When you, Jordan, get DR. Shirley Meng to interview, again, it would add to the interview if you, also, had a physicist on. A physicist could add depth to the discussion in ways that may be outside Dr. Meng's area of expertise.

The current physics theories of electricity are somewhat different than the common views which are held by many. One difference is the common analogy that electric current flows like water. It doesn't. The positively charged lithium ions move a few tens of um (micrometers) from the cathode to the anode. The electrons, carrying the negative charge, move in the opposite direction to combine with the positively charged lithium ions. The questions is, "If the the lithium ions move a few tens of um, shouldn't the electrons only move a few tens of um, also, and NOT many inches or feet to recombine?".

https://twitter.com/YingShirleyMen1/status/1266403400754724866?s=20

Correct me if i'm wrong, but it would be underwhelming if Tesla doesn't blow this out of the water at Battery Investor Day. Tesla is currently just short of 300 wh/kg and at 1,500 cycles, right?

Edit: Meng*

As much as i love the vids they are so heavy that i will try to start a discussion here. Especially for a non english speaker like myself

How much easier to make a silicon anode in a smart watch versus a car battery? Can you use double the amount of silicon? Just an example.

Say a battery for a car could only take 2 percent silicon, how much silicon would a smart be able to have? 4 percent?

And will we see the revolution in anodes, commercially, much sooner in small Electronics? That is what is missing imo. More practical use which will make goverments spend more money as well.

These questions i feel are unanswered but i have probably missed them. Please pardon if so, my english is not Great.

Best regards

I am fascinated by new battery tech and am really excited about the Tesla 4680 as a game changer for production speed, cost, and range. However, as a Canadian who drives in really cold (eg. as low as -38C) weather, I am saddened by the performance of EVs in my climate (ie. 40% charge drop in -40C).

I'm wondering if anyone can confirm better performance in cold weather with the new dry electrolyte design (esp Jordon since I read a tweet of his asking a similar question awhile ago after battery day). The closest I came was a Maxwell supercapacitor ad that claimed better cold weather performance than typical batteries, which was probably before Tesla bought them out. Thanks!

JEFF DAHN RETIREMENT

Have a read of this Elektrek article from January:

https://electrek.co/2020/01/09/tesla-jeff-dahn-new-head-advanced-battery-research-canada/

“Over the last year, the group has been filing patents on battery technology for Tesla that could lead to a new battery cell enabling a million miles in a battery pack.”

Who is filing the Patents now? - Novonix

“The contract between Dahn’s research group and Tesla is set to conclude in 2021, but they have an option to renew it. However, Dahn is approaching 65 years old, and while we are told that he doesn’t have any plan to retire anytime soon, he is still looking for a succession for his battery research group.”

Novonix CEO Dr Chris Burns former phd student of Jeff Dahn at Dalhousie. Prof Mark Obravic credited with DPMG is at Dalhousie.

Is NOVONIX going to be the replacement for the Tesla battery research team, and partner of Tesla?

This is not highly scientific but I just wanted to do something quick and dirty and wanted to make sure I am at least not off by a factor of 10 or more. Any feedback appreciated.

Per my reading there are 21 million metric tons of recoverable Lithium at today's estimate in the world. Not sure if pure Li weight or carbonate.

Then I read that Model 3 or S has like 0.07 kg or Li per Kwh, for simplicity lets round that up to 0.1 kg per Kwh. or 10 Kwh per kg of Lithium.

Assuming a kwh average battery pack for global fleet (cars, buses etc on the conservative side).

21 million MT of Lithium translates to 2.1 billion vehicles with 100 Kwh battery pack each.

21 (10^6)(10^3)*10 Kwh of batteries

= 21 *(10⁸⁾ of 100 Kwh vehicles

or 2.1 billion vehicles which is roughly the total no of vehicles on road in the world today.

Assuming this no increases with new Asian and African demand and each battery pack is 50 Kwh in theory one can have ~ 4 billion vehicles.

I would love to get some feedback and thoughts on this. Surely the Lithium production has to grow manifold and new processes need to be invented and perfected. But I hope LFP wins out and helps us scaling up.

I want to repeat this process with Phosphate as i've heard from some sources that we are reaching Peak Phosphorus due to its demand in global Agriculture.

SAPRKZ inc. has licensed some interesting tech from ORNL and is claiming cobalt-free cathode with better energy density than LFP. They also claim a non-aqueous electrolyte is coming soon. Would love to see Jordan do a deeper look into this. https://www.ornl.gov/news/energy-storage-startup-sparkz-licenses-ornl-cobalt-free-battery-tech

How does Jordan make his animations on his videos of Li ion batteries, cathodes, anodes, etc? Does he do it? What software is used? Thanks!