Featured Solid state battery in 2022 prius

Only the finest neurotoxins for my car!

 

Interesting - I remembered recently downloading this PODCAST from BBC World Service - I just listened to it:



You can listen here - it's only 9 mins long:

BBC World Service - 50 Things That Made the Modern Economy, Leaded Petrol

 

Tetraethyllead is interesting as if has hydrocarbon and metallic structure. Lead is still concentrated in hedgerows etc by many roads.

Now, dimethylmercury. Another organic / metal bonded molecule. That is the stuff nightmares are made of

 

In defense of tetraethyl lead, it provided the high octane, aviation fuel that helped the Allies defeat the Axis powers. Even today it is found in 100 octane, low-lead aviation gas.

Bob Wilson

 

And if it was only used in limited military and aviation purposes, we'd all have been far better off.

The Nation has an article covering the history of ethyl that is a pretty good read, if a bit long: The Secret History of Lead | The Nation

 

Wow, it reads like the Baby Boomer generation has a solid class action lawsuit for any number of various ailments.


Unsupervised!
iPhone ?

 

There is also some evidence that it was a significant driver of high rates of violent crime.

New evidence that lead exposure increases crime

But you know, lead is so awesome. Now you've got me laughing at you and not with you.

 

They'd still need us to change tires and coolant.

 

if they make some progress on self-cleaning windshields, we won't even need washer fluid or wipers. Save another 9 or 10 pounds or so to make room for more battery....

 

ZAK-LEE . . . after this is perfected in the lab it will be another decade before it becomes prevalent (lithium ion took even longer) since the large scale manufacturing issues will be enormous. Then, once it's dialed in, (think hydrogen ... every 10 years, another 10yr promise comes up) ... the 1st market would be small applications like phones & tablets. Only then will it go to cars. Doesn't anyone study history? Jeez. If it happens? Sure, the economic payoff will be huge. Even so, don’t expect solid state batteries to be a major technology until 2030. How many other breakthrough promises have been promised for electric storage that ended up being vapor-ware. Just saying.
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I agree - though - we don't know what has been stewing in the cauldrons of laboratories hidden from view. Hydrogen - could it be an intermediate stage? It's all a guess at this stage. There is also UltraCapacitors - who knows, there was talk about graphene being involved in the design, but it got a bit high-tech for me? The gyrobus using a flywheel to store energy short-term?

I wonder if the future might use a combination of many technologies - hybrid by another route?

 

Most of the announcements aren’t for the general audience, like us. They are more to scare up investments. But somebody should tell Shigeki Terashi. He seriously believes Toyota will intro a Solid State battery powered car next year.

Toyota accelerates target for EV with solid-state battery to 2020


Unsupervised!

 

Thomas Midgley, Jr,, the man who also invented Freon, actually died a horrible death from lead poisoning and polio, having been strangled in a mobility contraption that he designed.

 

I have no doubt toyota can demo a car with a solid state battery next summer. The trick is to get a car with it to be better or less expensive than teslas and lgs lithium ion. Allow it to cost $1000/kwh and only need it to last a year, and we are there, but this needs to be better than today's standard

 

It’s better but not less expensive. It’s actually quite a leap. Last year at this time they demo’d a SS battery in a car and it barely got across the parking lot. I’m just not sure they can produce these to even compete with the cost of the Mirai let alone Tesla. I wouldn’t be surprised if they put them in a Lexus because of the cost. Still don’t don’t look for mass production to get ahead of their roll out of their e-TNGA.


Unsupervised!

 

What I found of side interest is that we have corporate greed pushing ethanol gas blends today, but if not for such back then, our cars would have been using such blends for decades.

 

Actually, there aren't a whole lot of super top secret projects.
First off there are plenty of academic and industry conferences where the students, scientists and engineers go to show off and recruit talent. If you keep it too secret you lose out on recruiting top talent. Unlike TV and movies, this stuff isn't developed by one lone guy in a basement lab -- you need lots of good engineers.
You also need funding. If you are a small startup you need VC money, angel money or a big industry partner. You don't get this by remaining quiet.

So, sure, there are lots of secret little details...but probably no big secrets that those in the industry don't know about.

Mike