Hi Jim. The bottom line is that falling costs go on a curve, and tail off, not a straight line. Of course, the tricky bit is to know when and how sharply different things tail off and slow down, but tail off they will. As the Chinese saying is, trees do not grow up to heaven.

I just came across this French design for a VTOL hybrid electric craft: https://www.futureflight.aero/aircraft-program/atea I quite like the idea of hybrid at this stage of the game, as it gets around the present low energy density of batteries etc to give reasonable range but still with a very worthwhile reduction in emissions, GHG etc

@GdB There are umpteen 'analyses' of the future of BEVs which consist of asking the parties themselves what their projections are for their future, and take their notions of what they hope to reach as some sort of unbiased solid certainty. To make an argument against another, it ain't enough to say that you don't fancy the source, you have to show where they have gone wrong. In this case I can't see where the problem is. The argument is not against electric cars, but against fat heavy ones. With current battery technology it is tougher to keep weight down than for ICE, but not every BEV has to have the range of a petrol car, or to accelerate unreasonably for the public highway and in so doing shred their tires all over the environment. At least Aston Martin bling power cars did not make fake environmental claims about where their priorities lay.

Thanks Gryf. Premium applications where short cycle life under high power draw may be an acceptable trade off. I can't see any evidence from the information that they have provided that they currently have any way of combining charge and discharge rates with decent cycle life, although to be sure they do talk about high C rates without specifying what that does to cycle life. Unfortunately over the last decade or so I have come across loads of instances of that sort of 'omission' That is not to say that it can't be done by some future advance in the technology, but there is nothing at all to indicate that they have managed high charge rate combined with long cycle life for anything they have at the moment, even as a cell prototype.

Other battery chemistries certainly have lots of potential, and give grounds for hope. But it is extraordinarily difficult to predict when, or even whether, they will happen. So I tend to concentrate on the little bits I have some more professional insight. Once a fundamental process is established, it is possible to make surprisingly accurate predictions of its cost progress, with increased volume and expertise. So for instance aluminum production, from being a rare and exotic material, became fundamental to much of modern life, and the cost per kg could almost be read off by date, once the basics were in place. The tough part is to realise when fundamentally new stuff is needed, and the paradigm breaks down. So in the most well known example, Moore's law accurately predicted the fall in cost of computing power for a very long time, and now there is ongoing debate as to whether it still holds true: ' “Moore’s law is dead!” This is a line of thought championed by many prominent individuals in the fields of electrical and power engineering. But it’s quite a controversial one; just as many people believe Moore’s Law is still true today in 2022 as those who believe that it’s dead and no longer valid.' https://www.power-and-beyond.com/moores-law-in-2022-whats-the-status-quo-a-dc63a87e669b554d4d33d2a5ba73692a/ The situation with battery costs is analogous, and the question is whether, or to what extent, historic falls in cost can be maintained. But at the simplest level, when you are on the early part of the production curve and no very fundamental breakthroughs are needed, it is possible to get a remarkably accurate reading some years into the future on costs. That for instance is why I am very confident that the price of electrolysis and electrolysers is going to continue its steep fall. That early in the production curve, it ain't difficult to work out, even for me!

Thanks for the link, Gryf, which I admit I had not looked at in much detail before, as I thought it was mainly concerned with reprocessing, which I was already pretty confident can be done efficiently at good cost.

Hi Gasbag: Your figures and mine accord 'near enough for Government work' and I tracked back a bit on what does seem to be Musk's claim of 5kg of lithium for 'one of his battery packs' although I can't spot where he specifies which one he is talking about. If it is in one of his cars, that seems low, and if it is in one of his home battery packs, it seems high, and all the other stuff I have tracked down seems to reckon around 8-10kg for a typical EV battery, which of course is usually smaller than the average Tesla car battery which typically go for more range than other less premium BEVs. But the difference is not large enough to materially affect the conclusions of the approximate likely cost impact of the, very welcome, improvements suggested by this new process.

Working to the nearest planet for accuracy, I have fudged up some figures - false precision is extremely misleading. so I will keep it very, very rough. Price of battery grade lithium carbonate which contrains 20% by weight lithium: https://www.statista.com/statistics/606350/battery-grade-lithium-carbonate-price/ At $37,000 per metric ton, that is $37 per kg, times 5 for a kg of lithium, comes to $185/kg lithium Typical of the confusion is this article on battery weight: ' Besides lithium, EV batteries also contain many other minerals, such as cobalt and manganese. A typical EV battery has about 8 kilograms of lithium, 14 kilograms of cobalt, and 20 kilograms of manganese, although this can often be much more depending on the battery size – a Tesla Model S’ battery, for example, contains around 62.6 kg (138 pounds) of lithium.' https://blog.evbox.com/ev-battery-weight !! That is going to be the weight of lithium carbonate, not lithium, in the Tesla S Divide by 5 and you come to 12.5kg of lithium, which makes sense, which the figures in the article don't. Taking an EV battery as using around 10 kg of lithium, then you come out to a cost of $185 * 10 = $1850 for an averagish EV Guessing it as 70 KWh, we have something like $25 per KWh of the battery cost being for lithium This is going to help reduce costs, but can't by itself reduce them enough to make them hit the $50KWh really needed for full competitiveness with ICE at the cheaper end of the market. It sure can help supply though, and environmental impact, as well as cost, so is very welcome indeed.

There are all sorts of hassles in getting a fix on the simple question: ' How much does the lithium in a lithium battery cost as a percentage of total costs?' Among then is that, for instance, you often come across prices for lithium carbonate, which with lithium hydroxide is one way of using it, but only contains 20% lithium by weight. https://bisleyinternational.com/what-is-the-difference-between-lithium-carbonate-lithium-hydroxide/ Prices are also quoted at a variety of different levels of refining for use in batteries. These bits are hopeful though: ' direct production of battery-grade lithium hydroxide monohydrate, without the need to first produce lithium carbonate.' And ' The DLP process avoids the conversion of lithium carbonate to lithium hydroxide, which requires an inefficient, complex, lengthy, costly, energy-intensive and environmentally damaging process wherein up to 20% of the lithium is lost.' So I can't currently answer the question of how much this potentially reduces the cost of lithium batteries, but it seems likely, if it all works out, to substantially ease concerns about supply.

We were never going to 'run out' of lithium. But that does not exclude short tern shortages, and together with other relatively expensive and scarce elements used in lithium batteries is one of many reasons why the push for BEVs everywhere was far more problematic than enthusiasts allowed. In the case of lithium though, this is potentially capable of answering much of the issues involved. On reading this, the first question I asked myself was 'how much of the world's resources of lithium are in such brines?' Here is an article which gives the world's lithium resources at 89 million tons, most of it in brines: https://www.reuters.com/markets/commodities/legendary-lithium-riches-bolivias-salt-flats-may-still-just-be-mirage-2022-05-23/ It also talks specifically about the Salar de Uyuni lithium resource in Bolivia, which is the largest, at 21 million tons, so far substantially unexploited due to a variety of issues, including environmental concerns, the normal process, issues in the climate there about using evaporative solar techniques, and the large amount of magnesium in the brine. This process is not dependent on evaporation and is highly selective for lithium, so may enable tapping into that resource for a start, as it seems in addition to be very environmentally friendly, The process would also appear able to decrease the price of the lithium in the battery, One of the reasons that folk got over optimistic about future price falks is that top down 'analysis ' just extrapolated previous rates of decline into the future, when an increasing proportion as the technology and production advances is simply the far more sticky material costs, hence the recent rises, not falls, in battery prices. You need fundamentally new technology to break that link and force prices lower still, and you can't just read that off from historic rates of decline. I am having a look to try to find out how much of the current price of batteries is in the lithium, but it may take a while as you have to be careful, as the high grade lithium required is way more expensive than the less processed stuff straight out of the ground. This would appear to have good potential to some extent at least to actually drive down the cost of lithium batteries at a fundamental level though. And I very much welcome that, although some here may imagine me to be anti battery or whatever.

Thanks, Gryf. Since I am just a tad short of infallible, I was hoping that someone would check to see if I have gone totally off the rails on this occasion! ;-) However, looking at your references, I can't spot any substantial differences compared to the figures I based my comments on. For the first reference, from Ampius, on page 8, the graph for degradation looks pretty well identical to the NASA figures I quoted, with something of the order of 350 cycles to 80%, given that they are using there a C/5 discharge rate. In the second reference, sure, the battery can be fast charged, but there is no mention there of what cycle life they get if you do stuff in energy that fast, indeed, as your reference states: ' According to the press release, the energy density of the cells is amazing, at 370 Wh/kg, however, there is no word about the longevity and cycle life.' I'm afraid that over the last 10 years or so I have seen all sorts of dodgy elisons, so that if you read the obvious into statements from the battery company, if they have not explicitly stated it, they later wriggle out of it! Even Elon Musk was astounded by the misdirections and fakes in the battery industry, and he knows a thing or several about both. I don't know if that is the case for Ampion, but until I see figures explicitly stating the cycle life under fast charge assessed by reputable third parties, I will assume that it hammers it. I can't see anything to indicate authoritively that the cycle life and charging rates have increased at all since the NASA assessment I quoted.

If I have got the figures right on the relationship between charge rates and cycle life for this type of battery at the moment, I sure hope that the batteries are used where they can be swapped rather than any attempt to fast charge. I would hate to think what the cycle life would be at 10C.

Gryf: Don't get me wrong, I think this has got a lot of potential. I am just trying to get a handle on where we are at the moment. Have I got the figures right on cycle life, or have I dropped a decimal point somewhere? Assuming I have it about right, as I said, initially this will be for premium applications where weight is more important than any costs arising from relatively short cycle life, and things like the Zephyr fit that exactly.

I think folk imagine that I am negative about Ampius. I am not, but the results need taking for what they are, not imagined as though they are ready to stuff in a car to get double the mileage. This is lab bench stuff, which hopefully can now start making its way into premium applications where weight is very important, and cost isn't, so the low cycle life at any realistic draw can be covered. Presumably drones are high on the list. None of that means that the tech can't be improved in cycle life etc, but we have not even got that working in the very controlled conditions of early samples in a lab. Years and years away from something ready for commercial production for a car.

eci said: ' Keep in mind that for a given application, double energy density delivers the equivalent of twice the cycles as its half-capacity competition. But at half the weight. ' I think that you have double dipped. One or the other, but not both. And the batteries are not free, if you want more KWh, you are pretty much going to double the cost, although to be sure you can realistically lug it around, which you couldn't with lower energy density batteries.

The NASA tests I cited give the specific test conditions, see page 8 for C/10 and C/2 discharge to 80% At the very slow rate of C/10, a 70KWH battery pack would only be turning out 7KW. At 3.5Kwh per mile, you had better keep your speed down to 2 mph or so, and even then the pack is only good for 350 cycles or so. At a more realistic C/2, then the pack is good for under 300 cycles. For the entirely unspecified output on the Amprius site they give 'up to 1200' cycles. Sure, if you keep the draw low enough, and God knows what tiny rate of discharge they need for that, you get a lot of cycles. You are not running a car, or even flying a drone on that though

Heavy and fast is the way to go to do maximum damage to the environment and people.

'Based on today’s estimates, a net mass increase of 100 kg potentially results in an additional 500‑650 kg of GHG emissions and 1.9‑2.4 MWh of energy demand in vehicle production (without battery, including recycling). ' That sounds as though it may drastically underestimate the detrimental effects of weight in a BEV, as more weight means more battery needed to drag it around, in a negative spiral. And in addition to the climatic effects etc, more weight and acceleration means more tire wear and particulates.

Hmm, a post of mine seems to have disappeared, or maybe I pressed preview instead of post. Anyway, I always look for the bits press releases are not talking about, in this case cycle life. Here are NASA tests: https://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/atoms/files/nasa_aess_batt_dev_bdemattia.pdf Something like 200 cycles. Maybe enough for drones, but we are a long, long way from this lab top cell making its way into EVs.

I like to keep things simple, with standard components, and potentially cheap. So this bog standard 20MW reactor, air cooled and mass deployable on the spot where the energy is needed, appeals to me: https://www.nextbigfuture.com/2023/03/last-energy-gets-19-billion-in-contracts-for-simple-20-mw-nuclear-fission-reactors.html Having maybe 20% of energy as reliable baseload takes one heck of a lot of strain off of renewables. The first ones to be built in Poland.

I'm assuming this is inherently better than Protean Motors in wheel drive? https://www.greencarcongress.com/2023/03/20230322-protean.html The depth of my ignorance is such that I had thought that radial flux is something chiefly available on the Enterprise! - so please grade explanations to suit those at the very back of the class! ;-)

Just to put some of this into perspective, including my own whinging about heavy BEVs, here is this from Europe: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/mar/22/dieselgate-millions-of-extremely-polluting-cars-still-on-europes-roads-says-report ' based on extensive testing evidence, the ICCT has now revealed that about 13m highly polluting diesel vehicles sold from 2009 to 2019 remain on the roads. A further 6m diesels have “suspicious” levels of emissions, the ICCT said. The cars span 200 different models produced by all the major manufacturers.' This is largely straighforward use of cheat devices etc, criminally and lethally intentionally seeking to defraud over the years, with neither the directors nor the shareholders through jail and billions of damages and fines held to real account. Lying sociopaths deliberately misleading about their product, including autopilot which ain't, and the ecological 'benefits' of owing a heavy car with unsuitable acceleration are simply continuing an industry tradition established way back when the health benefits of lead in petrol were more widely appreciated by the likes of General Motors. They don't make lies like they used to, for which we should all be grateful.

@Gasbag Yeah, the particulates weigh less. But they do a wonderfully effective job of killing people without hanging around about it like GHG do. Not to mention contributing generously in the case of tire particulates to plastics in the ocean and the food chains there. Small, light and slow helps all the metrics, whether hybrid or BEV. Bling luxmobiles, BEV, hybrid or FCEV don't.

I would guess that there is a fudge available, or remedial action, according to taste. Some sort of particle grabber by suction from the tyres. That may ensure the God given right of people to maim and kill others by driving enormously heavy and massively accelerating cars on the public highway. Ecological, my........

@Bernard; This study is looking at the situation now, not what may, or may not, happen when and if various technologies improved as much as enthusiast's hope. And I have no idea where your notion of unlimited lifespan for EVs comes in. The longest warranty for the batteries in private vehicles I am aware of is 15 years, and if you have an old clunker of a car, putting in several thousand dollar's worth of new batteries may not be a sensible or realistic investment, especially given the income levels typical of people who own old cars, with the original more minted owners having long since sold them. Exactly that is happening right now with the Nissan Leaf, which had a pretty rubbish battery pack, and those cars are far more likely to get scrapped way before the typical life of an ICE car than last longer than them.