I have long believed that our battery tech is the major stumbling block to efficient everyday electrical devices. The lithium ion battery, IMO, was a game changer. Now three more advances are nearing mainstream. I hope they come to fruition and pan out as expected.

https://www.saftbatteries.com/...s-could-power-future

quote:

Originally posted by hudr:
I have long believed that our battery tech is the major stumbling block to efficient everyday electrical devices. The lithium ion battery, IMO, was a game changer. Now three more advances are nearing mainstream. I hope they come to fruition and pan out as expected.

https://www.saftbatteries.com/...s-could-power-future

I think the next step will be enhancement of existing technology. Some cool tricks are around with Graphene, the real feat is in making it in quantity and cost.

Battery limitations is a big issue with a manned mission to Mars from what I have been told.

There is some interesting work being done with aluminum ion batteries.

Solid-state batteries will be a game-changer analogous to solid-state memory storage vs. mechanical hard drives.

quote:

Originally posted by BB61:
Battery limitations is a big issue with a manned mission to Mars from what I have been told.

Have you seen NASA's new nuclear plant the size of about a 10gal bucket? It produces 250KW from what I remember. Saw an article on it about a year or so ago.

Depends on what resources are available at the time. Cobalt mining is a disaster from an environmental and political standpoint, but politicians and environmentalists love their electric cars.

The best batteries so far seem to be dry pile sulfur batteries. Those are good for 179 - 194 years (so far).

I think the way batteries charge could be even a bigger game changer. Two interesting technologies:

1. True wireless charging devices. A device that charges batteries over the air, much like a wi-fi router but a power router.

2. Research is being done on a way to capture all the wave energy that we produce such as TV signals, FM radio signals, AM radio signals, wi-fi signals, etc. There are thousands of "excess" energy sources in the air everywhere. What if a device could capture this very small amount of energy and store it over time. Interesting stuff.

I always thought it would be cool to have a battery that's like a capacitor. If you could control the discharge to be really slow, but still have the charging being almost instantaneous. Just think, charging your electric car would take seconds instead of hours. The only problem is if you short it out, it'll probably explode. Plus the dangers of it are far worse the being in the back of the old CRT televisions.

"Old CRT televisions?" I'm still using an old CRT television!

flashguy

quote:

Originally posted by jcsabolt2:

quote:

Originally posted by BB61:
Battery limitations is a big issue with a manned mission to Mars from what I have been told.

Have you seen NASA's new nuclear plant the size of about a 10gal bucket? It produces 250KW from what I remember. Saw an article on it about a year or so ago.

No. My brother works for NASA and is a PhD physicist involved in Mars research. He is the one that told me battery technology is critical. It’s been a while since we talked about battery tech and we did not discuss the power plant you referenced. I’ll have to ask him if that changes the equation.

Use the CRT television: Ode to Joy!

Ground the chassis of the CRT television with your hand: Taps.