Legitimately, i was floored when I learned how much bestbuy charges for recycling electronics (smart tv, specifically). Like motherfucker the precious metals in the components alone should be enough for you why are you charging me a benjamin on top of that??
I figured out how to recycle it through my city, instead. Massive pain in the ass to do, but at least they didn't CHARGE ME
Harvesting is different from generating - Here I thought it was using solar energy and some previously unexplored process that rips the O2 from CO2, then adds that to Hydrogen
That's a good point. I generally copy the title verbatim from the article but as you've pointed out it's a bit misleading. This is definitely not magic.
The article compares them to Hydropanels, which function very similarly to a dehumidifier - and subsequently don't work so well in "dry, arid areas where water - but not sunlight - is hard to come by". What about these things might make them work better in very low humidity?
Here is a video Dr. Becky did on the Hubble tension recently that might explain it a little better for you. Physics probably isn't wrong, it's more likely that astrophysicists just got some measurements wrong on the cosmic distance ladder. A recent paper seems to get rid of the hubble tension completely.
I wonder to what extent they can take advantage of the ocean liquid cooling the cables to increase transmission capabilities.
Edit: On further thought, I guess they don't want excess heat as that would increase losses, so while the cooling could be beneficial, preventing the heat in the first place would be better.
This horseshit again? Physical product available for independent analysis, or it didn't happen.
It's not like the Chinese are famous for lying about the specs on things they manufacture or anything. Every week we hear about some Chinese company poised to "revolutionize" the EV with pie-in-the-sky range figures and yet the market continues to remain resolutely un-revolutionized.
And as usual, this article harps on "range" as if that's not an easily fudged figure. The real numbers we need to see are watts per volume, or watts per mass. And number of charge cycles tolerated, and how many before it loses what percentage of capacity. Any idiot can claim to make a 1,300 mile, 2,000 mile, 5,000 mile, 1,000,000 mile battery pack -- just make the pack bigger, or the vehicle lighter, or both. That tells us nothing meaningful whatsoever about the battery chemistry itself. Advertising us what hypothetical ranges someone thinks a pack made of these "could" build is meaningless. We could build a 1300 mile battery pack right now with LiFePo cells if we wanted to, via the simple expedient of filling a dump truck with the things.
Battery costs keep falling while quality rises. As volumes increased, battery costs plummeted and energy density — a key metric of a battery's quality — rose steadily. Over the past 30 years, battery costs have fallen by a dramatic 99 percent; meanwhile, the density of top-tier cells has risen fivefold
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With regards to anodes, a number of chemistry changes have the potential to improve energy density (watt-hour per kilogram, or Wh/kg). For example, silicon can be used to replace all or some of the graphite in the anode in order to make it lighter and thus increase the energy density. Silicon-doped graphite already entered the market a few years ago, and now around 30% of anodes contain silicon. Another option is innovative lithium metal anodes, which could yield even greater energy density when they become commercially available.
What's more, the Chinese market is both the leading producer and consumer of battery technology. So its weird to reflexively doubt that a Chinese firm would release a new higher-efficiency battery design.
Given that this is a prototype, its entirely unclear if the model is cost-efficient to mass manufacture or efficiently scalable based on available resources. But I'm hard pressed to discount the claim on its face simply because its got "China" in the headline.
Its not even like "China" invented a new battery tech. It's some battery plant in China which is the place where most batteries are created that's innovated on a design.
There are battery plants in Atlanta, Georgia and Heide, Germany who are pursuing similar advancements. They just don't have the money or the manpower equal to their Chinese peers.
If the company is able to scale this technology large enough for consumer vehicles while keeping prices down, it could easily double the range of the farthest-driving EVs on the road today.
That's a big IF.
TL;DR: They haven't developed a means of making this scalable and able to be mass manufactured. Until they do, this is another "revolutionary" battery tech that may or may not actually be used due to cost of production. Most likely in the "not" category.
If you want to make EVs more popular, make them with Sodium-Ion batteries that are cheaper than ICE vehicles. They'll sell better as a result.
Hardly anybody needs an EV with more than 200 miles of range if they're plugging in each night. Most people's commute is round-trip sub-50 miles. "Range anxiety" is 95%+ of the time a "problem" that stupid people have for their theoretical future that never actually happens. Most people are impractical idiots.
Most people have the option of plugging in where they live and/or work. The only argument would be for apartment complexes. Townhouses, single family homes, etc. are easy to switch to electric.
Does anyone know some of the finer grained details of this recycling program? I'm not exactly a regular Staples customer, but I definitely have some shit that is better off recycled. Like no chance of fixing a few phones I've found smashed in the road...
For at least the last five years, the Staples in the Boulder 29th St Mall takes any electronics you have for recycling. The process is you hand it to them or drop it in a box they have sitting there.
Unsure if this applies to other Staples, but at least that one in Boulder, 29th St Mall, does this easy
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