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New Manufacturing Technique Halves Cost of Lithium-Ion Batteries
An anonymous reader writes: Experts in materials science at MIT have developed a new process for creating lithium-ion batteries that will drop the associated production costs by half. The researchers say fundamental battery construction techniques have been refined over the past two decades, but not re-thought. "The new battery design is a hybrid between flow batteries and conventional solid ones: In this version, while the electrode material does not flow, it is composed of a similar semisolid, colloidal suspension of particles. Chiang and Carter refer to this as a 'semisolid battery.' This approach greatly simplifies manufacturing, and also makes batteries that are flexible and resistant to damage, says Chiang. ... Instead of the standard method of applying liquid coatings to a roll of backing material, and then having to wait for that material to dry before it can move to the next manufacturing step, the new process keeps the electrode material in a liquid state and requires no drying stage at all. Using fewer, thicker electrodes, the system reduces the conventional battery architecture's number of distinct layers, as well as the amount of nonfunctional material in the structure, by 80 percent."
I'm going to call Bullshit on the price claims.
Reality... Experts at MIT have developed an idea that looks very promising as a source for funding dollars.
Yeah, it's like I paid $1000 for my first hard drive and it only held 100 MB so today's 2 TB drives for $100 are impossible.
"New Manufacturing Technique Doubles Profit of Lithium-Ion Batteries"
There, now it feels right.
You don't think a Nissan Leaf for $30K is affordable? Maybe not for everyone but it is for a lot of people.
No, it isn't... You can buy a similar sized gas car for half the price...
You can buy a MUCH nicer car for the same price...
The Leaf is really, really expensive for the size and utility of what it is...
And in 5yrs when the battery won't hold enough charge to get down the block?
We've already seen daily-driven Prii last longer than 10 years on a battery pack. Meanwhile, even if the battery pack on the i3 did only last 5 years (10 is more likely) the pack prices will drop significantly in five years.
As well, even at current prices, even if they only last five years, you'll break even if you do any significant amount of driving. And if you're the kind of person who also complains about range anxiety, then presumably you would be using those miles up, right?
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"