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Super-dense lithium-sulfur battery gives electric plane a 230-mile range:
British company Oxis says it's developed safe, high-density lithium-sulfur battery chemistry and will supply Texas Aircraft Manufacturing with a 90-kWh, next-gen battery pack to power the eColt, an electric aircraft with a two hour, 230-mile range.
[...] In practice, they have had issues – notably with the old chestnut of dendrite formation, in which ion deposits on the anode grow into long spikes of conductive material that short circuit the cell and cause it to catch fire. The lithium-metal anodes also tend to degrade in less dangerous ways that eventually just make the batteries die.
In a piece written for IEEE Spectrum, Oxis head of battery development Mark Crittenden details how his team is addressing these problems with a thin layer of ceramic material at the anode, and it's resulting in high-energy cells with significantly longer lifespans than previous Li-S designs.
"Typical lithium-ion designs can hold from 100 to 265 Wh/kg, depending on the other performance characteristics for which it has been optimized, such as peak power or long life," writes Crittenden. "Oxis recently developed a prototype lithium-sulfur pouch cell that proved capable of 470 Wh/kg, and we expect to reach 500 Wh/kg within a year. And because the technology is still new and has room for improvement, it's not unreasonable to anticipate 600 Wh/kg by 2025."
Still needs work on the limited number of number of charge cycles.
(Score: 2) by requerdanos on Friday August 21 2020, @08:37PM (1 child)
The fire outcome can't happen all that often, if they say that the technology is safe for aircraft, right?
(Score: 2) by VLM on Saturday August 22 2020, @02:28PM
Put the batteries in drop tanks?
(Score: 2, Troll) by DannyB on Friday August 21 2020, @08:40PM (2 children)
That's enough range to get up to a few thousand feet and then need to land again reel soon.
When trying to solve a problem don't ask who suffers from the problem, ask who profits from the problem.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Friday August 21 2020, @08:52PM (1 child)
Only need to go that far to make them profitable. Combine that with reduced pollution (low altitude, high emission 4-6 cylinder opposing piston engines) and the market is there. Plus based on their prototype numbers, they could have replacement batteries capable of 500 miles within a few years and if you can engineer in the additional weight in a balanced format into the airframe, a 1000 mile ranged all electric plane is in the cards. An electrical fault could become a safety issue in the future, but already this will reduce the number of components that can fail, the weight of redundant systems for components other than the engine or battery packs, and provide a reduced maintenance burden and thus cost for people who frequently commute by plane.
This could be a game changer, although as with all battery technology cost and time to market will be critical.
(Score: 2) by requerdanos on Friday August 21 2020, @10:15PM
I must heartily agree. From the summary:
To put that into context: blah blah chestnuts ions anode dendrite the plane is on fire.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday August 21 2020, @08:58PM
Dr. Emmett Brown: Oh, my God. They found me. I don't know how, but they found me. Run for it, Marty!
Marty McFly: Who? Who?
Dr. Emmett Brown: Who do you think? THE LITHIUMS!
Marty McFly: HOLY SHIT!
(Score: 0, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Friday August 21 2020, @09:06PM (7 children)
This is about as practical for aviation as fitting the aircraft with a really long power cord.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday August 21 2020, @09:27PM
Somehow, I was thinking of bombers.
When the batteries catch fire midflight, bombs away!
(Score: 2) by requerdanos on Friday August 21 2020, @10:28PM
The not-so-practical prize might go, however, to The Aircraft Reactor Experiment [chemixlab.com]...
More at Wikipedia [wikipedia.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday August 21 2020, @11:27PM (1 child)
yes but the weight of it will drag the plane down so you need to have the wire suspended up in the sky above the plane on balloons.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 22 2020, @02:14AM
But it would't be so heavy with out all the shielding. Would be perfect for bots, though.
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 22 2020, @12:06AM (1 child)
Which fool downmodded the parent?
Anyways, I see the wily coyote riding this plane to hunt the road runner, and the road runner standing over the cord with scissors.
(Score: 2) by HiThere on Saturday August 22 2020, @03:45AM
One of the rules is supposed to be that the road runner never leaves the road. Also that all the coyote's devices are made by ACME.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 2) by VLM on Saturday August 22 2020, @02:36PM
Air Freight don't care as long as Amazon centers are less than 230 miles apart.
I suspect you'll see this for stuff like Amazon Fresh produce. Why would Amazon pay downtown Chicago warehouse food dealer middlemen prices for fresh blueberries when they can fly blueberries direct off the fields in Michigan for zero fuel cost?
Crappy logistics with tons of slow moving middlemen get me decent edible Florida oranges today. Who knows what'll happen when Amazon logistics meets cheap electric air freight. An obvious example is I'd be wary of online delivery of fresh seafood right now. But if Amazon could guarantee my seafood was in the ocean less than six hours before it landed on my porch ...
The 2020s look to be a bad time to be a middleman in general.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Friday August 21 2020, @09:51PM (1 child)
Most flight lessons are about an hour. And fuel is one of the biggest expenses of flight training. Often overlooked is that the fuel used is leaded, even though the aircraft generally don't need that.
For practical use, electric is worthless for aircraft, but maybe it's ok for flight training.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Spamalope on Saturday August 22 2020, @12:34AM
That's spot on, recreational local flying and lessons are practical at this stage provided the batter life/expense is an advance over gas. This feels like a toe in the doorway to develop the tech (& possibly patents) while batteries advance. Either lower weight or higher power density helps, so they've got two ways to win with newer battery tech.
(Score: 3, Funny) by Snotnose on Friday August 21 2020, @10:59PM (1 child)
the 5 mile altitude until they hit the ground with dead batteries? I'm guessing that will give them an extra 15-20 miles, which is a significant percentage of what they're claiming.
Maybe off topic, but I remember a 90s video game. The goal was to get people to ride your rides and not kill anyone. I built a roller coaster ski slope that launched passengers into the competition's park. I got points for getting people to ride my ride, the computer lost points for killing people. This was way before you could play another person over the internet.
When the dust settled America realized it was saved by a porn star.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 22 2020, @09:55PM
Also does it count ejecting the battery after it's dead?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday August 21 2020, @11:10PM (3 children)
Let's ignore for a moment that range is limited, and accept that technology will improve with time. Batteries will store more energy per kg, last more cycles, recharge faster, be safer, etc, etc
This still leaves us with the not so small disadvantage of heavy batteries which don't get any lighter as they are "used up". Landing weight is an issue. Flight efficiency carrying extra weight is an issue.
What if the battery was designed as divided segments. Each segment is discharged in turn until the last segment remains. Further more, what if drained battery segments could be ditched, mid flight in a controlled manner. Some kind of automated para-foil recovery system that guides the drained battery safely to a pickup field for recovery and recharge. Maybe all at once on landing approach lightening the landing load to that of a comparable fuel powered aircraft. Maybe at designated points mid flight to reduce the trip flying weight. Or just after takeoff to dump the weight of the power used to get the plane off the ground up to flying altitude.
What if airports were equipped with a catapult system to eliminate the takeoff power requirements to begin with (something that could be done with today's fuel powered aircraft). Imagine a 747 getting slingshot into the air (gently and smoothly) at such a speed that it has enough momentum to gain considerable altitude before requiring it's own thrust to keep moving. This is not your average carrier deck catapult.
Electric flight may revolutionize aviation. It will look very different from the fuel driven aviation design that's been perfected up until now. We have to start looking at the problem in new ways.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday August 21 2020, @11:28PM (1 child)
They could use tugs to tow airliners between the gate and the runway, but they don't. This involves a lot less trouble than trying to do a catapult launch, which exactly zero airliners or airports are designed for. Airliner engines are painfully inefficient on the ground.
It is against the law to drop uncontrolled objects from an aircraft, except under specific circumstances. Aircraft are never dropping their batteries. The military uses drop tanks, but they don't drop them over Los Angeles.
Weight in mid flight is basically not a factor at all. Weight at takeoff matters a lot.
Before electric aircraft can revolutionize aviation, they have to be revolutionized themselves, because batteries are not remotely competitive with jet fuel.
(Score: 2) by MostCynical on Friday August 21 2020, @11:37PM
. . you missed the qualifier: for now [stanford.edu]
"I guess once you start doubting, there's no end to it." -Batou, Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 22 2020, @12:10AM
Still within the box, from tfa, "...a 90-kWh, next-gen battery pack".
That is equivalent to about 120 horsepower for an hour (given high efficiency electric motors). Or 60 hp for 2 hours, which is what I expect they do to get the quoted range. Perhaps they use 120+ hp on takeoff for a few minutes?
This is not much of a plane at all, roughly comparable to the canonical Cessna trainers, here's a story on the latest version: https://www.aopa.org/community/flying-clubs/flying-club-newsletter/2017/november/19/aircraft-spotlight [aopa.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 22 2020, @02:49AM (4 children)
Since the average floatplane charter is about a 30 minute flight at about 120 knots, this would get you to destination, a return to base, with plenty of reserve. Why do people think that all flying is done with 747's, crossing continents and oceans ?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 22 2020, @05:50AM (2 children)
That sounds like an environment that is "bush", i.e., not well connected to civilization. Electrical generation tends to not be robust or high capacity. Electricity may even be produced by burning liquid fuels. This is not an environment that favors electric planes over liquid fueled planes. Plus the plane will be inflexible in its uses because of short range; such environments favor very flexible vehicles.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by janrinok on Saturday August 22 2020, @07:19AM
While I cannot disagree with any of your statements per se, just imagine what would have happened to space exploration if scientists had had the same mental attitude. "Nah, it's too difficult, we shouldn't even try....".
If Henry Ford had believed those who said that people couldn't breathe if the vehicle went faster than about 15mph then where would we be today?
Problems are there to be solved, difficulties to be overcome, and progress is made by fighting through the setbacks and not by stopping at the first hurdle.
Well today one end of the flight must be in a place that is civilised enough to maintain ICE, provide fuel and, presumably, there are some people too.
...today. But every major city in every country did not come into being at the time of the big bang. People built the infrastructure and, over time, there is no reason why electrical generation cannot be provided if there is a demand for it.
If you read back a few comments there are some here arguing that this is what makes the aircraft more suitable to this environment, not less.
(Score: 2) by VLM on Saturday August 22 2020, @02:48PM
Interesting thing to think about is "middle of nowhere" usually has cheap land. So solar panels costing less than $/watt and aviation being a rich man's hobby to begin with, would not be terribly surprised to see bush camps with huge solar arrays in the future.
Real estate is too expensive to solar charge jets at OHare International, and there's too much traffic. But some farm camp with a modestly large non-aviation rated battery bank and solar panels on free land on the ground could easily top off the small bush plane every time it visits. I'm sure the locals would appreciate free silent electricity aside from keeping the bush pilots plane charged up.
(Score: 2) by VLM on Saturday August 22 2020, @02:44PM
The helicopter flight from Manhattan to JFK is eight minutes and about $200 burning jet turbine fuel, today.
Note that its a $57 flat fare to take a one hour+ taxi ride on the same trip, so the helo is not THAT extravagant. Your average hotel in Manhatten costs more than the helo flight per night.
I'm just saying I would not want to be a taxi driver with legally mandated $57 flat fee when the electric competition hooks up to a USB-C cable for two minutes then lands me at JFK eight minutes later.