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It could still take a couple of years to bring this breakthrough to market, but it sounds like Lithium Ion battery capacity is about to go go way up, while battery costs go way down. Steven Chu, former U.S. Secretary of Energy and Nobel Laureate and professor at Stanford predicts this development will make possible a $25,000 EV with a 300 mile range.*
Quote:
Stanford team achieves 'holy grail' of battery design: A stable lithium anode
Today, we say we have lithium batteries, but that is only partly true. What we have are lithium ion batteries. The lithium is in the electrolyte, but not in the anode. An anode of pure lithium would be a huge boost to battery efficiency.
"Of all the materials that one might use in an anode, lithium has the greatest potential. Some call it the Holy Grail," said Yi Cui, a professor of Material Science and Engineering and leader of the research team. "It is very lightweight and it has the highest energy density. You get more power per volume and weight, leading to lighter, smaller batteries with more power."
But engineers have long tried and failed to reach this Holy Grail.
"Lithium has major challenges that have made its use in anodes difficult. Many engineers had given up the search, but we found a way to protect the lithium from the problems that have plagued it for so long," said Guangyuan Zheng, a doctoral candidate in Cui's lab and first author of the paper.
If you want to try this in your home lab, what they seem to have discovered is a way to protect a lithium anode by wrapping it in a graphene nano film.
XYZ <company/university> has uncovered startling research that will revolutionize <take_your_pick>...
The Science and Technology forum has numerous examples of this pie-in-the-sky reporting, and their the consensus is "when it becomes commercially successful let us know."
XYZ <company/university> has uncovered startling research that will revolutionize <take_your_pick>...
The Science and Technology forum has numerous examples of this pie-in-the-sky reporting, and their the consensus is "when it becomes commercially successful let us know."
Yeah, pie in the sky stuff like Bell Labs invents transistor, Ohio brothers achieve powered flight, Computing Tabulating and Recording Company develops thinking machine.
Some of the advances made in energy and transportation technology have predictably long development cycles, like the recent DoD announcement of a method to turn seawater into liquid fuel for their ships and planes... with an expected development time of perhaps 10 years. These are of interest here if they offer a view into a possible cleaner environment in the future due to a fundamental change in technology.
Others are more immediate, developments that can be brought to market fairly quickly because they don't require wholesale reinvention of industrial processes or major replacement of infrastructure. This story appears to be one of those, because it's a tweak to known battery technology, not an entirely new technology. It has some projecting the technology could be on the market within two years. If so, that could cause a major shift in the EV market to go with it, so the cause for interest is obvious.
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