
Samsung Develops Battery Material with 5x Faster Charging Speed - nielsbjerg
https://news.samsung.com/global/samsung-develops-battery-material-with-5x-faster-charging-speed
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philipkglass
This looks closer to an industrial product than many new battery technology
announcements. The cathode chemistry isn't exotic. The efficiency is high and
stable (supplementary table 3). The rate capability is good. The specific
energy is quite good. The cycling stability is pretty good.

The trickiest part looks like the chemical vapor deposition of graphene onto
SiO2 nanoparticles. CVD is a slow growth process that I normally see applied
to creating precise, thin layers on flat substrates. I think it would be hard
to scale this up to industrial (tonne per day) quantities of coated particles.
Is it possible to replace that process with something like a fluidized bed
reactor? I'm out of my depth here regarding paths to scale-up -- I have a
chemistry background, but I'm not qualified to comment on most chemical
engineering.

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voldemort1968
"I'm out of my depth here"

Could have fooled me.

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throwawayjava
Chem != Chem Eng. I take your point though ;)

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djrogers
If even 10% of the battery 'breakthroughs' we've seen on these pages in the
past 5 years had come to fruition, we'd have 20Kw batteries that charge in 10
minutes on our phones. Oh, and they'd be 100% recyclable but that wouldn't
matter because they'd last for 100k cycles.

~~~
jacquesm
It's the exact same thing with solar panel technologies. But then if you look
at the long term, 10 or 20 years, you see that there really is an underlying
current (...) of steady improvements that eventually make it to the market or
that reduce cost. But the vast majority are hype.

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mark-r
"We always overestimate the change that will occur in the next two years and
underestimate the change that will occur in the next ten." \- Bill Gates

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njarboe
Most humans seem to understand linear growth pretty well. It is hard to get an
intuitive feel for exponential growth.

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wickawic
"The greatest shortcoming of the human race is our inability to understand the
exponential function.”

\- Al Bartlett

~~~
SomeStupidPoint
It's because we think in 3D, so we only really see three steps of exponential
growth.

If we thought in 100D, we might have a better sense for it, because we'd be
able to see a hundred of them.

Hypervolume grows exponentially.

One way to get a _really_ rough idea is to try and control each and every
joint individually.

Close your eyes and try to imagine that each joint, each muscle is a dimension
along which you can move (by moving it), and your posture at any given moment
is a point in that space. When you move, you make a line through it. Don't
_picture_ it, just _feel_ it.

What is the shape of that space?

You can get an idea of what exponential growth is like by exploring how the
shape of that space changes as you add more and more things you're
controlling.

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flatfilefan
An interesting way to look at human thinking patterns. Is there any book on
it?

I never completely figured out Aikido with it’s joint locks and levers. Maybe
talented aikidokas have a grater capacity to visualize/fill this type of
activity?

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Pamar
(Aikido SanDan, ~28 years of practice, still going to the dojo 3 times a
week).

Interesting point, but I don’t think Aikidoka have any special talent for
that: we use a small number of techniques and what changes is the way you use
them in response to different attacks/holds.

Also, you tend to work on your specific Ryu (school) technicsl curriculum and
nobody goes around “inventing” new locks.

(Some argue that Aikido is not really adapting to modern world nor cross-
pollinating with other martial arts due to -arguably excessive - reverence for
tradition).

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ficklepickle
Is it possible that this announcement explains the crazy recharge rates
announced during the Tesla truck unveil?

Experts were skeptical[1] that their recharge rates and capacity were possible
with current gen tech...unless Elon knew something they didn't.

[1] [https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-11-24/tesla-
s-n...](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-11-24/tesla-s-newest-
promises-break-the-laws-of-batteries)

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krolley
Experts are right to be skeptical that it's possible with current gen tech. As
usual, Musk is probably extrapolating charge speeds to when the truck will be
finally delivered, which is in what, 2020?

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saagarjha
> Additionally, the battery can maintain a highly stable 60 degree Celsius
> temperature, with stable battery temperatures particularly key for electric
> vehicles.

Isn't this only necessary because Lithium-Ion batteries need it to maintain
efficiency and longevity? Is this also an issue with graphene?

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mrguyorama
meanwhile if my phone maintained 60 degrees in my pocket, I'd be rather
unhappy

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Skunkleton
Equally interesting is the claim of increased capacity. I wonder how
impractical this is to manufacture?

Edit: better source here
[https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-017-01823-7](https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-017-01823-7)

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_grep_
So far there is no way to reliably mass produce graphene. There have been
claims in the last year or so that we're getting closer, but nothing real yet.

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agumonkey
instead of mass production let's have tiny production pods patent free so we
can all make the graphene

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pat2man
So scotch tape and pencils?

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agumonkey
Very low jab. There are other ways to generate graphene since, thank you.

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bufferoverflow
Graphene coatings for anodes/cathodes is something Robert Murray-Smith has
been talking about on YouTube for years, many people called him a scam artist,
even though he never tried to sell anything.

[https://youtube.com/user/RobertMurraySmith](https://youtube.com/user/RobertMurraySmith)

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userbinator
...and 5x shorter cycle life?

Observe the noticeable lack of any mention of how many cycles a cell will last
at this charge rate. It is well known that ordinary li-ion cell can be charged
extremely fast too, as long as you don't charge so fast it heats up rapidly
and goes into explosive thermal runaway, but it shortens the lifetime
considerably.

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Defenestresque
You probably missed it, but the nature.com article that some commenters have
referenced [1] has more details, including information on the charge rate.

> A full-cell incorporating graphene balls increases the volumetric energy
> density by 27.6% compared to a control cell without graphene balls, showing
> the possibility of achieving 800 Wh L−1 in a commercial cell setting, along
> with a high cyclability of 78.6% capacity retention after 500 cycles at 5C
> and 60 °C.

In your other comment you write:

>the standard is 80% capacity after 500 cycles at the normally specified (1C)
charge rate

So I'd say that's pretty good.

[1]
[https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-017-01823-7](https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-017-01823-7)

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dtx1
> A full-cell incorporating graphene balls increases the volumetric energy
> density by 27.6% compared to a control cell without graphene balls, showing
> the possibility of achieving 800 Wh L−1 in a commercial cell setting, along
> with a high cyclability of 78.6% capacity retention after 500 cycles at 5C
> and 60 °C.

Does that mean 5C Charge rate and > 5C Discharge? Because in the EV Market 5C
discharge would be borderline enough (I think Teslas 18650 discharge at a peak
of 20A per ~3,5Ah Cell so 5C Discharge would be cutting it very close.)

If it's 5C Charge and getting to 500 cycles with higher discharge then...woah.

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csours
So it seems that this cannot be immediately scaled. I wonder if Samsung/Apple
will incorporate this in a super-luxe phone, which could perhaps bring it to
scale.

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mark-r
I think the better application would be car batteries - you have huge
incentive for a really fast charge. Imagine charging the battery in the same
time it takes now to fill your gas tank!

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rurban
It's not new battery material. It's just a better anode coating with a
graphene layer, only a normal lithium-ion battery. Same strategy as most
improvements there. Means time to market could be much faster.

Problem is that this graphene layer is extremely thin, one atom. Mass-
production, what they claim to do, would be a killer app for much more than
just batteries, but for batteries it's the easiest win.

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m3kw9
What about the other rather important attributes like discharge rate, losses,
temperature stability?

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hwillis
Discharge rate appears similsrly improved (iirc), losses aren't really
dofferent, temperature stability is increased, cycle life is increased vs. no
additives, but they didnt test with additives.

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arnoooooo
Indeed, but you'll need to be able to supply the current. Tesla superchargers
are the exception; other than them, 50kW is the max you'll get.

For cars, having twice the capacity with the same charge speed would be
enough, since you can charge slowly when you sleep, what matters is that the
car can handle the distance you can travel in a day.

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matco11
...And suddenly, Tesla’s battery technology progress implied by the semi’s
announcement looks conservative

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AJRF
Painting the bike-shed here. We need capacity, not recharge speed.

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hwillis
Most people disagree. It's rare to drive >500 miles between charges, but most
people will want to spend less than 20 minutes charging when they want to go
long distances.

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executive
Is this the Galaxy Note 7?

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zeep
it used to be

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georgespencer
What could possibly go wrong

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marknadal
This is some explosive news! ;)

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Mrtierne
Whenever I see an announcement for battery technology I'm always just waiting
for Musk's reply.

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orliesaurus
Anyone else clicked this hoping Samsung would announce "a battery that won't
blow up your phone and will last more than your current battery" and then
reading the comments felt every single one of those dreams and hopes being
shattered, one by one?...

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orliesaurus
Welp I guess I was the only one

