Two years ago, sodium-ion battery pioneer Natron Energy was busy preparing its specially formulated sodium batteries for mass production. The company slipped a little past its 2023 kickoff plans, but it didn't fall too far behind as far as mass battery production goes. It officially commenced production of its rapid-charging, long-life lithium-free sodium batteries this week, bringing to market an intriguing new alternative in the energy storage game.
Not only is sodium somewhere between 500 to 1,000 times more abundant than lithium on the planet we call Earth, sourcing it doesn't necessitate the same type of earth-scarring extraction. Even moving beyond the sodium vs lithium surname comparison, Natron says its sodium-ion batteries are made entirely from abundantly available commodity materials that also include aluminum, iron and manganese.
Furthermore, the materials for Natron's sodium-ion chemistry can be procured through a reliable US-based domestic supply chain free from geopolitical disruption. The same cannot be said for common lithium-ion materials like cobalt and nickel.
The design of battery technologies with increasingly longer lifespans could help to meet the growing needs of the electronics and automotive industry. Lithium (Li) batteries are the most widely used rechargeable batteries worldwide. Thus, devising strategies that can increase their longevity could be far easier than designing entirely new batteries.
Li-metal batteries, batteries with a Li metal anode, are among the most promising next-generation battery designs. Nonetheless, the reactivity of Li metal has so far greatly limited their cycling stability, by impairing the formation of stable solid-electrolyte interphases (SEIs), ultimately resulting in shorter battery lifespans.
The global shift to electric vehicles is gaining momentum, yet the extraction of battery materials has a significant environmental footprint that comes with high costs.
Now, two studies led by McGill University researchers offer hope in the search to manufacture cheaper and greener lithium-ion batteries used in electric vehicles (EVs).
Their findings unlock the potential to produce batteries using more sustainable and less costly metals, known as disordered rock-salt-type (DRX) cathode materials.
In the first study, engineering researchers including lead author Richie Fong, a Ph.D. student in Materials Engineering, focused on cathodes. The costliest component of batteries, cathodes are traditionally made from unsustainable metals like cobalt and nickel. Iron could be the cheapest alternative, but until now, existing iron-based cathodes have lacked sufficient storage capacity to power a long-range EV.
https://www.independent.co.uk/tech/sola ... 52948.html6 minutes ago
Every six seconds, in a factory on the northern fringes of Stockholm, a top secret printer is spewing out sheets worth thousands of euros apiece. Each one contains 108 miniature solar cells that will soon find their way into everyday gadgets – from keyboards to headphones – that will fundamentally change how we interact with technology. According to their creator, they will even force us to rethink our relationship with light.
Sweden may seem an unlikely location for a solar revolution, but the lack of light during the winter months was one of the reasons for Exeger co-founder Giovanni Fili to look beyond the Sun as the sole source of power for a photovoltaic cell. His company’s breakthrough tech can harvest electricity from virtually any light source, from direct sunlight to candlelight. It can even generate a charge from moonlight, though it would take a while for it to be of much use.
“Like the algae on the bottom of the ocean where it’s almost pitch black, we can make efficient use of very few photons,” Fili tells The Independent. The t-shirt he wears describes his company’s technology as “world-changing”, capable of simultaneously addressing the global need for energy and some of our planet’s greatest environmental challenges.
Indoor solar panels have been around for decades. Solar-powered calculators were first introduced in the 1970s, but the limitations of the amorphous silicon cells they rely upon mean they are too low power, too fragile and too rigid to be integrated into other products.
The latest innovation stems from a discovery made in 1988 relating to dye-sensitised solar cells (DSSC). A pair of scientists from UC Berkeley in California invented a low-cost, high-efficiency cell that was both semi-flexible and semi-transparent, which offered a pathway for commercial development of the technology.
Battery technologies that can reliably operate at very low temperatures could be highly valuable for a wide range of applications. These batteries could, for instance, power devices, vehicles, and robotic systems in outer space, deep under the sea, and in other extreme environments.
To safely and effectively operate in these environments, batteries should have components that do not freeze or adversely react to significant drops in temperature. One proposed solution is the design of rechargeable aqueous batteries containing so-called anti-freezing electrolytes.
Researchers at the Chinese Academy of Sciences and other institutes in China recently devised a new strategy to design anti-freezing electrolytes for aqueous batteries. This strategy, outlined in a paper published in Nature Energy, focuses on two specific temperature-related factors, which have so far not been the primary focus of anti-freezing electrolyte design.
https://newatlas.com/materials/sinonus- ... r-battery/
Building on the trailblazing carbon-fiber-as-a-battery work started at Sweden's Chalmers University of Technology, deep-tech startup Sinonus is working to commercialize a groundbreaking new breed of multifunctional carbon fiber. In its vision, the wonder-composite will save weight not merely because of its famously low base weight but because it will double as a set of energy-managing electrodes, becoming a structural battery that cuts reliance on the traditional standalone battery pack. The company believes this style of energy storage could help revolutionize everything from electric aircraft to windmills.
Imagine an electric car that isn't weighed down by a huge, kilowatt-hour-stuffed battery. It wouldn't need as much power to drive it forward and could rely on a smaller motor, saving yet more weight. Or imagine an eVTOL that could take off without lifting a lithium-ion anchor that requires it to be back on the ground within an hour for charging. Or a windmill with blades that work as their own batteries, storing energy during low demand periods for distribution at peak hours.
High-capacity lithium-ion batteries (LIBs) could play a crucial role in the electrification of vehicles and other large electronics. To successfully deploy these batteries on a large scale, however, engineers will first need to ensure that they can safely operate at different temperatures and do not explore when overheated.
One common solution to improve the safety of LIBs is using thermal-conducting interlayers, materials designed to even out the temperature between a battery's modules, bringing it to between 15 to 45 °C. To ensure that a high-capacity LIB is safe, these materials should be highly thermally insulating, thus preventing the propagation of heat, while also ensuring that temperature is uniformly distributed in the battery.
Researchers at Tsinghua University and Zhejiang University recently designed a new thermal-switching material that meets both criteria and can effectively regulate the temperature in high-capacity batteries. This material, introduced in Nature Energy paper, rapidly responds to temperature, enabling the safe cycling of batteries in varying operating conditions.
Read more here: https://www.futurity.org/lithium-batte ... -3231442/(University of Pittsburgh via Futurity) Making batteries takes a lot of lithium, and new research indicates some of it could come from wastewater.
Most batteries used in technology like smart watches and electric cars are made with lithium that travels across the world before even getting to manufacturers.
But what if nearly half of the lithium used in the US could come from Pennsylvania wastewater?
A new analysis using compliance data from the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection suggests that if it could be extracted with complete efficiency, lithium from the wastewater of Marcellus shale gas wells could supply up to 40% of the country’s demand.
Already, researchers in the lab can extract lithium from water with more than 90% efficiency according to Justin Mackey, a researcher at the National Energy Technology Laboratory and PhD student in the lab of Daniel Bain, associate professor of geology and environmental sciences at the University of Pittsburgh.
Finally, Tesla Energy has arrived. Tesla installed 9.4 GWh of energy this is over double the 4.0 GWH last quarter.
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This should be about $3.8 billion in quarterly energy revenue alone and nearly $1.0 billion in gross profits. Tesla is officially more than a car company with Tesla energy a major thing.
Tesla car deliveries were good relative to expectations at 444k. Most were expecting 410-430k.
