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Elon Musk Says Larger Batteries Might Be On the Way
mknewman writes "Elon Musk intimated that more-powerful batteries could be on the way for the Model S. The most potent battery pack currently offered in the Model S holds 85 kWh of juice, or enough for 265 miles of driving. Musk wasn't terribly specific, however: 'There is the potential for bigger battery packs in the future, but it would probably be maybe next year or something like that. The main focus is . . . how do we reduce the cost per kWh of storage in the battery pack?' In other words, Musk seems less concerned with stronger battery packs than making cheaper battery packs for the upcoming mid-size sedan, which is expected to be unveiled at the 2015 Detroit auto show. 'Our goal is to drop the cost per kWh by 30 percent to 40 percent.'"
The larger the fire.
Just strap it into the passenger seat, plug it into the lighter socket, and head straight for the HOV lane!
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Prisencolinensinainciusol. Ol Rait!
Don't forget when 3D printing this car at home, print out the battery separately in case it catches fire while printing.
Unless you can come up with battery tech that offers at least 700-800 kilometres range and a maximum recharge time of 5-10 minutes, electric cars are a dead end. Hydrogencars ftw. That is all.
Musk, creator of substandard regulation-evading bank "Paypal" and suckler of government teat "Space 'the first hit's always free' X", a collection of publicly trained ex-NASA, Boeing and Lockheed engineers who aren't employed directly by government because of concerns of ideological anathema, has announced today, "This overpriced, underpowered car my employees have built would be a little better if it were cheaper." Drooling dorks everywhere were keen to republish his words.
The electric utility companies have so much excess capacity at night, mostly idling or off line. If they could come up with special meters and sell electricity cheaply overnight, the break-even point calculations vis-a-vis gas cars will shift dramatically. The utility companies will get a piece of the transportation energy market, currently shared only between oil companies. That is the motivation for the utilities. We need to set dog against dog, thief against thief and coal burning utilities against oil companies.
I wish someone with the charisma of Elon or pig headedness of Jobs would make the top honchos of these organizations and companies to pay attention.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
Of course he's concerned about cost. The battery cost is a significant percentage of the cost of Tesla cars.
Reduce cost of batteries -> lower price -> increased sales -> more profits to be funneled towards development of better batteries with greater storage.
You know, where when you're on the highway you pull your energy from the road itself which would have power cables in it. Unfortunately I think I've read that would be really expensive. (Plus I think doing an induced current is less efficient. Been awhile since I've looked up anything on that though.)
Did you know 80 to 90% of the moderators on slashdot wouldn't recognize a troll even if one dragged them under a bridge.
it would probably be maybe next year or something like that.
Sounds like he has a handle on making accurate project estimates
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
Elon Musk says larger batteries might be on the way
And monkeys might fly out of my butt.
Now that would be news.
systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
zillions of miles per charge... unless we use inter-stellar mode? you go mr. musk. free the innocent stem cells never a better time to consider ourselves in relation to each other & our new clear options.. stop dreaming?
The good news is that larger batteries are on the way. The bad news is that increases the chances of the car catching on fire from 75% to 85%. It's expected that Tesla will market a line of optional garages made of concrete and asbestos to mitigate the risk.
As the other responder said, the danger of fires with batteries is far less than that with fossil fuels, but even more - there is tech a few years off that will make them even safer. Just the other day someone developed a form of lithium ion battery that is significantly less prone to fire, which is amazing given how much energy is stored in those things. It's nearly impossible to design something that holds such an enormous amount of energy without it being dangerous if damaged and accidentally discharged.
"We must hold the just balance and set ourselves as resolutely against improper corporate influence on the one hand, as
"there is tech a few years off that will make them even safer.there is tech a few years off that will make them even safer."
Just like the singularity it seems that improved battery tech is always about 5-10 years down the road.
http://www.rootstrikers.org/
It will be capable of delivering 1.21 jigawatts
The awesome thing is that it really is always 5-10 years down the road -- and things are rolling off of that 5-10 year timeline into production all the time.
If you don't think batteries have been getting better, you aren't paying attention.
Right, because we continue to invest in the science and engineering behind them.
Batteries are vastly better than they were 10 years ago, because they've been in continual development. The batteries of a decade ago were similarly much more advanced than the ones that came before.
Batteries are one of the easiest areas to see the "in a few years this tech will be amazing" future speak actually pay off.
90% of the trips of 90% of the population can be met with existing battery vehicles.
The problem is that people will not buy something that cannot do 10% of what they want to do, when the importance of doing that thing they do not do often is around 80% to them.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
I find the perception that battery tech is not improving rather bizarre. You realise we have laptops that last 12-24 hours today, when only a decade ago the very best laptops lasted only 4 hours, right?
I find the perception that battery tech is not improving rather bizarre. You realise we have laptops that last 12-24 hours today, when only a decade ago the very best laptops lasted only 4 hours, right?
How much of that is improved batteries and how much of it is improved computation per watt of modern laptop hardware?
If you follow this rule, there's no problem. Also, store it outdoors so it if blows itself up overnight it's not a problem.
Avoiding problems is easy, so long as you follow the rules.
36L for my Toyota Yaris Hybrid
44L for my Ford Fiesta
Mostly due to batteries. If you compare the power usage of laptops then, and now, you'll find that older laptops tended to use in the 10-20W range for their motherboard and CPU. Modern ultra books use a similar power level, while modern laptops use around 30-50W, and still get longer battery life.
...more expensive cars that only small fraction of the population can afford are on the way.
More like silicon chips.
The fact is that today's batteries are superior AND cheaper to what we had 10 years ago.
Just think of what a laptop battery cost 10 years ago and how long it lasted.
You shop at the flea market???
Now you can watch free cricket on http://www.crictimesports.com/
Do you have any sources for this claim?
Every source I've been able to find estimates a 2-3x increase in Lion capacity in the last 25 years.
http://www.enevate.com/eart/ca...
http://www.technologyreview.co...
You're also very wrong about laptop battery life. The increase in laptop battery life is almost entirely due to the huge advancements made in frequency scaling, advanced idle states, and fine grained power management (ie shutting down individual cores when not in use).
You'll find that new laptops (and cell phones) will still run their batteries down very fast when actually under load, but when doing normal desktop tasks all of the advanced power saving features on the silicon are vastly cutting down laptop power consumption. Lion capacity has very little to do with it.
Elon Musk Says Larger Batteries Might Be On the Way
Making batteries larger is easy and pointless,
storing more energy without making them larger would be great.
Disclaimer:
I didn't read TFA, of course.
Just judging from the headline, which I assume is an accurate summary.
and let it react with oxygen - which is abundand in our atmosphere! Bam, instant power with only ~50kg overhead to be transported!
European cars all show fuel economy in liters/100km. I don't know why. Seemed odd to me at first, too.
Since everything does it that way, it's an easy lower-is-better comparison.
I'd be curious if anyone knows why it caught on to measure it that way. Maybe it's easier at the pump? If I put in 5L, then I can go 100km... ?
People say the vast majority can operate within the range of a electric car. But I question that validity in many areas. Yes in a big city your average commute may be well within the range. But what about this range they all talk about? Just like my laptop battery its hours of life depends on what I do with it. Do I watch a movie, just surf the web or play a 3D game. Electric will remain a niche simply because it will not attract as many drivers as many proponents of all electric vehicles think.
When you buy a Tesla you are the same person who bought a Delorean or who buys a Leaf or a Corvette. You buy them because you know they are worthy of history and of value down the road. You know they won't be mass produced and they are unique. It will be very much the same for a self driving vehicle, a flying car or a hydrogen powered car. Does not mean they will be successful, just that some will find them important in history.
Mostly due to batteries. If you compare the power usage of laptops then, and now, you'll find that older laptops tended to use in the 10-20W range for their motherboard and CPU. Modern ultra books use a similar power level, while modern laptops use around 30-50W, and still get longer battery life.
No, mostly due to higher IPC, agressive power gating and deeper sleep stages. Here's the extended battery pack from my 2002 UltraPortable, 3600 mAh in 330 grams. In 2014 the extended battery for the Sony Vaio Pro 11 is 4690 mAh in 290 grams, that's about a 75% increase in power/gram in 12 years. There have not been any major revolutions in battery technology, it's still the same lithium-ion technology just a little more refined.
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
How come it takes 60 days for ebay sellers to collect their funds on paypal when they sell a product and yet Elon Musk rides around happily in his spaceship laughing at them from space?
I still don't understand why so many people have their head in the clouds about battery tech. Yes, it's an extremely important, key, vital piece of the puzzle in terms of a better future. However there is absolutely zero reason to believe that advances in energy storage will be in any way similar (in scope or in pace) to advances in microprocessors. It's not magic.
Electric cars, as they are currently being marketed, will simply not be competitive with their ICE brethren in any remotely near-term scenario without advances that are extremely unlikely. Furthermore, if such advances were to occur, the disruption to the global economy would be immense, and there are a lot of major players with a nearly unimaginably tremendous vested interest in slowing - if possible, even stopping - such disruption.
It sometimes almost seems like the public is being lulled into a false sense of security about what sorts of things are going to be possible in the near future (and what aren't).
Every source I've been able to find estimates a 2-3x increase in Lion capacity in the last 25 years.
Oddly, 12 hours is about 3 times longer than 4 hours ;)
You'll find that new laptops (and cell phones) will still run their batteries down very fast when actually under load, but when doing normal desktop tasks all of the advanced power saving features on the silicon are vastly cutting down laptop power consumption. Lion capacity has very little to do with it.
Nope, my laptop lasts about 6 hours even under very heavy load, I would have been lucky to get 1 hour, let alone 2 hours out of a laptop a decade ago.
well - they seems to tell us about new fantastic improved super batteries. Then give us a nice but not large improvement. Semantics or just reality imposing its view?
The battery that is coming will not be SOLD with the cars. They make ZERO sense for regular car driving. 40, 60, and 85 kwh is perfect (though 40 was killed) for running around town.
What the coming 120 AND 160 KWH battery will be used for is long distance trips. You will simply to to the local service center, and swap your battery out with one of the LD ones. Then do your trip. If you are going to spend time at a remote location that has a service center, you will be able to swap back to a lower KWH battery, which will costs you less for the week. Then when you are ready to go, you simply change out for a fully charged 120/160 KWH battery and drive the 450-600 MPC that it gives you.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
Just like the singularity it seems that improved battery tech is always about 5-10 years down the road.
Pretty much true.
I've had laptops that ran on Lead Acid batteries, followed by ones that run on NiCad, and Lithium, then Li-Poly.
Seems like they were all about 5 to 10 years apart.
Seems like each time, we knew the new tech would arrive about 5 years in the future.
We are doomed to always be in this cycle, of using the best tech we have while waiting for rumored better tech form the future.
We even develop government programs to ensure that this perpetual waiting game remains perpetual.
We've all gotten used to it.
You'll be happier when you do.
Sig Battery depleted. Reverting to safe mode.
Every source I've been able to find estimates a 2-3x increase in Lion capacity in the last 25 years.
Oddly, 12 hours is about 3 times longer than 4 hours ;)
You'll find that new laptops (and cell phones) will still run their batteries down very fast when actually under load, but when doing normal desktop tasks all of the advanced power saving features on the silicon are vastly cutting down laptop power consumption. Lion capacity has very little to do with it.
Nope, my laptop lasts about 6 hours even under very heavy load, I would have been lucky to get 1 hour, let alone 2 hours out of a laptop a decade ago.
You may think you are proving a point, but the previous poster is correct. Li+ battery technology peaked in the 1990s. It is limited by the actual physcis involved. Most likely, what you are seeing is improvements in CPUs such as scalable frequencies, more efficient HDs or even SSDs, and changes to screen technology. Of course, it's also possible that with the shrinking of electronics and the increased size of laptops (17" screens), there is simply more room inside the case for larger battery packs.
Li+ is still highly used, but most research has moved beyond it to more advanced technologies, if for no other reason than we are running out of lithium.
I like the idea of towable range extenders, but if you're renting one, what are the advantages over automated battery swapping instead?
You can use the existing gasoline/diesel infrastructure. Big advantage since automated battery swapping infrastructure essentially does not exist yet.
Eh, that's what you get from reading press releases. :)
New chemistries frequently have some particular thing they do really well, and a set of drawbacks. The problem you get is when you read the articles about "new battery has X% more energy density", or "new battery has X% higher charge/discharge rate", and expect to get both of those things in the same battery (much less a battery that isn't making tradeoffs unamenable to consumer use).
And batteries for consumer electronics are getting better over time, they're just not keeping up with best-chemistry-for-X in every factor X. Which isn't a reasonable thing to expect.
Mostly due to batteries. If you compare the power usage of laptops then, and now, you'll find that older laptops tended to use in the 10-20W range for their motherboard and CPU. Modern ultra books use a similar power level, while modern laptops use around 30-50W, and still get longer battery life.
No, mostly due to higher IPC, agressive power gating and deeper sleep stages. Here's the extended battery pack from my 2002 UltraPortable, 3600 mAh in 330 grams. In 2014 the extended battery for the Sony Vaio Pro 11 is 4690 mAh in 290 grams, that's about a 75% increase in power/gram in 12 years. There have not been any major revolutions in battery technology, it's still the same lithium-ion technology just a little more refined.
You're not comparing just the weight of the energy storage element, but also the weight of the casing. And that has changed a lot in the last 10 years.
FWIW it seems you need to increase the surface area of electrodes to increase battery capacity and this can be done with nanotechnology. The issue so far is reproducing some of these in mass production.
Just like the singularity it seems that improved battery tech is always about 5-10 years down the road.
Just like american cars having decent build quality is just 5-10 years down the road. My beat up, 15 year old hyundai has better build quality than what comes off the production lines at GM.
From what I've heard the 'physics limits' haven't been reached.
Take a look at metal air batteries. They are lightweight and powerful but non-rechargable. With an extra battery compartment for such batteries, you could just buy new batteries at a gas station and plug in when you need longer range than the rechargable battery can provide.
From what I've heard the 'physics limits' haven't been reached.
Then you have heard wrong, at least for the practical real world physics involved, particularly those that involve cost/benefit. Li+ battery technology has peaked and it is unlikely for any new breakthroughs to occur that would increase the energy density provided. That's probably why most new research is being funded for other matrices than Li+.
Could a more efficient Li+ battery still be produced? Yes. Could it be produced at a price point that would make it a viable power source? No. The same could be said for lead-acid and carbon batteries. As long as there are chemical bonds still intact, there is energy to be derived. That's not the issue. It's how costly is it to eek out that additional energy? And, that is the physics that is at its limits for Li+ technology.
"...2002 UltraPortable, 3600 mAh in 330 grams. In 2014 the extended battery [amazon.com] for the Sony Vaio Pro 11 is 4690 mAh in 290 grams, that's about a 75% increase in power/gram in 12 years."
Most of the difference is that older batteries were pretty much just a set of AA-sized batteries wrapped into a plastic shell. Modern computers often use pressed and formed LiPo batteries that allow for more "battery" in the same amount of space.
Others, like Apple, carry it a step further and completely eliminate the plastic shell used in removable batteries. I'll leave the math as an exercise for the reader, but you'd be surprised at just how much volume you gain by simply extending your battery size by 4mm in every dimension.
Any sect, cult, or religion will legislate its creed into law if it acquires the political power to do so.
What this really means is bigger batteries, hotter fires!
Yea! Bring on the hotdogs.
I agree that batteries are problem for electric car drivers. After I bought a Nissan Leaf, I have driven all my driving with it, and the battery in my gas Lexus is dead and it won't start. Again, actually, as it was revived once already for a friend visiting...
If you run out of electrons ask someone to tow the car for awhile. Regen that time lightly and you'll charge the pack. I've done this dozens of times during test driving and with prototype vehicles. After 10 miles of towing you can drive 6-7 miles with the charge. Maybe enough to the next service station with a plug.
While I believe that battery swap idea is possible and such fears might be possible to alleviate, by guaranteeing getting "your" battery back when returning as Tesla says, it is commercially difficult concept.
Here is some math: 1 Tesla S battery stores approximately $15 worth of electric energy (number out of hat). The process takes 2 minutes, and they could have it in a very central location and could have 50% utilization rate during daytime (battery changed every 4 minutes during 10 business hours), total of 150 swaps per day. The battery wear could be assumed to be large as batteries are deeply cycled, so lets assume that they can be used for 5 years and they cost 20k a pop (investment cost today). Assume that the swapping system costs 1M per site (there won't be many of those, so development cost has to be shared with few sites, and it is rather complex system). Assume 10 year lifetime, by then we will have batteries with at least double capacity and the driver will need sleep before battery runs out (even if one would not see that happening, anyone doing business decision on this will account for that risk). The capital cost comes to 700k per year plus return on capital requirement of 5% (low) 200k = 900k. To break even on this one the battery swap would need to cost 16.5$ + energy. That, obviously assuming that the above numbers would not be optimistic, there is a market for such thing in a compact enough area and with enough Tesla S's who want to drive 800km per direction per day to feed it. I would think that this might be possible concept for, say, Taxis in a very large city, or long distance trucking, but I just cannot make a lucrative business proposal out of it for normal cars. Even highly optimistic figures would just make it break even, and it is a very small niche.
Tesla S 85 can already do around 400km per charge, which will take 4-5 hours to drive. Other than 24 hour racing I cannot imagine why any normal person would not feel like having a lunch or other food break every 4-5 hours. Most road safety organizations in Europe recommend having a break every hour or two. Other than very high speed run through Germany on unlimited Autobahns, benefit from drop of recharge time from 1 hour to 2 minutes is not that large, as gas cars will still need 2/3rd of the stops to gas up, and the difference per stop being that Tesla owner needs 1 hour stop instead of 15 minutes. Gas driver will still need top himself up and visit restroom, even it they eat while driving (I think eating sandwich at 200km/hour is a safety risk, and likely illegal in Germany). There are few people (mostly in Germany) who actually have any real time benefit. Would they pay substantial extra for that? Unlikely. Those very few people will get a large diesel car for intercity driving and use a city car such as Volkswagen Up electric for city driving instead. For them, it makes more sense today. The economics come even better for electrics in countries other than Germany, as top speed limitations will make electrics more competitive by making charging stops smaller percentage of the total travel times, as well as allowing longer per charge trips due to lower energy consumption per km.
My conclusion would be that battery swap is technically perfectly possible, but unlikely to be commercially viable.
Driving 4 hours in the morning, stopping 1 hour for lunch, then 4 more hours in the afternoon, sounds great, just charge for that hour, right? The Tesla doesn't have enough range for that, in 4 hours, at 85 mph (the real speed on most of America's highways), you'll cover 340 miles which is well beyond the range of the Tesla. Even if you cut it down to 70 mph, you're looking at 280 miles. You are simply not going to take off on a cross country drive in a car that might or might not make it to your next stop.
Now, this problem will be solved once electric cars have 500 mile ranges, that would probably be enough, assuming there are super charge stations that can fully recharge the car in 1 hour, in many locations.
That is likely 20 years away however...
A much more reasonable answer is the Chevy Volt technology, a series hybrid, a pure electric car with a gas range extender, is more likely to gain traction.
How is a factual reply to the OP comment with a link to the source (which provides technical details) to support my argument , "overrated"?
Slashdot, words simply fail me. This place really has turned into reddit.