Solid-State Batteries

[Marina Schwarz + 1,576]

Not quite there yet. Good overview from Bloomberg amid so much EV hype.

[DA? + 301]

So as the report says will take awhile but no miracles required for this technology. Lithium still has some room for improvement and then other chemistries may come in fluoride based for instance.

I don't see whats going on as "EV hype", with present technology EV's are good enough for most people. With manufactures producing in bulk (demand is there) prices would come down considerably.

Yes it would be great if we had solid state batteries today but they aren't necessary for EV's to become dominant.  

[Marina Schwarz + 1,576]

On 1/8/2019 at 12:04 PM, DA? said:

So as the report says will take awhile but no miracles required for this technology. Lithium still has some room for improvement and then other chemistries may come in fluoride based for instance.

I don't see whats going on as "EV hype", with present technology EV's are good enough for most people. With manufactures producing in bulk (demand is there) prices would come down considerably.

Yes it would be great if we had solid state batteries today but they aren't necessary for EV's to become dominant.  

If that were the case EVs would be more than ICE cars and they are not, even in -- gasp -- Norway.

[JunoTen + 118]

1 hour ago, Marina Schwarz said:

If that were the case EVs would be more than ICE cars and they are not, even in -- gasp -- Norway.

https://electrek.co/2018/10/01/electric-vehicle-sales-new-record-norway-tesla/

With the subsidies, all-electric vehicles will reach more than 50% market share this year in Norway. So at a subsidized price they are good enough for most people.

At current growth rates, the rest of the world will catch up very soon, subsidies or not!

[Marina Schwarz + 1,576]

No, it won't. Norway is a small country with a very small and wealthy population. And "more than 50%" is still not "most people", let's be real.

[DA? + 301]

3 minutes ago, Marina Schwarz said:

No, it won't. Norway is a small country with a very small and wealthy population. And "more than 50%" is still not "most people", let's be real.

There would be over 50% EV's sold in Norway if supply kept up with demand.

[Marina Schwarz + 1,576]

Still not equal to "most people". Are there any problems with supply? Interesting. Tesla reported all-time highs in deliveries for the last quarter of 2018.

[DA? + 301]

5 hours ago, Marina Schwarz said:

Still not equal to "most people". Are there any problems with supply? Interesting. Tesla reported all-time highs in deliveries for the last quarter of 2018.

I was actually referring to the EV technology being able to produce cars that fulfil most people needs. The cost is really the issue along with people not really having a clue about them (not surprising with all the FUD out there). The issues with supplying EV's in general is the companies aren't making enough to fill demand. Yes Tesla is producing as fast as they can but everyone one is sold as soon as it can be shipped to the client. Traditional automotive companies have dragged their feet as much as possible and now some are only just becoming to get serious about them. Will be interesting to see what happens with VW.

[Auson + 123]

8 hours ago, JunoTen said:

https://electrek.co/2018/10/01/electric-vehicle-sales-new-record-norway-tesla/

With the subsidies, all-electric vehicles will reach more than 50% market share this year in Norway. So at a subsidized price they are good enough for most people.

At current growth rates, the rest of the world will catch up very soon, subsidies or not!

JunoTen,

Is that 50% of sales or 50% of all vehicles ? Whats the percentage of EVs to ICE in Norway ?

[DA? + 301]

1 hour ago, Auson said:

JunoTen,

Is that 50% of sales or 50% of all vehicles ? Whats the percentage of EVs to ICE in Norway ?

That would be sales, it takes some time to replace all the old cars.

[Red + 252]

8 hours ago, Marina Schwarz said:

Still not equal to "most people". Are there any problems with supply? Interesting. Tesla reported all-time highs in deliveries for the last quarter of 2018.

I will have to learn this new math, as on that basis it's possible that MOST people in the USA think the president is doing a good job - good news eh🤣.

[Rodent + 1,424]

9 hours ago, Marina Schwarz said:

Still not equal to "most people".

right you are, and saying that it's not equal to "most people" isn't just splitting hairs--it's a meaningful distinction.

 

[Rodent + 1,424]

4 hours ago, DA? said:

I was actually referring to the EV technology being able to produce cars that fulfil most people needs.

 Are there numbers for how most people feel an EV could meet their needs? Seems like EVs would fall into a similar category as renewables in general.

just not there yet

[Red + 252]

5 minutes ago, Rodent said:

right you are, and saying that it's not equal to "most people" isn't just splitting hairs--it's a meaningful distinction.

 

?

10 hours ago, Marina Schwarz said:

And "more than 50%" is still not "most people", let's be real.

Again, what math makes that meaningful?

[Rodent + 1,424]

Just now, Red said:

?

Again, what math makes that meaningful?

oh, I think unless I misunderstood the distinction is that more than 50% in Norway doesn't equal most people (in the world). 

[Red + 252]

11 hours ago, JunoTen said:

all-electric vehicles will reach more than 50% market share this year in Norway

That was the context - what am I missing?

[Rodent + 1,424]

32 minutes ago, Red said:

That was the context - what am I missing?

hmm.. perhaps it is I not you who is missing something.

[Red + 252]

On 1/8/2019 at 8:04 PM, DA? said:

Yes it would be great if we had solid state batteries today but they aren't necessary for EV's to become dominant.  

Way back when there was Beta and VHS, VHS won out on scale despite being slightly inferior.  Worse for me was that I went out and bought a Video 8 cassette player which was compatible with the Handycam I had also purchased.  This was my first big lesson learnt in the follies of being an early adopter.

Anyhow, even if we assumed solid state batteries could be more efficient (and possible marginally safer), they will struggle on the cost curve by being so far behind in the scaling race.

[Marina Schwarz + 1,576]

6 hours ago, Red said:

That was the context - what am I missing?

This was part of the context. The other part was your claim that current EV tech fulfills the needs of "most people". And here is the logic why 50% is not equal to "most people". 50% means half. Half is not a synonym for most/majority. With this I exit the rabbit hole of meaningless discussions and stay with the prospects of solid batteries, which was the topic of this thread. 

[Red + 252]

18 hours ago, Marina Schwarz said:

And "more than 50%" is still not "most people", let's be real.

Your words are exactly as quoted above, so when you said "50% is not equal to "most people" you are making up a new narrative to hide your earlier error.

Moreover, your claim that I suggested "that current EV tech fulfills the needs of "most people" is also an error on your part.  

So, when it comes to meaningless discussion it might pay to get your facts right as otherwise your contributions appear front and centre.  

[Marina Schwarz + 1,576]

Whatever makes you happy. Anything to say about solid-state batteries?

[Tom Kirkman + 8,860]

Sounds like solid state batteries are mostly not there yet, not even close to half way:

"It’s a brutal battlefield actually making these batteries work, and nobody is anywhere close,” said Sam Jaffe, managing director at Boulder, Colorado-based Cairn Energy Research Advisors, an industry consultant.

[Jan van Eck + 7,558]

What you are getting into with these ideas of solid-state batteries is  what I term  "the rust principle" of business.  The community (in this case, of EV builders) will continue to use batteries, in whatever form, simply because that is what the rest of the players are using.  And because the other players use them, it becomes a self-fulfilling dynamic, where the continuing use justifies further use, and development cash is pushed into that one specific technology.

But when you think about it, that is all rather silly.  Those batteries are bulky, they are heavy, their carriage requires sturdy suspensions, and they tend to cost a lot of money.  All kinds of other solutions are out there.  And there are likely solutions that we have not even thought of.  For example: 

Suppose that roads are built with specific lanes, enforced by having two strips of concrete and the auto or bus has to stay within those strips or else be running on grass.  To understand this, I invite you to contemplate this German-built dedicated roadway  (only buses currently allowed):

 

Once you have created this type of roadway, which is easy enough to do  (and costs a lot less than a conventional paved road, and also can be cast in sections in a factory under controlled conditions, then taken to the field and dropped on the ground), the traffic is effectively obliged to run within a narrow set of parallel tracks.  From there, it is easy enough to string an overhead trolley wire, and have some form of pantagraph or shoe-slider on a pole, the way it was done with the old interurban cars.  Your "battery" or for that matter your IC engine or even external-combustion engine, or your fuel-cell motor, or your nat-gas motor,  can be available in the event you need to make a short detour from the roadway, without wire.  With automatic pantagraph retract and extension, easy enough to do,  you just removed a ton of weight and cost from your "electric" auto, truck or bus.  Developing this type of technology is easy enough to do. 

Would this ever happen?  Not likely.  The technology has headed off into one direction, self-contained battery packs, mostly due to a vast investment of CAPEX in the on-board battery concept.  Had that Chinese investment not been made, it is likely that all sorts of other inventions would be out there puttering around, including both Stirling engines and steam cars.  Even, possibly, flywheel-powered buses.  They do not get developed as there is nobody doing the venture capital into those directions - all because one player  (the Chinese) decided to go the battery route. 

this is why I call it the "rust principle."  What is holding that boat together is the accumulated rust. The boat just keeps sailing along, with no real steel in that hull - it is all rust.  As long as you have that rust, you will keep on sailing. 

[ronwagn + 6,290]

On 1/8/2019 at 2:04 AM, DA? said:

So as the report says will take awhile but no miracles required for this technology. Lithium still has some room for improvement and then other chemistries may come in fluoride based for instance.

I don't see whats going on as "EV hype", with present technology EV's are good enough for most people. With manufactures producing in bulk (demand is there) prices would come down considerably.

Yes it would be great if we had solid state batteries today but they aren't necessary for EV's to become dominant.  

Definitions of hype https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/hype There is definitely a lot of hype about electric vehicles and virtually none about natural gas vehicles, which I think will win the race. 

[Red + 252]

9 hours ago, Marina Schwarz said:

Whatever makes you happy. Anything to say about solid-state batteries?

I made a salient point about solid state batteries, but you ignored it and preferred to instead indulge in a false narrative.

As Tom pointed out, nobody is anywhere close, so creating this thread didn't appear to have legs.

As Jan points, there may be other options that win out which are still on someone's drawing board.  The difficulty is going to be for any better idea to gain commercial traction.  That's in light of gigafactories being built now which will also progressively lower battery costs.  Given that energy densities are a drawback to EVs compared to hydrogen, maybe that would have been a more interesting topic.