Search for the Super Battery

[yurtle]

While channel surfing, I stumbled on a PBS show with the above title. It's still got a half an hour, and may be available online.

[scottyb]

Originally Posted by yurtle

While channel surfing, I stumbled on a PBS show with the above title. It's still got a half an hour, and may be available online.

We expect a full report in the morning

[yurtle]

It started off with making lithium batteries less prone to fire by short circuit, over-charging, and physical damage. Car crashes could be bad, though a tank full of gas could also be bad.

[Volt_Ampere]

Show was ok. I was hoping for better technical info. It was mostly hype. Bottom line is there is nothing short term that is better than the batteries we now have. There were some future predictions of much better and safer lithium batteries. (Lithium is still the highest energy density battery material available) The other interesting thing is that they are finding more and more Lithium so the supply problem may not be a long term one.

[cgtech]

Just because they "find" it, doesn't mean they "mined" it. To keep prices high, mining it & putting it on the market will likely be slow. Just like how China is the main supplier of Mercury for CFL light bulbs that were popular (like USA has no mercury, thanks again EPA). In that situation, China pretty much sets the price for the lights, since they are controlling the manufacturing & materials used to manufacture.

[yurtle]

Same thing with rare earth minerals.

[DaveTM]

I'm going in Ebay and purchasing every cell phone I can. Then....with my trusty soldering Iron.......I will connect all the batteries together until I reach warp speed!!! No longer will I be a slave to lead acid......BANG