Posted on 03/25/2025 8:55:15 PM PDT by Red Badger
The atomic energy of betavoltaic batteries can power a variety of devices, from aerospace and robots to your future smartphone, for up to a century without recharging.
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In the world of batteries, duration is king. Whether nestled in the smallest wearable or providing back-up power for the electric grid, a battery that provides reliable energy for longer will always outlast the competition—figuratively and literally.
The U.S. led the way in nuclear battery innovation over the past 70 years—and even developed the first battery that ran on nuclear radiation in the 1950s. But in the 21st century, China has become the undisputed champ of nuclear batteries, which make it possible to power endeavors for decades without needing to recharge. They could provide the backbone for whole industries we haven’t even invented yet, like cybernetics, which could enable a truly intelligent robot, or deep space missions that could fly us to the stars. In early 2024, the Chinese company Betavolt revealed a coin-sized nuclear battery named BV100 that uses Nickel-63 as its radioactive source, yielding an estimated 50-year lifespan. But this battery isn’t just a lab innovation—it’s already being mass produced, with the intention to power technologies ranging from medical and aerospace devices to future smartphones.
For most of us, better batteries are simply a convenience, but in some cases, battery life that’s more akin to a human lifespan is crucial. We may have no hope of long-term space exploration or life-saving medical interventions without such long-term batteries, which harness energy from a radiation source. Some elements, like uranium, are radioactive, and they have unstable atomic nuclei that spontaneously lose energy. There’s more than one way to capture that energy—in the 1950s and 60s, NASA developed radioisotope thermoelectric generators that transferred the heat from natural radioactive decay into practical energy.
But now, a new generation of batteries can trap energy from beta particles, which are electrons or positrons that fly away from their atomic nuclei during radioactive decay. This acts somewhat like photons hitting a solar panel, but in this case, beta radiation is bombarding a specially designed semiconductor, and this is how Betavolt is powering its batteries. Betavoltaic batteries comprise two parts: a radioactive emitter and semiconductor absorber. As the emitter naturally decays, high-speed electrons (aka beta particles) strike the absorber. This creates an “electron-hole” pair, which generates a small-but-stable supply of usable electric current. Since beta particles can be blocked using simply a thin sheet of aluminum, betavoltaic batteries are safe.
While not producing as much power as NASA’s thermoelectric method, these “betavoltaic batteries” can provide small amounts of reliable power for possibly up to a century—or maybe even longer, depending on the half-life of the material. It may not replace the old, reliable lithium-ion battery that powers most of our gadgets. However, the betavoltaic battery’s long life—coupled with its ability to operate in extreme conditions—makes it perfectly suited for planetary rovers, deep sea sensors, and even pacemakers. Basically, anywhere you desperately want to avoid frequent battery replacement. Nuclear batteries will become even more relevant as the world continues to decarbonize while also becoming increasingly dependent on smart sensors and other internet-connected devices. Several countries are pursuing betavoltaic battery development, including China, the U.S., South Korea, and in Europe.
Betavolt isn’t the only China-based company devising nuclear battery advancements. Just last week, Northwest Normal University in Gansu, China, announced its own carbon-based nuclear battery that can last up to 100 years. Although the basis of this battery, carbon-14, is extremely rare, the South China Morning Post reported that China has a carbon-14 commercial reactor in Zhejiang. Mimicking its photovoltaic playbook for solar energy, China is building the entire supply chain for these devices within its own borders.
While China forges ahead, the rest of the world is racing to catch up. In the U.S., the Miami, Florida-based City Labs is feverishly working on betavoltaic-based microelectronics for space missions. In November 2024, the company received significant funding from the NIH to develop long-lasting betavoltaic batteries for pacemakers (thanks to their low penetration depth, beta particles can be easily shielded from the body). Instead of Nickel-63, City Labs’ battery uses tritium, which will likely provide a 20-year battery life. Following China’s lead, the company also thinks the supply chain in the U.S. could support the batteries’ production. Scalable production of tritium can happen, because national labs and companies are forging a path, Peter Cabauy, chief executive at City Lab, told Chemistry World.
City Lab actually developed the world’s first successful betavoltaic battery called the “Betacel” back in the 1970s, but the battery’s relatively limited lifespan at the time, along with growing nuclear stigma in the U.S., essentially relegated betavoltaic batteries to laboratory research. Now, times are changing.
And City Lab isn’t going it alone. Two U.S.-based companies—Kronos Advanced Technologies Inc and Yasheng Group—announced a joint partnership to pursue nuclear battery technology last year. The U.K. joined the betavoltaic fray in September 2024 when the company Arkenlight developed its first carbon-14 battery, made from nuclear waste.
It doesn’t take much imagination to see how a battery that truly keeps “going and going” will be a game-changer for a variety of technologies. But one thing is certain—last year’s reveal of Betavolt’s 50-year battery was a wake-up call for companies, laboratories, and governments around the world. More than 70 years after the U.S. developed the world’s first betavoltaic battery, it seems this tech’s time has finally arrived.
It just may not be the U.S. leading the charge.
Radioactive batteries everywhere. What could possibly go wrong?
Contact exposure doesn’t need much to do a lot of damage.
Or they are adapted to tolerate high levels of radiation...
I need one of those for my flashlight. Batteries always dead when I really need it.
That's as far as I cared to read.
Either the Chinese are now decades ahead of everyone or there’s a massive amount of propaganda, mostly regarding science and tech, coming out if there.
I’ll go with propaganda.
Buut, butt? It is nuklar!!!That is evil.
Liberals will never allow.
Yeah, yeah, I know that many smoke detectors use nuclear material. So what? That is being reasonable. And, name me five instances in last five years wherein liberals have been reasonable.
I never believe anything about China
How about Korea?
https://scitechdaily.com/scientists-just-built-a-battery-that-never-needs-charging/
I asked my son how China produces so many great students/engineers/etc.
He explained it is because of simple math(1.4 billion to choose from) and early testing. Apparently, all Chinese children are IQ tested at a young age. The high IQ ones are then sent to special schools.
These special students get a much better education than the average child.
The best of the best are then sent to US and UK universities where the state pays for their tuition. So, when they do graduate from MIT or Harvard they really do owe a huge debt to the CCP homeland. So, they are all potential spies.
FYI, my son went to UNH for Biotechnology. He applied to several colleges for a PHD program including MIT/Harvard.
When he visited the lab at Harvard the entire lab was Chinese students. The professor was also Chinese.
If he was accepted he would have been the only white male in the program. He was not accepted. He was accepted at GA Tech but decided to go into industry instead.
He is with his second Big Pharma corp out of college. The current one is paying for him to get a Masters at UMass in Engineering Management. He would still be working on his PHD at GA Tech(6 years a slave) if he had chosen that path.
China spent the last fifty years having America train their scientists. China hs also spent at least the last fifty years stealing American science and technology. How long till these wonder batteries start exploding or self immolating like their EV’s ?
I recently came across an old flashlight in a toolbox I hadn’t opened in years. I switched it on and it still had some juice in it. It had two Racovac AA batteries in it.
Bingo! Thanks for catching my oversight.
Yes, we have done plenty of training, just in the wrong area of expertise.
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