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[–] 42 points 2 months ago* (15 children)

For comparison, li-ion 18650-size 3500mAh cells are 260Wh/kg, that is almost +50% capacity per gram but only +15% capacity per volume

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  • [–] 11 points 2 months ago (7 children)
  • [–] 9 points 2 months ago

    Or car batteries. EVs are still heavier than ICE vehicles and road wear goes up by what was it, the 4th power of axle weight? Even at the exact same capacity per volume, an increased capacity per weight is a huge advantage. Not to mention that the car itself needs to have beefier suspension, tires and brakes for more weight (even though yes, on the braking side, EVs get regen braking - they still need to be able to stop quickly if something happens to the drivetrain). Also no danger of battery fires.

    If this works out AND charge/discharge rates are good AND production scales fast enough, this could be huge in a few years. Of course it might also not be.

    The incredibly unbelieveable smells-like-bullshit donut battery hit an even higher Wh/kg (not by much) in the new VTT test, but there's still no guarantee that every test's been on the same type of cell. Current leading theory is that they're just taking a bunch of completely different cells to be tested and the solid state one might not be the same one that did all the other tests.

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  • [–] -1 points 2 months ago (5 children)

    Only if power density is good enough

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  • [–] 8 points 2 months ago (2 children)

    I'd have thought that the weight would be the deciding factor

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  • [–] 3 points 2 months ago (6 children)
  • [–] 6 points 2 months ago (5 children)

    I understand that these things are perhaps less flammable because no electrolyte that burns, but also there's a question about efficiency, manufacturability, overheating, charge depletion in time and across cycles etc. Maybe it's not even any good

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  • [–] 2 points 2 months ago (4 children)

    Sure. And, given how people tend to hype stuff which never works out, it probably isn't. But, sometimes it is, so... maybe?

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  • [–] 3 points 2 months ago (3 children)

    it's nice to find someone who gets it in the wild. i'll give you an example: 90% of clinical trials fail, and it creates a predicament: some news site grabs a headline from university press release, which is informed by a paper. paper says that maybe there is some effect in cell line, if you use some new compound, against some kind of cancer. sometimes it grabs more attention if it's a compound from common plant because of folk medicine connection. press release: university w made a compound y that kills cancer z. article: university w makes a drug for cancer z. clickbait youtube video: underdog researcher DESTROYS ALL CANCER. naturally, years pass, compound goes through extra testing and in most of cases, fails, many times even before it ever touches humans. sometimes it doesn't work, sometimes you need quarter of body mass of it to see effect, sometimes it wipes out liver, sometimes it does something else entirely. then clueless people looks back at these headlines, and ask, where is cure for cancer z, or sometimes even where is cure for all cancer. the stupid and embarrassing reality is that it never existed, because it was at best toy compound and maybe someone develops something out of it, but mostly it won't. some people take it as a sign of conspiracy that suppresses inconvenient TRUTH and there is a cure, but you can get it only from a BOLD RESEARCHER THAT THREADS WHERE NO ONE ELSE DARES. then we get clinics ran by scammers and a lot of dead people

    that said, there's already a lot of things, mostly moving things, that can be electrified with current technology. it would be a nice thing to have something better, but it's not like it's strictly necessary to have it

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  • [–] 2 points 2 months ago (2 children)

    You worked in Pharma too, huh?

    Well put.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 months ago (1 child)

    there are dozens of us, dozens!! (closer to third of dozen)

    wdym worked? i don't think i'll ever retire

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  • [–] 1 point 2 months ago

    I was in briefly around þe time þe last MD C-level at GSK was replaced by a marketting wonk; a bunch of people I liked started trickling off, a couple got laid off, and I headed for greener pastures. Pharma wasn't my domain anyway, so I had no real career ties. I did learn a hell of a lot about drug development, and þe research process (specifically, þe business side). I was pretty young at the time and bought into þe whole "we have to charge a lot, because it's so expensive to develop drugs" until a director a couple of levels above me said, "don't feel sorry for the company. They're making plenty of money."

    In a weird twist of fate, my wife, whose background was even less medical-related þan mine, found her way into þe medical device field, only she's stuck wiþ it. So I now know more þan I wanted to about med devices þan I ever þought I would, too.

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  • [–] 25 points 2 months ago

    ProLogium Technology has started mass production of its Gen 3.5 Lithium Ceramic Battery in Taiwan, putting an all-solid-state battery design with high energy density into Giga-level manufacturing.

    A third-party test by TÜV found that ProLogium’s 185.4 Ah large-format cell reached 381 Wh/kg of gravimetric energy density and 903 Wh/L of volumetric energy density. In simple terms, the cell can store more energy for its weight and size, an advantage for electric vehicles and other applications where battery space is limited.

    The cell also passed a separate test by UL Solutions under China’s GB/T 43568-2026 methodology for all-solid-state batteries. After six hours under vacuum at 120 degrees Celsius, the cell recorded less than 0.05% weight loss, compared with the standard’s maximum threshold of 0.5%.

    That result allows the cell to be classified as all-solid-state under the Chinese standard. GB/T 43568-2026 has also been submitted to the International Electrotechnical Commission as a reference for international standardization.

    Battery numbers meet factory scale The bigger development is not just the cell’s performance figures but the manufacturing scale behind them. ProLogium says its Gen 3.5 battery is now in mass production at its Giga-level facility in Taiwan, moving the technology beyond laboratory and pilot-line production.

    The company’s Lithium Ceramic Battery platform has been developed since 2012. ProLogium began commercial production in 2013 and says it has since shipped more than 2.4 million cells for consumer, specialty and automotive applications.

    Its manufacturing process has also evolved in stages. A Sheet-by-Sheet production line began commercial operation in 2013, followed by a Roll-to-Roll line in 2017. The company’s third-generation Giga-level manufacturing platform entered operation in 2024.

    That progression is important because solid-state batteries have faced a difficult transition from promising laboratory cells to reliable, high-volume manufacturing. ProLogium’s approach is to carry manufacturing knowledge, equipment, and process improvements from one battery generation to the next instead of starting over at each stage.

    Same architecture, new chemistry At the center of the platform is ProLogium’s Logithium cell architecture. It uses a ceramic separator and an edge-frame structure that extends around the electrode perimeter to help isolate potential burrs while providing sealing and insulation.

    The architecture has remained in place as ProLogium has changed electrolyte chemistry and active materials. The company says this allows new battery generations to use much of the existing manufacturing foundation.

    That strategy will be tested further with Gen 4, which uses a fully inorganic superfluidized electrolyte while retaining the same Logithium architecture and manufacturing process. ProLogium expects only about 10% of its existing Giga-level production line and related equipment to require modification for Gen 4 production.

    Gen 4 is also designed to add an Active Safety Mechanism intended to prevent thermal runaway by stabilizing electrode active materials at high temperatures. The company is targeting applications including electric vehicles, maritime systems, aerospace, unmanned systems and data centers.

    ProLogium is also building a manufacturing strategy beyond Taiwan, with France planned for scaled production and North America targeted for phased localization. The company says the model could use battery inlays produced at scale in France or Taiwan before downstream partners assemble them into cells, modules and packs closer to customers.

    For now, the Gen 3.5 production milestone puts ProLogium’s solid-state battery technology on a manufacturing line rather than leaving it at the prototype stage.

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  • [–] 13 points 2 months ago (22 children)

    Correct me if I'm wrong, but wouldn't this be great for electric commercial flights?

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  • [–] 18 points 2 months ago (21 children)

    Every percent gain in battery weight compounds insanely for commercial flight.

    It is the same problem as with rocket fuel. You have to store the energy to carry the capacity to store the energy. And that's even worse for batteries because at least the rocket gets lighter as it uses its fuel. Whereas a loaded battery is basically the same weight as a loaded one.

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  • [–] 3 points 2 months ago (8 children)

    I realise that. I'm reading that energy densities will have to be around 800wh/kg for planes to rely entirely on battery power, but there are shorter distance planes already using battery power. With how quickly solid state batteries recharge, I don't see why planes couldn't just stop more often. It's a small price to pay for zero emission flights.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 months ago (7 children)

    There are many ways in which planes can be different.

    Smaller plane going shorter distance at a slower speed can also mean that there are more lines and lines avoiding big hubs. If a plane goes slower but closer to your destination, you may not mind!

    The cost equation changes a lot if fuel is much cheaper.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 months ago (1 child)

    You're right, so much about our world revolves around how cheaply we can put...fucking...smoke into the air. It's maddening, but you're right.

    I don't know if oil will get cheaper though, do you think it will?

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  • [–] 1 point 2 months ago (4 children)

    Sigh....instead of short plane flights, just take a train.

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  • [–] 3 points 2 months ago (3 children)

    Unfortunately, train tickets are often more expensive than plane tickets. So you pay more and it takes longer.

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  • [–] 0 points 2 months ago (11 children)

    For this reason, green hydrogen is likely the best bet for air transport

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  • [–] 1 point 2 months ago (10 children)
  • [–] 1 point 2 months ago* (9 children)

    But that has the same emissions issue as the current fuel

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  • [–] 1 point 2 months ago (8 children)

    That's a whole different debate. I tend to agree that they are less ideal, that their proponents say, but they are actually renewable. They don't add durably CO2 in the atmosphere from fossil sources. It is a very different thing. The CO2 they emit is part of a cycle. Ideally, that's also a type of emission that we cut, but it is possible to include them in a sustainable society.

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  • [–] 2 points 2 months ago (1 child)

    Biofuel is a dead-end technology. Synthetic fuels from direct air capture of CO2 are about 3X as efficient in terms of energy in -> energy in fuel, while also avoiding wasting all the extra nutrients (phosphorus, potassium, nitrogen - some of which are scarce) needed for the plant to grow that give nothing in terms of energy storage and must be recaptured.

    A bunch of solar panels and some direct air -> methanol plants uses far less land than corn fields for bioethanol, while also providing easy avenues to switch energy from feeding the grid to filling the tanks depending on conditions.

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  • Synthetic fuels from direct air capture of CO2 are about 3X as efficient in terms of energy in -> energy in fuel

    I have a very hard time believing it to be true, but I am always opened to an unexpected good news. Do you have a specific tech/source in mind for that claim?

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  • [–] 1 point 2 months ago (5 children)

    CO2 is not the only emission and pollution in the high atmosphere is even more damaging than on the ground.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 months ago (4 children)

    Which pollution are you thinking of?

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  • [–] 1 point 2 months ago (3 children)

    Well incomplete combustion, which is unavoidable, produces carbon monoxide, VOCs, soot, and unburned fuel. All which would be dumped into the high atmosphere.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 months ago (2 children)

    I know these are bad for human health, but are they bad for the environment in these quantities and at this altitude?

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  • [–] 1 point 2 months ago (1 child)

    Unburned fuel is an order of magnitude worse for the atmosphere than CO2. Plus you think only humans are poisoned by these things?

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  • Unburned fuel is also an order of magnitude less in terms of volume than burned fuel. It is also something that's solvable by better combustion and optimized engines.

    Humans are 'poisoned' by these things in cities where they live close to thousands of vehicles that pass a few meters away. Inside sometimes a city where this gas accumulates.

    And they are not poisoned per se. They lose years of life expectancy and they get preventable diseases. An animal population regulated by predation probably does not notice these differences in life expectancy.

    Don't get me wrong, that's still a problem, but that's not an ecological and climatic problem and something that can be addressed after we've finished our transition out of the fossil fuel.

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  • [–] 8 points 2 months ago

    That website is cancerous even with an ad blocker.

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  • [–] 5 points 2 months ago (2 children)

    Wait that's the whole article? One sentence.

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  • [–] 5 points 2 months ago

    Ohhh this actually seems cool. While for me size matters more than weight(heh) and this battery mainly improves on the weight but its still very cool. Its already smaller and lighter and i imagine its gonna get even better because that was what happened when lithium batteries overtook.

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  • [–] 3 points 2 months ago

    Any info on the cost? What the price per kWh would be?

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  • [–] 1 point 2 months ago (1 child)

    Do lithium batteries somehow move? Or do I just not know what solid state means in this context?

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  • [–] 8 points 2 months ago

    They are talking about the electrolyte - the material between the battery anode and cathode that allows the transport of lithium ions.

    A normal lithium ion battery generally uses gels-like materials. Lithium hexafluorophosphate dissolved in organics is common, and is a viscous liquid.

    A solid state electrolyte is basically a solid ceramic membrane that allows the ions to travel through it. Many potential benefits around stability, sustainability, and durability. Challenges around electrical contact, particularly as the battery cycles because the active materials do change volume slightly as the lithium moves between the sides of the cell.

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  • 22 comments in c/energy@slrpnk.net view that post
    [–] 15 points 2 months ago (10 children)

    What are non-solid state batteries up to, in Wh/kg? Because my car with an 82 kWh battery would need about 215+ kg to reach the same charge with a solid state battery.

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  • [–] 16 points 2 months ago (7 children)
  • [–] 13 points 2 months ago (6 children)

    That's pretty great, for the solid state battery then. Looked it up and it seems like the battery weighs about 500 kg in my car. Very significant change down to only 215–216 kg.

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  • [–] 5 points 2 months ago (5 children)

    not only added range, but think of the even more fun with even better acceleration 😁

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  • [–] 3 points 2 months ago (4 children)

    Blast past these stupid ass BMWs who think they own the road.

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  • [–] 3 points 2 months ago (3 children)
  • [–] 2 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (2 children)

    Never had much problems with Teslas in my country. BMWs, Audis, and lately Volvos have been the reckless (speeding) drivers.

    I myself drive a Volvo, and I think that's why I've started noticing more and more Volvos, and being surprised by their frequent recklessness.

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  • [–] 3 points 2 months ago (1 child)

    Drivers of older BMWs and Audis have had a bad reputation for being reckless drivers in my country for at least the last 30 years. Volvo, that's a new one for me.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 months ago

    Yeah, new to me as well. But having a Volvo myself, especially my electric one, I can see why these cars blast past you and it can feel like you're not really driving that fast. The electric engines are so strong and so silent that you can't tell how fast you are accelerating or cruising. You can't hear the engine(s) working hard.

    But that's what makes them bad drivers. They don't care to follow the law. The law is there for safety, not for anyone's benefit except the drivers' and passengers'. It's easy to enable cruise control, or check the speedometer every once in a while, to stay at a safe speed.

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  • [–] 10 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (1 child)

    260 Wh/kg in a good modern battery.

    But the reality of SSBs needs to be verified, there already have been scams.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 months ago

    scams or definition issues. There was a bunch of stuff of what made it solid state percentage wise and if only one part needed to be it. Granted I do think it should not have liquid components if its going to be called solid state.

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  • [–] 3 points 2 months ago* (10 children)

    Looking forward to similar discoveries in the sodium ion batteries.

    These numbers are cool, and we may never see them that high with sodium, but we really need to get them to the level when we could use them in things like powerbanks and electric vehicles, and not just grid-scale storage.

    We must pivot away from lithium, it is not sustainable.

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  • [–] 9 points 2 months ago (9 children)

    Of course it is. It's not rare and can be recycled.

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  • [–] 3 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (8 children)

    Lithium is relatively rare, and very environmentally damaging to mine. Recycling is absolutely a must, but, as with any recycling, the recovery is not 100%. Of course, greater harm comes with large-scale applications like cars (lithium batteries are part of why electric cars are NOT eco-friendly vehicles they're often advertised to be) and home/grid power storage, but reducing the harm where possible is essential.

    Sodium is obviously hugely abundant and we already have relatively eco-friendly salt mining for many centuries.

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  • [–] 3 points 2 months ago (7 children)

    "relatively" does a lot of work here. Lithium is not going to be a scarce ressource any time soon: https://pubs.usgs.gov/periodicals/mcs2025/mcs2025-lithium.pdf

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  • [–] 3 points 2 months ago* (6 children)
  • [–] 4 points 2 months ago (1 child)

    Absolutely, I only commented on the scarcity aspect.

    The local pollutions of mining is a subject I never dived enough into and I wonder how much of it is really necessary and how much hinges on the fact that you always go to the lowest bidder who is often the one with the lowest environmental regulations.

    Minerals are very fungible. Even if it is possible to mine one in an environmentally friendly way, in a socially acceptable manner, the person undercutting you by 10% by using slavery and dumping toxic waste in the environment is going to win.

    When I started looking into that, I realized that this was much more than a simple technical and environmental discussion but a broader criticism of the global trade system.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 months ago (3 children)

    I'm not saying it is nothing, but the environmental cost of 1 car battery has to be compared to the environmental damage of 1 tonne of gasoline/year it is replacing. So 500 kg of batteries or 10-15 tonnes of gasoline for a typical car...

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  • [–] 1 point 1 month ago* (2 children)

    It absolutely is better, especially if you drive often. For example, in the US where you wouldn't get places without a car and drive it back and forth everyday, it's a no-brainer.

    But, it is still quite an impact. Add to that all the other impacts of cars, be it tyres, parking lots, materials, e-waste, and so on and so forth, and no one in their right mind would call electric cars environmentally friendly. But hey, at least it's somewhat better.

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  • [–] 1 point 1 month ago (1 child)

    I absolutely agree, but that wasn't what you brought up in regards to electric cars. As for the stuff you bring up besides the lithium, EVs eat more tires, but for the rest of it, the rest can be said about fossil cars as well.

    Yes, you are right, cars are bad, but if you need a car, electric is better. And unfortunately, not all places are planned to be livable without a car. And that part isn't the fault of the car driver.

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  • [–] 1 point 1 month ago

    Keeping more to the original point, installing a sodium battery in a car will be more ecologically and otherwise beneficial - materials are more common and less environmentally damaging to acquire, battery has a longer lifespan, and can operate much better at low temperature, reducing the need of pre-heating during winters. All of these are not only convenient, but environmentally positive.

    The only downside, and the reason sodium-ion batteries are not everywhere, is that the range under normal conditions would be lower. Still, it does crawl into automotive tech thanks to Chinese manufacturers. I think it's a good development, and one I watch more than new advancements in lithium.

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