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A team of researchers from the Technical University of Denmark (DTU) has announced the creation of a so-called super battery made from rocks, a technology that may one day replace Lithium Ion batteries used in electric vehicle production. The team claims their discovery would lead to cleaner, safer, and longer-lasting batteries that don’t rely on rare metals or end up as toxic waste. According to the DTU team behind the battery’s creation, the key to their entry into energy storage lies in the simplicity of the materials involved. More specifically, their super battery is based on potassium and sodium silicates,...

Chinese battery giant CATL says it's successfully flown a 4-ton plane using its ultra-high density "condensed batteries." It now expects to have an 8-ton electric aircraft with a range of 2,000 to 3,000 km (1,240-1,865 miles) operating in 3-4 years. Contemporary Amperex Technology Company Limited (CATL) is the current world leader in manufacturing batteries for electric vehicles, owning 37% of the entire market share. Nearly every major car manufacturer, from Ford to Tesla, is using CATL batteries. In April of 2023, CATL announced its "condensed battery" packing over twice the energy density of nearly anything else on the market at...

While Chinese manufacturers have burst out in front of the pack with semi-solid-state battery achievements, other manufacturers around the world are working hard to get their own cells developed and validated. Based in Massachusetts, Factorial Energy has been working on its lithium-metal quasi-solid-state technology for over a decade, attracting backing and collaboration from major automakers like Stellantis, Mercedes-Benz and Hyundai. It's aiming for a long-range, energy-dense battery that costs the equivalent of lithium-ion units and rolls off the same production lines. This month, it sent out its first round of B-samples to Mercedes-Benz for further testing and development. Factorial first...

In the superheated market for batteries, promising lab developments often get overhyped by startups. ‘Liar, liar, battery supplier.’ Given what’s at sake, it’s easy to chalk up exaggerated claims about new battery breakthroughs to the tech industry’s propensity for hyperbole and grandstanding. A typical example: Researchers invent a tweak to a type of battery that has long shown promise but has never come close to commercialization. That gets spun into claims that an electric car with a 2,000-mile range is within reach. “People like a breakthrough, but when we write papers we try to avoid using these kinds of words,”...

Battery Wars: is Japan about to beat China in race for the energy game changer of the decade? Japan once supplied the world with the most advanced Li-Ion batteries. China and Korea now dominate the market, and Japan wants it back The search for the holy grail of batteries may be over. After a multi-year industry-wide effort, Japan solves the elusive solid-state technology

ScienceDaily (Mar. 18, 2008) — Engineers harnessing the same physical property that drives silent household air purifiers have created a miniaturized device that is now ready for testing as a silent, ultra-thin, low-power and low maintenance cooling system for laptop computers and other electronic devices. The compact, solid-state fan, developed with support from NSF's Small Business Innovation Research program, is the most powerful and energy efficient fan of its size. It produces three times the flow rate of a typical small mechanical fan and is one-fourth the size. Dan Schlitz and Vishal Singhal of Thorrn Micro Technologies, Inc., of Marietta,...

DOWN THIS tiled corridor, light does muscular, noisy work. Lasers dig dirt and weld metal. They pound aircraft parts into shape. In Bob Yamamoto's lab, light devours. He straps on emerald green goggles. A technician stabs a fire button and calls out the computer countdown. "Three ... two ... one ..." Then ... nothing. Just a buzz of electronics and an ephemeral glow in this darkened room at Lawrence Livermore Laboratory. But inside Yamamato's target chamber, a block of steel spits flame and molten metal. In those two seconds, 400 blasts of light poured into slabs of clear, manmade garnet....

One of the biggest challenges facing Lockheed Martin in its efforts to install a high-energy laser on the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) is the question of what to do with all the excess heat generated by the system, according to the company's lead for directed energy programs. Laser systems use electricity to produce highly focused beams of light, as well as considerable amounts of waste heat that must be dissipated. Lockheed Martin believes that a 100-kilowatt laser is the minimum power level needed to be an effective weapon for a fighter. However, "to get 100 kilowatts of light out,...

When McVeigh smiled a content grin before he was killed, could it be it was because he knew 9/11 was coming. It was a grin saying I know something you don't. Thoughts?