Fortunately, in the realm of EVs Chinese companies like CATL are leading the way in the global shift toward LFP batteries, which unlike NMC batteries don't rely on cobalt. CATL is also leading the way in the commercialization of the successor to lithium-ion batteries, sodium-ion batteries.
Fortunately, in the realm of EVs Chinese companies like CATL are leading the way in the global shift toward LFP batteries, which unlike NMC batteries don't rely on cobalt. CATL is also leading the way in the commercialization of the successor to lithium-ion batteries, sodium-ion batteries.
"As my colleague Casey Crownhart explained last week, Ford’s new plant will focus on making LFP batteries, which use iron rather than the cobalt and nickel used in the other main type of lithium battery, known as NMC. Compared with NMC batteries, which are widely used to make EVs in the US and Europe, LFP batteries cost less, have a longer life cycle, and are safer when it comes to the possibility of catching fire.
But just a few years ago, LFP batteries were considered an obsolete technology that would never rival NMC batteries in energy density. It was Chinese companies, particularly CATL, that changed this consensus through advanced research. “That’s purely down to the innovation within Chinese cell makers,” Max Reid, senior research analyst in EV and battery supply chain services at the global research firm Wood Mackenzie, tells me. “And that has brought Chinese EV battery [companies] to the front line, the tier-one companies.” "
Ultimately innovation in battery technology will be what reduces global demand for cobalt. This is a problem that will be solved by innovation rather than through a greater emphasis on corporate ESG.
When they're contributing bald CCP marketing, they should do it under a non-Chinese name. Pedro McKenzie, or La'amar Proczycz, or Mickey Blankenshipsteinwitz.
I am completely skeptical of this claim. Any form of these batteries requires enormous amounts per battery of minerals mined in horrible conditions, using enormous amounts of fossil fuels. Meanwhile, what pushes up cobalt mining exploitation is the overall distortions of markets via the massive green subsidizing of EVs. These market distorting subsidizations seek to close off ICE car production far ahead of any normal market justification for the switch. The bloated demand for LFP batteries will therefore not stop the growth of a bloated demand for cobalt for NMC batteries. The two will rise together and together impose massive costs (including fossil fuel production costs). To say nothing of the horrendous moral costs, imposed by a preening elite deceived by its false ideas and ideology. A huge waste of historical proportions.
It is impossible to overstate the difficulty of making a battery that can compete successfully with the internal combustion engine. Atmospheric oxygen is the key: at a stoichiometrically proper mixture (approximately 15:1 air/fuel ratio), an IC-engined vehicle carries only 1/16 the weight it needs to generate power; the rest comes from the ambient air, then dumping ALL of the exhaust weight overboard. And as the fuel is used, the vehicle weighs less, taking even less power to maintain motion. This is critical in aircraft, where weight is everything. A battery, aside from storing very little relative energy, maintains its full weight throughout the cycle. Add to that the long "refueling" times, and it's a no-brainer.
Of course, there's the CO2 argument.
CO2 is a trace gas - 0.04% of the atmosphere - approximately four parts in ten-thousand - equivalent to the first four seconds of a 2-1/2 hour walk of 10,000 steps; yet because plants can extract it from the air at that low concentration, it provides the substrate for the production of 100% of the oxygen that keeps animals - like, say, humans - alive. Add to all the above the fact that man creates only 3% - 97% comes from natural sources like decaying vegetation - and the CO2 Hoax is second only to the Climate Hoax itself.
Fortunately, in the realm of EVs Chinese companies like CATL are leading the way in the global shift toward LFP batteries, which unlike NMC batteries don't rely on cobalt. CATL is also leading the way in the commercialization of the successor to lithium-ion batteries, sodium-ion batteries.
https://www.technologyreview.com/2023/02/22/1069032/ev-batteries-politicization-china-us/
"As my colleague Casey Crownhart explained last week, Ford’s new plant will focus on making LFP batteries, which use iron rather than the cobalt and nickel used in the other main type of lithium battery, known as NMC. Compared with NMC batteries, which are widely used to make EVs in the US and Europe, LFP batteries cost less, have a longer life cycle, and are safer when it comes to the possibility of catching fire.
But just a few years ago, LFP batteries were considered an obsolete technology that would never rival NMC batteries in energy density. It was Chinese companies, particularly CATL, that changed this consensus through advanced research. “That’s purely down to the innovation within Chinese cell makers,” Max Reid, senior research analyst in EV and battery supply chain services at the global research firm Wood Mackenzie, tells me. “And that has brought Chinese EV battery [companies] to the front line, the tier-one companies.” "
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/04/12/business/china-sodium-batteries.html
Ultimately innovation in battery technology will be what reduces global demand for cobalt. This is a problem that will be solved by innovation rather than through a greater emphasis on corporate ESG.
"Advanced research" in this case is a euphemism for "industrial espionage".
When they're contributing bald CCP marketing, they should do it under a non-Chinese name. Pedro McKenzie, or La'amar Proczycz, or Mickey Blankenshipsteinwitz.
Because then I'd totally be fooled.
Yeah sure. The Chinese are our saviors. Aren't they the same freaks who sold escaped North Korean women into sex slavery?
I am completely skeptical of this claim. Any form of these batteries requires enormous amounts per battery of minerals mined in horrible conditions, using enormous amounts of fossil fuels. Meanwhile, what pushes up cobalt mining exploitation is the overall distortions of markets via the massive green subsidizing of EVs. These market distorting subsidizations seek to close off ICE car production far ahead of any normal market justification for the switch. The bloated demand for LFP batteries will therefore not stop the growth of a bloated demand for cobalt for NMC batteries. The two will rise together and together impose massive costs (including fossil fuel production costs). To say nothing of the horrendous moral costs, imposed by a preening elite deceived by its false ideas and ideology. A huge waste of historical proportions.
It is impossible to overstate the difficulty of making a battery that can compete successfully with the internal combustion engine. Atmospheric oxygen is the key: at a stoichiometrically proper mixture (approximately 15:1 air/fuel ratio), an IC-engined vehicle carries only 1/16 the weight it needs to generate power; the rest comes from the ambient air, then dumping ALL of the exhaust weight overboard. And as the fuel is used, the vehicle weighs less, taking even less power to maintain motion. This is critical in aircraft, where weight is everything. A battery, aside from storing very little relative energy, maintains its full weight throughout the cycle. Add to that the long "refueling" times, and it's a no-brainer.
Of course, there's the CO2 argument.
CO2 is a trace gas - 0.04% of the atmosphere - approximately four parts in ten-thousand - equivalent to the first four seconds of a 2-1/2 hour walk of 10,000 steps; yet because plants can extract it from the air at that low concentration, it provides the substrate for the production of 100% of the oxygen that keeps animals - like, say, humans - alive. Add to all the above the fact that man creates only 3% - 97% comes from natural sources like decaying vegetation - and the CO2 Hoax is second only to the Climate Hoax itself.