Tesla battery researcher unveils new cell that could last 1 million miles? - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / general

author: optoisolated
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: September 09, 2019, 01:13:13 am
content: Saw this article this morning; haven't had a chance to read the actual research paper yet, so unsure if it's legit or not, but definitely noteworthy.Tesla’s battery research partner has released a new paper on a battery cell that could last over 1 million miles, which they say is going to be particularly useful in ‘robot taxis’ – something that Tesla wants to bring to market.The new battery tested is a Li-Ion battery cell with a next-generation “single crystal” NMC cathode and a new advanced electrolyte. Dahn’s team have been extensively testing these cells and based on the results, they think that the battery could power an electric car “for over 1.6 million kilometers (1 million miles).”“We present a wide range of testing results on an excellent moderate-energy-density lithium-ion pouch cell chemistry to serve as benchmarks for academics and companies developing advanced lithium-ion and other “beyond lithium-ion” cell chemistries to (hopefully) exceed. These results are far superior to those that have been used by researchers modelling cell failure mechanisms and as such, these results are more representative of modern Li-ion cells and should be adopted by modellers. Up to three years of testing has been completed for some of the tests. Tests include long-term charge-discharge cycling at 20, 40 and 55°C, long-term storage at 20, 40 and 55°C, and high precision coulometry at 40°C. Several different electrolytes are considered in this LiNi0.5Mn0.3Co0.2O2/graphite chemistry, including those that can promote fast charging. The reasons for cell performance degradation and impedance growth are examined using several methods. We conclude that cells of this type should be able to power an electric vehicle for over 1.6 million kilometers (1 million miles) and last at least two decades in grid energy storage.”https://electrek.co/2019/09/07/tesla-battery-cell-last-1-million-miles-robot-taxis/

author: windsmurf
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: September 09, 2019, 04:19:29 am
content: Lots of cool new battery tech in development...https://www.pocket-lint.com/gadgets/news/130380-future-batteries-coming-soon-charge-in-seconds-last-months-and-power-over-the-air

author: Psi
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: September 09, 2019, 04:26:20 am
content: I will reserve my enthusiasm until i can order the cells.

author: sleemanj
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: September 09, 2019, 05:18:02 am
content: It looks to be a serious improvement in longevity and should be noted that this is with 100% Depth of Discharge (whichthe papersays is 3v lower, 4.3v upper)A "million miles" pretty much means the pack would never have to be replaced, the car will be scrap value long before then unless it's being used in a commercial setting.

author: james_s
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: September 09, 2019, 05:32:41 am
content: Quote from: Psi on September 09, 2019, 04:26:20 amCame here to say that. There have been many, many claims of revolutionary batteries over the years, many of which went nowhere. I'm only interested when I can buy some to use.

author: filssavi
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: September 09, 2019, 05:57:23 am
content: This is clearly a research result, thus it is probably an hand picked cell, among a batch, manufactured with the best materials and techniques...When going from the lab to the factory floor unfortunately the blueprints pass through thecost cutting.. ehm manufacturing engineering department, where the performances are thrown away for dimes on the dollar

author: windsmurf
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: September 09, 2019, 06:19:15 am
content: Quote from: filssavi on September 09, 2019, 05:57:23 amIts only a research paper... there are not results yet.

author: Rerouter
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: September 09, 2019, 06:51:04 am
content: It seems like a much smaller breakthrough when you start putting the numbers together,Quoteso that means they are only promising ~6000 discharge cycles, which while the 100-0% cycles is an improvement, is not far from similar research papers on batteries if you limit yourself to something like 100-25% discharge.It also makes sense then why they would be targeting taxi's, they would want vehicles that are essentially always in use, so the cycle count is the dominant factor, not the number of years.

author: Stray Electron
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: September 09, 2019, 09:42:20 pm
content: "Tesla battery researcher unveils new cell thatcouldlast 1 million miles"Yawn! Wake me when someone has one thatwilllast 1 million miles.

author: Nusa
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: September 09, 2019, 09:52:20 pm
content: I could care less how many miles it lasts, especially when that number is much higher than I'd ever need. I'm more interested in actual specs.

author: Bud
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: September 09, 2019, 09:57:43 pm
content: Can they give me a million miles cell phone battery?

author: filssavi
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: September 09, 2019, 10:25:27 pm
content: Quote from: windsmurf on September 09, 2019, 06:19:15 amIt’s a research paper, so they have experimental results, however trying to extrapolate real world performance form the figures obtained in a lab is methodologically wrong and disingenuous at best...The job of researchers is not to design new products, but to explore ideas and concepts that are still too far away but could be one day down the road implemented in real products

author: nctnico
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: September 09, 2019, 11:03:33 pm
content: Sounds great but the world would be better served with a battery which is 20 times cheapers and costs 20 times less energy to produce. Who said a vehicle battery can't be a consumable?

author: james_s
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: September 10, 2019, 12:13:18 am
content: I'll gladly pay 3x as much for a battery that lasts 2.5 times as long. Replacing consumables is far from free from a labor perspective and we have enough disposable trash already. Lifespan is very, very important as a lot of gear gets disposed of due to failure of the battery pack even if buying a new pack is arguably economical.I mean I've had cars given to me that were bound for the scrapper due to faults as simple as a fuel pump relay.

author: tom66
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: September 10, 2019, 06:25:51 am
content: Quote from: nctnico on September 09, 2019, 11:03:33 pmBecause there are certain physical constraints with current battery packs - such as requiring a rigid protective case - that do not ally themselves to being disposable/consumer-serviceable components at 1/20th the weight of a current battery pack.Also, there is then the environmental cost of disposing of that battery pack - even if it costs less energy to make, it still needs to be recycled or safely landfilled.

author: FreddieChopin
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: September 10, 2019, 05:42:23 pm
content: Problem with ICE cars is that current engines are so badly overengineered and hard to repair and that's why it's not worth buying anything new. My 1994 Honker with Andoria 4C90 diesel engine is so simple to service that even 16y old kid can do it. Anyway, what's the point of having electric car that accelerates from 0-60mph in few seconds when most of the time it's driving from red light to red light. If winters weren't as harsh I could get by with just a bicycle. And I can assure you, with regular welding repairs to bodywork my Honker will still be driving in 20-30 years. Your tesla will become a razor or Juicero or metal weights for a gaming mousse.

author: nctnico
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: September 10, 2019, 05:49:55 pm
content: Quote from: tom66 on September 10, 2019, 06:25:51 amThis thread is about dreaming of new batteries. Not the current ones. But for argument's sake let's assume the housing + electronics can be re-used and it is just the cells that need replacing.QuoteOfcourse the 20 times less energy includes getting recycled.If you think about it in terms of TCO it makes a lot of sense. A low endurance battery pack which costs 20 times less makes an EV's price similar to a regular car and at 20 times less energy on par where it comes to CO2 emissions from production. Say a low endurance pack lasts 50k km on average. This means you break even at a million kilometers compared of the price of a high-end battery pack. If you only drive the car for 100k km you'd need to spend somewhere between $1000 to $2000 on a new battery pack half way. The price of the EV can also become lower because the manufacturer doesn't have to reserve so much money for warranty on batteries (warranty isn't something you get for free; it is an insurance you pay for).The bottom line is: making something better doesn't always mean it is an actual improvement in terms of TCO. You see the same with a lot of other stuff. You can buy a washing machine which lasts 20 years or one which last 5 years at 1/5th of the price. In the latter case you do end up with a washing machine which has the latest technology on energy savings every time you buy a new one.

author: Nauris
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: September 11, 2019, 03:16:20 pm
content: Quote from: nctnico on September 10, 2019, 05:49:55 pmYou can always dream and play with numbers, but thats a rather pointless excercise if there is no connection to reality.The battery manufacturing capacity is being constructed now at a fast pace and it is based on current lithium-ion technology. At this point any improvements needs to be such that they can be easily integrated into existing and planned manufacturing infrastructure.Northvolt CEO said some time ago that battery market is going to be capacity limited for the next decade - thats why their aim is for longer life cells, to get max out of the limited manufacturing capacity.

author: nctnico
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: September 11, 2019, 04:07:39 pm
content: That could be the case for now but a decade will probably have passed before we see this new long-life battery on the market. At that point the market may be entirely different. Nobody knows (which also may be the cause of the limited production capacity; it hints towards a low risk profile towards investments in battery manufacturing).

author: Nusa
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: September 11, 2019, 04:36:11 pm
content: Pretty safe bet, since a decade is a pretty normal delay between "hey, we have prototypes that work" and "you can buy them now", assuming they don't find a gotcha during the commercialization process.

author: Rick Law
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: September 11, 2019, 06:13:20 pm
content: Quote from: windsmurf on September 09, 2019, 06:19:15 amButfilssaviis keying on the important point - actual manufacturing and the cost cutting. Manufacturers are by nature less enthuse about something that lasts. The shorter something lasts, the more frequent the purchase.Take Kitchen appliance. The manufacturer(s) have no reservation about saying "we change the XYZ so cusomters can 'date' the kitchen" - I heard a marketing exec said that on a live TV interview. So folks throw away perfectly functioning white color dish washers and refrigerators to "upgrade" to beige color ones, then stainless steel ones, recently they dispose of the stainless steel ones for "apple white" ones...Even in the software industry, I recall the discussions in magazines (then less internet) windows 3x turning into Windows 95, then Windows 97, Windows 98, so on, as purely Microsoft's effort to create repeat customers. All to create an impression that you need to buy another newer one.My opinion is, it is probably far more useful for both consumers and manufacturers to improve efficiency/endurance and deploy-ability verses improving longevity. Batteries that weights less and costs less but goes 400 miles on a charge and can recharge in 400 seconds would be far more successful as a product than a battery that can lasts 400,000 miles.

author: janoc
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: September 11, 2019, 06:25:46 pm
content: Quote from: filssavi on September 09, 2019, 10:25:27 pmYou mean like all marketing press-releases?

author: janoc
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: September 11, 2019, 06:36:35 pm
content: Quote from: FreddieChopin on September 10, 2019, 05:42:23 pmTry to move to a country that actually enforces emission rules and doesn't let you register whatever imported wreck that wouldn't be possible to legally sell anywhere in the Western Europe anymore. You will find that your 1994 Honker is not allowed anywhere near a major city, that you are paying through the nose on various emission-related taxes and insurance maluses (if you even pass emission test at the mandatory tech inspection in the first place - e.g. your 1994 diesel certainly doesn't have a particle filter and likely smokes like a chimney) and the fuel costs are going to bite off ever larger piece of your income due to the various carbon taxes and rising prices of oil.E.g. I am driving a 2009 Seat Leon, also diesel, satisfies EURO 4 standard - and I am not allowed into Paris with it anymore whenever there are polution-related restrictions in force. In a year or two I am not going to be able to drive in most major French cities that have the low polution zones in place. A 10 years old car, in perfect shape!At some point the electric car or at least something newer that isn't hitting against all these restrictions starts to look interesting. Tesla is still mostly an enthusiast car but there are other cars than Teslas, both electric and gas powered.

author: nctnico
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: September 12, 2019, 08:45:29 am
content: Quote from: janoc on September 11, 2019, 06:36:35 pmOff topic: But why did you buy a diesel? The signs that diesel is going to be phased out/banned in large parts of Europe have been on the wall for a long time. It started with the German environmental zones.

author: tszaboo
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: September 12, 2019, 10:59:31 am
content: Quote from: nctnico on September 12, 2019, 08:45:29 amSince diesel abominations like these are sold here:It should be illegal. The amount of engineering to make these cars less polluting is nil. They are more harmful to the environment, than dozens of hybrids. Like police should stop people driving these "cars", ask them to step out, and crush it into pieces on site.

author: janoc
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: September 12, 2019, 03:16:33 pm
content: Quote from: nctnico on September 12, 2019, 08:45:29 amGerman environmental zones are not banning diesels (or at least were not until about 2 years ago after the various activists started to sue cities en masse). In fact, most of those zones are a lot more lenient than the French ones.The "writing on the wall in large parts of Europe" has certainly not been the case before the Dieselgate.In fact, diesels were massively subsidized by lower taxes on fuel compared to gasoline because they were/are consuming less fuel and thus emitting less CO2. Soot pollution that has plagued old diesels has been a non-issue ever since the particle filters became mandatory years ago. For a very long time the consensus was that modern diesels were greener than gasoline cars. The consequence is that e.g. here in France over 60% of cars are diesels, with only slightly smaller numbers in Germany and elsewhere.Then 2015 rolled in and the Dieselgate erupted. And now suddenly everyone and their grandma wants to ban all diesels outright, regardless of real emissions and to penalize diesel car drivers - as if it was their fault.In fact, the straw that broke the camel's back and started the Yellow vests unrest in France has been a law on the introduction of a carbon tax and bringing the taxes on diesel fuel to the same level with gasoline - both of this would have caused a significant fuel price hike.I have bought my Leon second-hand in 2013, when diesels were still the thing to drive. Hindsight is a wonderful thing, isn't it?

author: nctnico
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: September 12, 2019, 04:19:53 pm
content: Quote from: janoc on September 12, 2019, 03:16:33 pmNot banning but unless you got a diesel which was nearly brand new you'd end up with a red sticker for the German low emission zones. All this started in Germany in 2008/2009 and it spread to other cities quickly (including a lot of interest from cities abroad). You can't really claim the hindsight defense if you bought a diesel car in 2013. Low taxes or not; governments always lag behind and a car is something you buy to use long term. BTW I bought my current car in 2014 and I switched from diesel to gas/petrol; the enviromental zones where a major drive behind this decission.And dieselgate was more like an acknowledgement of what everybody with some interest in how a diesel engine works already knew. You can't really get the emissions low for the lifetime of a diesel car without making it horribly expensive. I looked at various diesel cars too but they all had the same problems: the emission control systems cause problems and need expensive repairs. On my previous (diesel) car I simply removed all of it and got a 5% better mileage in return.

author: janoc
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: September 12, 2019, 05:51:33 pm
content: Quote from: nctnico on September 12, 2019, 04:19:53 pmSorry that's just wrong. In 2008-9 is when my car was made, it has EURO 4 compliant engine. Are you trying to say that brand new cars were getting penalized in Germany at that time already? Surely not. In 2013 when I have bought it the zones only started to appear in larger numbers and EURO 4 compliant cars had agreensticker! In fact, they still do.See here, for example (Moenchengladbach), archived text from 2013:https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:ARoIkEW7I9kJ:https://www.umwelt-plakette.de/de/info-zur-deutschen-umwelt-plakette/umweltzonen-in-deutschland/deutsche-umweltzonen/moenchengladbach.html+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=frQuote("The traffic restrictions linked to the low emission zone are valid since the establishment of the low emission zone and permit entry only for the vehicles with the green sticker (EURO 4) from now on.")BTW, the rule there is still the same, check for yourself:https://www.umwelt-plakette.de/de/info-zur-deutschen-umwelt-plakette/umweltzonen-in-deutschland/deutsche-umweltzonen/moenchengladbach.htmlThe green sticker is from EURO 4 and up still. Only the older cars (EURO 1-3) have the yellow and red ones. The current diesel bans in some cities (e.g. Stuttgart) are on top of all this.And anyhow, I am in France, the German rules are not really so much relevant for me. Here we didn't have the zones until recently, the Paris one was the first, then Lille and few other cities followed suit.Quote from: nctnico on September 12, 2019, 04:19:53 pmGood way how to fail the compulsory technical inspection and possibly get a large fine on top as well. That's not something I would brag about in a public forum.

author: nctnico
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: September 12, 2019, 08:03:23 pm
content: Quote from: janoc on September 12, 2019, 05:51:33 pmI wrote 'near new cars'. You are not getting the point though. It is not about the rules that are applied right now but foreseeing the rules that are going to be applied in the future. You are complaining about the fact that your car is not allowed in some cities. All I'm saying is that you could have foreseen that. Not by looking at rules which apply to your car at the time of purchase but looking at where governments are going and how much support there is from the public. It is pure risk assessment.For my next car I'll take a long hard look at a hybrid. Diesels will get banned for sure in many cities and there may be a chance non-hybrid gas/petrol cars face similar restrictions in 10 to 15 years in some cities.Quote from: janoc on September 12, 2019, 05:51:33 pmNope. Perfectly legal. I actually got compliments about the low amount of sooth that came out of the tailpipe at the annual inspection.

author: janoc
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: September 13, 2019, 04:19:28 pm
content: Quote from: nctnico on September 12, 2019, 08:03:23 pmNo, you aren't getting what I am saying. My car has been made in 2009, when you were claiming "that all this started in Germany in 2008/9". That means it wasn't "near new", it was new! And it has been also sporting a then brand new EURO 4 classification.And even 4 years later in 2013when I have bought it, there wereno restrictionson these diesels, only on old ones (EURO 1,2,3 - but that was applying to both gasoline and diesel engines) and no such diesel-specific restrictions were being planned. I am not sure what is so difficult to comprehend on that. I am not that stupid to buy a car where I know that I won't be allowed to drive it few years later anymore.Quote from: nctnico on September 12, 2019, 08:03:23 pmThe governments were busy subsidizing diesel and VW (and others) were still busy pushing diesels as a more ecological alternatives to gasoline in 2013. Sorry, you are just wrong here. The big political push to ban diesels from cities came only after 2015 and the VW emission scandal. Then everyone suddenly woke up with the feeling that something has to be done and the pendulum swiftly moved to the other extreme.Quote from: nctnico on September 12, 2019, 08:03:23 pmPerfectly legal as long as your country doesn't measure anything else except soot emissions on diesels (which used to be the case until 2015 too). Not the case anymore in many places and unauthorized tinkering with emissions-related equipment (EGR valve, catalysator, DPF filter, etc.), is a reason for instantly failing the check when discovered.

author: nctnico
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: September 13, 2019, 05:26:12 pm
content: Quote from: janoc on September 13, 2019, 04:19:28 pmI beg to differ on the latterI'm sorry but you didn't do your homework before buying your car. I bought my current car early 2014 (so not long after you bought yours) and (again) a big part of the decission to buy a gas/petrol one instead of a diesel one was the spreading of the low emission zones. Ofcourse the zones wheren't planned back then to ban euro 4 -yet- but it shouldn't take much imagination that euro 4 &5 (euro 6 was already announced) where soon too be banned as well. After all the low emissions zones are constantly adjusted to ban the oldest cars (which is more or less their design & purpose). Maybe dieselgate woke you up but banning diesels was already brewing for a while before dieselgate happened. But this is getting wildly off-topic.