree with your statement, but in the 4 years I waited, nothing has actually happened with the batteries on EVs (except for a bit faster charging on already insane charging times).
Well, Toyota has promised 2026 for their battery tech and hasn’t changed that guidance, so I think there’s a decent chance they’ll stick to that timeline. I don’t know if Samsung is their supplier or if they’re competing on the tech, but if it’s the latter, I expect we’ll see something in the next 2-3 years.
I’m still convinced Toyota is just announcing breakthroughs miracles in battery tech Coming Soon™ because they shit the bed so hard on the first round of EVs. Now they’re trying to discourage people from buying EVs now while they play catch-up.
Well, the good news is, nobody is making an actual solid state battery car, so if they don’t deliver, I’m not out anything. The current set of EVs aren’t good enough to replace our family car (we like road trips, and even 300 miles range is too little), so I’m waiting regardless. I’ll be looking for announcements in the next year or two.
Both of our cars are Toyotas though, because they make really good cars. We have a Sienna for our family car and a Prius for my commuter, and I’m probably going to replace that Prius with an EV if I can find a good deal on something with 150 miles range. The Sienna is getting old (nearly 200k miles), but it’s reliable, so I’m holding off until I can either get a good deal on a hybrid/ICE, or reasonable EVs are released. If that’s Toyota, great, but I’m not buying the first gen of anything regardless.
I’ve found the current gen of EVs is perfect for road tripping with my family. The battery range is perfectly sized for the bladder sizes of my kids. It works really well if you’re road tripping at a casual pace. However I know a lot of people that like to “death march” road trip where they won’t stop for 500 miles at a time - so I admit it’s definitely not for everyone.
Yeah, I have kids, and we can usually get about 300 miles before someone needs a bathroom break. So usually I refill gas (<5 min) while the kids go to the bathroom, and we usually pack enough food with us (sandwiches and whatnot) that we only need to go to a restaurant once on the trip.
An EV could work if fast chargers were as plentiful as gas stations, but in many of the areas we go (I live in Utah and travel to WA, MT, ID, and CA frequently), they’re pretty infrequent. So we’d need to plan stops based on charger availability, not on bladder size, which means an extra recharge or two for the trip. It’s getting better, but every time I look at maps, there are maybe one or two chargers in a 50 mile radius, so if it’s full or out of service, we’d be screwed.
Now, if gas stations started offering EV charging, I’d probably be looking at them today. Gas stations are perfect because they often have fast food, bathrooms, and snacks, all of which are essential for road trips.
As another anecdote, my coworker just bought a Model 3, and he frequently says he can’t reasonably visit places within our state because the charging network sucks. That’s a pretty serious concern for us, since we like camping, which means pretty remote trips.
One important thing to remember is the that battery capacity is unlikely to improve anymore, we should mostly improve charging, lifespan, safety, etc.
I doubt that we will ever see batteries that have much more capacity per weight than what we have now.
That’s completely wrong. Lab research continues and we’re not close to the theoretical limits of energy density yet.
This is the real next step, every other battery hasn’t made it to production, but if they’re sending out working EV batteries to EV manufacturers and have production line running then it’s finally real.
And as soon as Korea starts mass producing long range, quick charge solid state batteries, the factories in China are going to start mass-producing them as well.
Regardless of what it means politically, this is fantastic news, I didn’t know they were actually producing them beyond prototype stage into commercial production.
Heellll yeah.
I bet the Europeans and Americans already work on imposing tariffs.
Won’t matter much; Chinese EVs are so inexpensively made, especially with subsidies, while exceeding European and American auto safety standards that tariffs for the last five years haven’t stopped them expanding outside of Asia.
In addition, EVs are so much cheaper to produce, run and maintain for auto companies that tariffs aren’t going to make much of a difference stemming the continued EV manufacturing explosion.
Capacity and range will just keep going up, any tariffs have so far been and will be footnotes in EV story rather than any sort of relevant market mechanism
Chinese EV sounds terrifying. I am sure the specific cars they sent for safety testing were well made and passed just fine, but I wouldn’t get into their production run vehicles.
Nah, these are the exact standards US/euro cars are tested by, tested annually from regular production, not specially chosen cars.
Besides, it isn’t like American or European companies didn’t make production line cars that literally blew up if they rear-ended someone.
So far the manufacturing of exported Chinese EVs is doing very well, and each product is tested upon import anyway to make sure it conforms to the regulations of that country.
Tanking a potential market like this for the Chinese doesn’t make any sense right now, at least outside of their country it makes the most corporate and political sense to do what they’re doing and exceed European and American auto safety standards.
You should be more concerned about privacy invasion from the smart tech rather than the physical safety of the vehicles.
My point is the the EU ans US are shooting themselves in the foot in a big way with these idiotic tariffs. The Chinese will just clean up in all other markets and if they retaliate, the EU will lose their most important export market, which is China.
I think the US is hoping to buy itself some time while their EV manufacturing catches up, but they aren’t being practical about the limited effect of these tariffs and aren’t making the necessary domestic investments so far to compete with the level of manufacture the Chinese are at and the level the Japanese and a few other countries will be at in 5 years.
The market is still going to end up with safe, affordable EVs sooner than anyone thought, so I can’t get too worked up about the US not jumping into the race.
If they don’t want to catch up, then they get left behind.
They let others manufacture their TVs, computers, and toilet paper, it’s not unlikely they’ll let their national auto industry die as well.
On Korean products?
Exactly. Our government doesn’t hate foreign EVs, they just hate China. That’s really it.
I mean it is just economic warfare. China substitutes their EV producers to undercut competing countries. They respond with tarrifs. That is business as usual since global trade exists.
It really shouldn’t be though. I believe in free trade, and tariffs ain’t it.
The tariffs are to compensate for the Chinese government subsidizing production.
Are they? Or is it protectionism?
I’d like to see some actual numbers here, because 100% tariffs seems to be more than just the subsidies, but also includes labor cost disparity.
Completely free trade works as well as unregulated capitalism in that it’s terrible for the consumers. You’ll always end up with a monopoly.
I don’t think that’s true. There are other mechanisms besides tariffs and direct regulations that can help regulate markets, depending on what you’re looking for. For example:
- carbon taxes - charge companies for the cost of removing the carbon they emit; this would look like a tariff for imported goods, but they can reduce the tax by proving the carbon they emit is lower
- anti-trust - break up companies that break the law
- remove certain corporate protections - jail execs, increase liability (e.g. protect retirement assets and primary house, but not investments), etc
- more consistent and active enforcement of the laws we do have
I’m not saying we should flip the switch overnight to free trade, I’m saying we should be moving that direction. The only case I can see for tariffs is to reverse government subsidies. If we can prove China subsidizes EVs by X%, I’m fine with a matching tariff to level the playing field. However, if they’re merely able to produce them cheaper because labor there is cheaper, a tariff is merely protectionism and therefore illegitimate, and we should instead compete with automation or quality.
Oh please! I’d love to see Big Oil shrivel and die just like our societies and very planet have under their influence.
I mean they absolutely will when civilization collapses due to climate collapse and accompanying weather events, famine, droughts, and plagues.
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-023-39810-w
I take solace in knowing that they can build all the luxury bunkers they want, but they will one day come to realize they are their tombs, protecting them from the world and species they damned, including for any of their muh legacy nepo babies huddled underground with them, for a couple million years.
I’d appreciate if people just like you would stop taking any solace and tolerating this bs. The ONLY reason this shit continues to happen is because too many people do nothing. Then when asked they get defensive and say, “What am I supposed to do?!” followed by “What are you doing?!” Like guys, you’re smart enough to recognize the perils of these industries, read journals and papers, and internalize the evidence, and you can’t fucking do a quick Google search on activism and even lightly contemplate entering yourself into local politics?
Come now.
I was part of Occupy, and it was mostly the fellow peasants being hurt from this system laughing us off the street. I made phone calls for Bernie’s primaries.
I still vote the least non-progressive out of harm reduction, and will vote for Harris, as I would have for Biden’s corpse, just as I did voting for his corpse the last cycle, and Clinton before when not many showed up. But I no longer have hope. That’s just so I can look myself in the mirror and say I did the right thing in the face of madness.
Good on you if you have hope, rage against the dying of that light. I’ve seen too much to believe that the nobility of the human spirit will prevail.
I was taught a lesson when I was younger that you cannot compare your trauma to that of another. I also learned that it isn’t rage which defines progress, it is determination. Apathy, a loss of hope, quells the spirit and stunts progress. Those not on the Right are especially individualistic. We cater to the spirit of independence, while also celebrating love and community, though always as individuals to individuals. It’s not “I” or “Myself” that makes the change. The shift happens when we step up together and change sets in when there is a united, achievable goal.
In near every recent movement the Left has been a part of with the exception of Bernie, there has been nothing that was clearly defined and clearly achievable. Just a bunch of angry people loosely pointing fingers. FeelTheBern DID work and imagine how things may have been different not if Bernie had been elected, but if we with our strength of spirit continued down a united path. Bernie’s ENTIRE message was never about getting him elected, it was always about us coming together and being active as one.
I’m sad that so many people seem to have forgotten that.
I hear you about the long arm of history, and I might even agree, but not just our society, our species was put on notice we are risking the habitability of our only shared, sole habitat in the medium term a century ago. Now it’s here, it’s accelerating, we are feeling amuse bouche of our reverse terraforming project, scientists are finding new runaway effects their conservative estimates didn’t account for, and still humanity collectively shrugs because we can’t disrupt our global economy short term even to literally have a future for our species. We, the US, are among the leaders in the world in terms of accelerating that destruction.
I likely would have more of an attitude of not for us, for our children if that weren’t the case. But physics doesn’t care that we are the slow learners and selfish fucks. I hold the shame and guilt in my heart for my son’s likely hellish future that I really can do nothing about short of becoming an ecoterrorist which for the record I’m not planning on becoming.
Time is no longer a luxury humanity possesses. We needed to take drastic, draconian, lifestyle altering changes decades ago, and we still aren’t willing to entertain such things today, with shattered heat and earliest cat 5 hurricane ever records.
Exactly why “we” is important. People are struggling and it’s difficult to consider the world when your own life is falling apart.
Unfortunately I don’t have a true solution to this beyond the need for a real leader to step up. Well…there is another solution, though I’d rather not speak of it for fear of ending up on a list. It’s also not one I support. Still, I feel strongly that we can find our way.
At the very least I’m not just going to roll over.
Concrete is effective at sealing shut bunker doors, and air ventilation systems, as is caulk
Yeah, but humans are not very effective at organising humans to act in their best interests in a coordinated and logical manner. I feel that this will be even more of a challenge post-collapse. Some bunkers may get caulked. Most will get left alone.
Too bad the lithium battery industry is no better. Those places are child labor slave mines and the environmental damage is astronomical…
You’re probably thinking of cobalt or perhaps hard rock lithium mines. Most lithium is just pumped out of the ground as brines, just like oil.
This is true but coal mining is just as bad and requires orders of magnitude (mineral fuels) more excavation than all of the other minerals combined. If we can stop mining coal by using renewables the total amount of mining will be a fraction of what it currently is. Plus many of the other minerals can be reused where coal just ends up as carbon in the atmosphere.
This is exactly it. Of course battery production is harmful too, but not only is it less harmful than other sources to extract, you also don’t have to burn batteries to generate the power. With fossil fuels, the extraction is massively more harmful and then the use itself creates even more pollution.
Just take a look where most of these rare raw material resources exist and note what attitude these countries have to the environmental cause. Zero, none. Russia, China, Africa https://www.dw.com/en/how-chinas-mines-rule-the-market-of-critical-raw-materials/a-57148375 I bet they won’t mind destroying whole local ecosystem just to get extra bucks Europe needs
You really sound desperate to reject any possibility that hard work and human ingenuity can solve problems. I assume it’s because you’re scared of feeling you have to actually take life seriously and consider the implications of each choice you make.
I reject the possibility that exploration of workers isn’t going to be a part of this “human ingenuity”. Enjoy your electric cars all you like, but don’t pretend nobody was exploited in the making of it.
Let’s hope it’s better than most Samsung products
It comes with their version of a calendar installed and it wont charge unless you grant it permissions to access your gps log, at which point it will crash.
Seriously, why are they so absolutely shit at software. It boggles the mind.
Their batteries are usually top notch. If you’re hunting around for 18650 cells–which are notoriously bad for fake claims on Amazon and Aliexpress (“80,000mAh!!!” when the best 18650 cells are closer to 3,500mAh)–a genuine Samsung cell is a safe bet.
Samsung was very transparent about their fuck up with the note 7. The article you linked makes it very clear it was a connection issue or a different manufacturer. At this point this is equivalent to the burn banana peels to get high or you eat dozens of spiders while you sleep internet lies.
It’s not a lie, they screwed up twice. I don’t care if it was another manufacturer that screwed up, at the end of the day, Samsung is responsible for QA on anything they sell.
That said, they were very transparent (hence why I linked it). However, I still don’t trust Samsung for other reasons:
- their refrigerators have a horrible repair track record
- Samsung Smart TVs spy on you
- they steal your aftermarket parts
- Samsung is the largest chaebol, so I expect them to not play fair
They do make some high quality stuff, but I generally avoid them because I don’t trust them (I do have a Samsung “dumb” TV, and I may get a Samsung washing machine). I don’t think their batteries will explode again, but they’ll probably do something like make it difficult for independent repair of their batteries. They’re actually better than most in their phones, but that’s a pretty low-value repair vs for cars.
Mostly agree, I hate Samsung in general (sent from Samsung Galaxy S22). Anytime I see someone considering their appliances or TVs I try to turn them to something else. They have made the best batteries for a long time though. I hope a competitor rises to squish them a bit.
Don’t buy a sumsung washer. I only buy used washers and dryers because I’m cheap and handy. Samsung is not an option because a large part of the user market is broken in a way that costs the same as buying new.
I do sort of disagree with your QA comment. Everyone seems to think QA stops once you sell a product, but it doesn’t. They did a full recall to fix their quality mistake. It’d be like if Tesla finally recalled all of the cybertrucks for sucking as much as they do. Massive PR hit to attempt to maintain quality.
Idk, this was after they were banned by the FAA, so I don’t think it was a “PR hit to attempt to maintain quality,” I think it was to stem the damage. The Note 7 was already in the news by that point, and 3 major airlines had already started telling passengers to turn off their Note 7s specifically. The second set of devices failed even when powered off.
Here’s Time’s timeline of events if you want to revisit it. I can understand the first not being caught, but Samsung should have been extra wary of the replacement devices. But no, they only stopped after even more bad news came out.
If Samsung really cared about maintaining quality, they would’ve taken more than a month to test and ship fixed devices. They should’ve done a total recall and relaunch a few months later, once they have thoroughly tested their products.
And thanks for the warning about Samsung washers. I have an LG now, and this is the second time the logic board has had an issue in the 10-ish years I’ve had it (this time it’s a sticking relay), and I’m debating repairing vs replacing it. The part is something like $100, but I’m thinking there’s a chance something else could die given its age. Then again, $100 is totally reasonable if it lasts another 5 years. If you have any recommendations for brands, I’m all ears.
I went with Speed Queen for laundry machines. If I recall they have three models: a 3, 5, and 7, with a warranty of the same number of years (I got the 7). They’ve been mostly solid, but we have had some issues and I like that they are made to be serviced instead of thrown away and replaced. I’ve heard Maytag’s commercial line is similarly made to last.
Better in what way?
Well my $1800 phone has push notification ads for mobile games I can’t disable because Samsung flags the Galaxy Store as a system app so you can’t disable notifications. You can see here that the option is greyed out.
They also install shitty games with “security updates” every month or so.
I’m so glad that the launcher I use has a “Recently Installed Apps” button at the bottom of the apps list. It makes it so easy to go through and scrub the bullshit they install on my phone.
You can kinda turn them off if you silence it like I did
There’s actually a way to kill them, but it’s super hidden.
You have to go to the phone notification settings, go into advanced settings, select the option to disable notification categories per app, then go back into notification settings, open the app list, open the three-dot menu and select system apps, then find the Galaxy store, then select categories to disable.
Easy, right?
hmm, so… I had the notifications category set to on. by doing this, I could see the different categories, so I think you have to have it on to select the correct categories instead of switching it off like you said.
HOWEVER, check this bullshit out:
I can’t turn important updates off, and there’s one they don’t even let me see. wtf!! I wish there was another company that did folding phones as good as Samsung 😢
So you want the batteries to not show ads? I don’t understand. Do you have any actual relatable issues between the batteries and other products?
How about the time they had to recall their flagship phones because the batteries were exploding and ended up being banned by the FAA?
So they changed our all the batteries, and re-released the phones, only for them to start blowing up again?
When 2 different manufacturers both have a design catching fire, it’s the design that’s the problem.
The first was a design issue, the second was a manufacturing issue. Both should have been caught by Samsung’s QA.
Use ADB to disable Store and AppCloud (adware/nagware that should be killed with fire). No, not the notifications, the apps themselves.
It’s ludicrous that my phone costs more than 2 different cars I’ve owned and I have to go through this kind of bullshit so they can make another 15 cents on average per user.
Nova Launcher and set the first page of the app drawer as empty. Then when it does that, you see them and can uninstall. Samsung is trash, but I also don’t care if I drop my phone in the ocean, cause it isn’t $1400…so a trade-off.
I swear I read about how some companies have managed to come up with some break through to charge or increase battery capacity every few months, yet these are never make it to market.
Cold fusion is right around the corner!
Cold fusion certainly isn’t.
That’s the joke
The joke is fusion energy is just around the corner.
Cold fusion is a totally different topic.
Cold fusion is right around the corner!
i thought they’re already at “triple cold² fusion++” ;-)
yet these are never make it to market.
my personal favorite (but not a battery) were two different fake news about fans without any moving parts, one with electricity, conductors and shapes only, the other using ultrasonic somehow, how cool were these lies !!!
https://www.itnews.com.au/news/silent-microchip-fan-has-no-moving-parts-106236
“RSD5 is the culmination of six years of research by Dan Schlitz and Vishal Singhal of Thorrn Micro Technologies”
“Six years of research”, such a cool “product” and now that linked thorrn domain is for sale, how bad!! the world will never profit from their super “cool” invention !!!
“today” other bladeless fans (based on ultrasonic freqs) were anounced: https://linustechtips.com/topic/1471374-not-a-big-fan-new-solid-state-cooler-can-blow-air-with-no-moving-parts/ (“Frore is expecting to start shipping units in Q1 of next year.” which was news from 2022) but did you hear about that cool product beeing shipped yet? i would have, i’m somehow sure, but somehow i didn’t. maybe the “units” they wanted to ship were just something else *lol That article also says: “Frore Systems hasn’t announced any actual computers featuring its Airjet solid-state coolers. But the company is already in partnership with the likes of Intel […]” no actual result, but already partners like intel (intel, how does’nt that already fit !!)
The same nonexisting effect (fan without moving parts), abused (at least) twice. (i’ll just ignore those “bladeless fans” here that officially just have hidden “propellers”) but military says “twice” is already a scheme…
why should it be different for batteries?
if they produce batteries THAT good, they would never sell them but make them available only for rent, to maximise their(!) ROI (and not yours). so i guess it’s yafn - yet another fake news. i might still be wrong however, but i also like to be on the safe side of predictions ;-)
a theory: the richies offsprings startups desperately need other lies than their parents and grandparents who already used up nearly all language-allowed possible lies (as well as nonverbal lies, just watch tv for a while to see it in action) to distract people, companies and govs to ‘invest’ in them instead of i.e. in the future or in the nation, thus new nonexistant technologies is what the richies offspring found best to be their lies about.
This one is definitely real and will be in cars (whether it’s Samsung or someone else), probably by 2027.
I posted about this a week ago. The battery pack will likely be around 150kWh (Nio has a solid state battery car that will be produced that can do 577 miles on a 150kWh battery). The 9 minute charge is from 8-80% (according to the marketing material I dug up) so it is 432 miles of charge in 9 minutes. Considering fast charge costs like $0.50/kWh currently, I’m guessing most people will not be charging up that entire portion unless they are planning on driving for a long fucking time…after they have already been driving for 9-10 hours.
But that charge rate would have to come from a charger that can output much higher than current ones. The highest output you are likely to find is 350kW which would take 18 minutes to charge that 108kWh. So while this battery can charge that fast, you are not likely to be able to find a charger with that high of output for a few years. Still great to be able to get a couple hundred miles of range in 9 minutes. Solid state batteries supposedly have a quicker ramp up period and can take the full output for a higher percentage of the battery.
There are already some charging stations in Germany offering 400kW. Still 16 minutes though. 800kW is just insane. CCS is currently capped at 500kW, so you would need MCS which is planned for trucks.
If you do the math, the common standard plugs simply can’t do the charging rates that would be required here. You’d need a whole new plug design on top of all new chargers.
It’s also silly and unnecessary. We should focus on getting more chargers out there, not chasing a fast charge time goal. If you plan your route out a bit, 20-30 minute charge times every 2-4 hours are fine for the vast majority of people.
https://wumpus-cave.net/post/2024/03/2024-03-30-ten-minute-ev-charging-wont-happen/index.html
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Does fast charging reduce the lifespan of a battery like this? The headline is bothersome because my suspicion is it won’t last 20 years if you fast charge all of the time and whatnot. I realize that’s not a typical case but it’s good to understand the trade-offs.
The chemistry is substantially different, so we’ll probably have to wait until scientists run some tests to get a more precise set of parameters that affect degradation. I expect failure modes like dendrites are basically impossible with solid-state, but electrode cracking is still possible. There might even be new and exciting ways they can degrade! Regardless, this is still great news.
Engineering Explained has a good summary: https://youtu.be/w4lvDGtfI9U (Piped link: https://piped.video/watch?v=w4lvDGtfI9U)
Your math checks out.
Charging a 600 mi battery in 9 minutes would require a charging station that can output somewhere north of 1.2 MW.
We need major upgrades to the electrical grid as well as doubling our electricity generation capacity for charging stations and vehicles like that to be common place.
Honestly, we do that. Almost every year we drive for 13-14 hours to visit my parents, which is something like 900 miles. We usually do 300-400 miles then refill gas and grab some fast food. We usually stop twice on this trip, sometimes three times if someone has an emergency. We also do some shorter 600 mile+ trips as well (in-laws and sibling are just over 600 miles away), and frequently drive ~200 miles, so we usually have 1-2 road trips each year.
Current EVs that get something like 200-250 miles per change would require at least four stops, and 30min or so per stop, which would add at least 2 hours to the trip. That turns a one-day drive into a two-day drive, and probably three days if charging stations aren’t readily available. For the shorter trips (just over 600 miles), we’d still need to recharge at least twice, which adds more than an hour to the trip.
So I’m absolutely interested in this kind of range. I don’t need 600 miles, but 400-500 would be good. Until they’re affordable, we’re sticking to our ICE family car, though we’re planning to exchange our hybrid commuter for an EV.
That’s a long day in the car, too much for me. Any road trip over about 350 miles gets me pretty exhausted and sick of being in the car. So I’d be OK with a 300 mile range and stopping overnight at a hotel with a charger nearby for trips like that.
I grew up with it. Almost every year we’d drive 800-900 miles to visit family, and almost always in one day. We’ve done it in two before, but honestly it’s more of a pain to get everything unloaded and get the kids to actually sleep in the hotel that we just drive all the way through. We arrive exhausted, but it’s one long day instead of two.
That is the case for some people but cases like that are pretty rare. There is no way I could do a drive like that. Current EVs are fine for the vast majority of people but there is the rare family that makes 900 mile trips once our twice a year. For those instances like yours, I’d suggest renting an ICE one or twice a year if you wanted to switch to an EV for your larger vehicle or get a plug in hybrid.
Definitely swap out that commuter car. A used Bolt is pretty darn cheap. I did some math and replacing our Prius C with one would save $1200/year in gas costs. And then there are oil change costs that you save and a few others.
A used Bolt is pretty darn cheap
Yeah, I’ve been looking at them, and it’s something like $13k, which is definitely in the reasonable range of prices, especially since I can probably get $5k for my current car.
However, I’m worried about battery issues. People claim it’s fixed, but I’ll be parking mine in my garage and there’s a lot of flammable stuff in there. So I’m a little hesitant. I don’t need to ever fast charge it since I only drive like 200 miles per week (and never more than 100 miles in a day, usually like 50), so trickle charging should be totally fine. If I can confirm that, I might just do the swap. Or maybe I’ll get a Leaf, which is in a similar price range used.
Our gas and electricity costs are pretty low ($3.50/gal and $0.12-0.13/kWh), so even at $13k, the Bolt would still need ~10 years to pay back for itself (and that’s not counting the opportunity cost of investing that money). I’m still tempted based purely on the convenience factor (never needing to go to a gas station again), but it’s not a slam dunk yet. If the car dies, I’ll certainly replace the commuter with an EV though, I would just rather avoid the hassle of listing and selling my current car.
From a purely climate perspective, it’s probably better for me to replace our family car. We get ~20mpg, and hybrids would get 30-40mpg, and a plug-in would get emissions-free for most of our around-town trips. That car is only used for very short trips (<20 miles) or long trips (>200 miles), with almost nothing in-between. But those cars are super expensive right now, so I’m watching the used market to see if I can score a deal.
I would advise against a Leaf, especially used. Nissan was great at getting a popular, cheap EV out the door but they have completely stagnated since then. The Leaf’s big issue is that the battery is air cooled. That’s fine if you live in Hawai’i where the temperature is in the 70s year round but places that experience heat will see a severe degradation in range relatively quickly. It’s not unheard of fire a 10 year old Leaf to only get maybe a dozen miles of range. There is also the fact that it uses CHAdeMO instead of CCS for fast charge. They have finally started to make adapters but they are $1000 and are not officially supported.
If you are indeed worried about a Bolt battery, you could always park it outside. There is not a catalytic converter for thieves to rip off so being out of a garage is not a big issue in that regard.
I would agree that switching will likely not make a ton of sense for you. Thankfully in my state, they offer a rebate for EVs on top of the federal credit so a used EV for us would pay for itself in about 5 years.
you could always park it outside
I’m not worried about theft at all. My neighborhood is really boring and my city has one of the lowest crime rates in the area, with most of the crime happening on the other side of the city. It could happen, but I doubt it.
The bigger reason for the garage is climate control. It gets pretty cold in the winter (5-15F is common), and the non-insulated garage generally keeps it above freezing. That should help with the battery, as well as avoids having to scrape the windshield.
they offer a rebate for EVs on top of the federal credit
Yeah, if we had that, I’d probably jump on it. But there’s a bigger chance that my vehicle registration tax will increase to offset the lack of gas tax than a rebate happening.
Another issue is that a lot of our energy comes from coal, so switching to an EV wouldn’t be a a dramatic as other areas in terms of carbon footprint. I’m considering getting solar (about a 10-year payback period if I DIY), but I’ll need to also replace the roof when I do, so I’m putting that off as well.
Anyway, I want an EV, but as you said, it probably doesn’t make sense for me. But I do like the idea of never having to refill my commuter, which I currently need to do almost every week.
Or maybe I’ll get a Leaf, which is in a similar price range used.
If you will EVER need to fast charge then the leaf is going to be more annoying because it has CHADeMO and not CCS
Get the bolt unless you’re certain that’ll never be a problem even once, it’s seriously not worth it anymore
Source: longtime happy leaf owner who hates CHADeMO as it cannot be easily converted to CCS like NACS can
I can’t think of a reason I ever would, it’s going to charge in my garage 100% of the time, with the only exception being if my company installs charging stations. But they’re about the same price used, so maybe I’ll just go for the Bolt. I just need to do a bit more research to see if the battery issues happen when doing level 1 charging, since that’s what I intend to do in my garage.
If a product lasts, it will be subscription based
No, if a product exists, it will be subscription based. That seems to be where we’re at these days…
The idea of ownership is being destroyed
Only because things are too expensive for plebes to buy outright! Mortgages are basically subscriptions too. Or “layaway” at least.
Thanks to monthly payments for everything, you can have whatever TV you want!
Honestly, if a product last forever I wouldn’t mind it on a subscription model. The company needs to make money in order to, at the minimum, continue supporting the product.
Then comes the costs of support staff, R&D for future product developments, etc etc.
That price should not include massive yearly bonuses for the top execs.
It’s a battery. You put it in the car, and it powers it. How much support does the manufacturer need to provide that can’t be baked into the initial cost?
gestures around Products as a service in general isn’t needed, but it’s done anyways. Single player games don’t need to be always-online and subscription-based. Same with movies. Same with cars. But in the world we live in, everything is becoming X-as-a-service. In this case, it wouldn’t surprise me a bit if they purposely built in a chip that would disable or otherwise limit the battery unless the
purchaserclient continued paying the subscription fee.
I’ve been saying electric cars are never going to catch in until they can keep up with gas on affordability and how far you can go. This is how you compete with gas!
Now we’re cookin’ with gas! er…without gas.
All we need are swap stations and cars that can be battery swapped.
Charge speed is also extremely important. People keep waxing on about it only takes 15min to charge, but that’s is 3-4x as long as pumping gas.
Imagine if we all switched to electrical with those charge times, gas stations would become clogged almost immediately.
95% of charging would be done at home, since I get tons of energy from the sun. I have a feeling many other people would be doing the same. Highway stations are a different story though.
Non EV owners can’t grok how convenient home charging is, and the reality that station charging is a general rarity.
We literally can’t all switch to electric right now so that’s not a problem 😉 but yeah, if I do try to imagine it, I imagine a world where most people charge their cars at home or at work, so the only problem to solve is upping the charging capacity along certain long distance tourist routes. But we can build lots of lovely high speed rail to help decongest those routes 😋
Most people on long-term road trips time their stops with meals anyway. If this became a reality, and charging infrastructure got directly built in to parking spaces at rest stops, then they can probably tolerate a 15 minute wait ti charge while they eat lunch.
That’s such a capitalist way of thinking. “The daycare down the street is never going to compete with ABC Baby Slaughter as long as their rates are higher!”
The weight matters too. EVs are notoriously heavy. You have to haul around the batteries whether they are full or not.
“However, due to their high production costs, these batteries’ initial application will be limited to the “super premium” EV segment.”
The weight matters too. EVs are notoriously heavy.
This is a regular argument against EVs but its a weak argument in the real world application in the USA at least.
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The most popular EV by sales in the USA is the Tesla Model Y with a curb weight of about 4200 lbs.
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The most popular vehicle in the USA is (and has been for quite awhile) the Ford F150 Pickup which a curb weight of 4400lbs.
Yes, many of those F150 trucks are used in commercial or heavy duty applications legitimately, However, many are not. The F150 outsold the Tesla model Y by more than 50%. Why is the argument of curb weight only leveled against EVs, the recent addition to the roads, and not giant pickup trucks and SUVs that regularly weigh much more?
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Personally I like small, lightweight cars because they’re fun to drive and somewhat efficient. Obviously the f150 doesn’t light my fire in that regard, but the model Y isn’t exactly a nimble little thing either. Between weight and annoying tech (screens and driver assist mostly), I’m honestly not interested in modern cars at all
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“initial” could very well be the key word here. Same goes with any new technology, including the relatively outdated Chevy Bolt design (which was pretty expensive at launch and is now a dime a dozen)
Solid state batteries are more energy dense, meaning that if all you want is 300 miles of range on a charge (perfectly fine with it’s faster charging), then you can have less battery for the same range. Now how much lighter I’m not sure, but it’s in the right direction!
Amazing, now we just need charger infra to be more ubiquitous
That’s the main thing holding EVs back in general, in my opinion. That, and the price of EVs. Batteries will get better with time, chargers will get faster. But if there aren’t enough fast chargers all over the place like petrol stations, then the adoption of EVs will be too slow for prices to drop significantly until ICE vehicles aren’t supposed to be produced anymore.
Also, I hope the electronics industry really gets their shit together in terms of recycling and sustainability.
965 km … so aprox 1000km.
So about 1 megameter.
Wow, 1 megameter for a vehicle weighing 2 megagrams. That’s some serious efficiency
There’s a good chance you are mistaken. It was not specified which type of mile they are referencing.
The only sensible mile to use would be the Scandinavian mile (10.000m). = 6000km range.
Another possibility is the nautical mile (1852m). = 1.111,2km range.
And there are plenty of other “miles” to choose from.
Mm!
Can’t we get Nokia to make an EV battery instead?
If this works as advertised then it’ll revolutionize more than just cars. This is huge
So long as its not 2,3,4 times the price of current cars. Otherwise put them in busses and trains. Cost is strangly missing, I’m guessing because it is prohibitive.
Exactly. I’m interested if this is in the $30-40k range. It’s probably not.
Now we’re getting there!
I get the cost, but it should be an option to upgrade any current EV to this new style battery.
There’s some EVs that are integrating the battery into the frame in order to save weight. And it does save weight, but there’s no way to replace the battery.
That’s a super awful idea, so battery EOL = car EOL.
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