[HN Gopher] BYD has already produced its first solid-state cells
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BYD has already produced its first solid-state cells
Author : teleforce
Score : 204 points
Date : 2025-02-23 12:04 UTC (10 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.electrive.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.electrive.com)
| jmisavage wrote:
| This is just pilot production is the first of many steps towards
| mass production. They don't expect actual production until 2027.
|
| It even mentions that CATL is at roughly the same stage. So while
| good news its still going to take some time to get these into
| production cars and to get the costs down.
| jillesvangurp wrote:
| Exactly. In order to be able to start production in 2027 they'd
| have to logically be quite far with the development of their
| battery cells to be able to say with confidence they'll be
| ready for that in 2027. You see the same with announcements
| from other manufacturers like CATL, Factorial, Quantumscape,
| Toyota, etc. Most of these are talking about timelines from
| 2026-2028 currently.
|
| They have each been testing battery samples for years and
| making announcements about roughly where they think they'll be
| going to production. It's not like battery cells suddenly pop
| into existence fully formed and ready to go. There's a lot of
| work and problem solving that needs to happen.
|
| 2027 isn't when mass production starts but when early, low
| volume production begins. It takes time, and many billions, to
| build large scale factories. They'll want to see low scale
| production work first. Early batteries are likely to be scarce
| and expensive for a while.
|
| People have unrealistic expectations about solid state
| batteries in general. Currently the best selling batteries
| aren't those with the highest density but those with the lowest
| cost of materials and production. That's why LFP is so popular
| currently. Solid state won't change that. LFP will be widely
| used for years to come. A logical place for relatively
| expensive early solid state batteries to be used would be in
| aviation related use cases and maybe some high-end vehicles or
| sports cars. Forget about these showing up in budget cars
| anytime soon.
| audunw wrote:
| Isn't quantum scape at a similar stage as well?
| Gareth321 wrote:
| And Toyota: https://electrek.co/2024/01/11/toyota-solid-
| state-ev-battery...
|
| I'm hopeful that in the next few years we will see some
| serious range improvements across the board with EVs. Then
| mass adoption really takes off.
| underseacables wrote:
| _According to the battery business CTO, BYD expects to start
| "mass demonstration" of solid-state batteries around 2027.
| However, he did not provide any information on the number of
| prototype cells produced to date._
|
| Awesome if true, but I'll believe it when I see it. Until then
| like similar announcements from Toyota and others, I'll hold my
| enthusiasm.
| cmrdporcupine wrote:
| at least BYD is mass producing lithium-ion consumer vehicles in
| the interim.
|
| Toyota is just spreading FUD as a delay tactic and milking the
| petroleum cow
| readthenotes1 wrote:
| It is another Better Battery Bulletin
| mi_lk wrote:
| > In theory, replacing the current liquid electrolyte in a
| battery cell with a solid offers a number of advantages. As the
| flammable liquid electrolyte is no longer required, solid-state
| cells are generally safer. At the same time, higher energy
| densities and more power are possible, resulting in a longer
| range and shorter charging times.
|
| In case you wonder why it can be important
| uxhacker wrote:
| What difficult to find metals do these batteries need?
| throw-qqqqq wrote:
| Maybe this can satisfy your curiosity:
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solid-
| state_battery#Material... ?
| sebazzz wrote:
| It doesn't however mean this battery won't go up in flames when
| there is an unprotected short. It has X kWh stored in it that
| must and will be released in a way when a short happens.
| louwrentius wrote:
| > However, BYD does not expect series production in the near
| future.
|
| That's the most important part of this article I believe.
| Animats wrote:
| Yes. Solid state battery prototypes do work and are available
| as expensive prototypes, but nobody has a low-cost volume
| production process yet.
|
| Here's the lab-scale process of making a solid state cell, from
| the Fraunhofer Institute.[1] This is how different battery
| chemistries are tried.
|
| Honda has announced that they have a demo version of their
| solid state battery pilot plant in test.[2] There are low-
| detail pictures of the interior of the plant.
|
| Hyundai has announced that they will show their prototype solid
| state battery on March 9. They have built a pilot plant.
| They're thinking motorcycles before cars.
|
| EHang demoed a version of their flying car with solid state
| batteries a few months ago.[3] They got 48 minutes of flight
| time. (EHang's flying car is a scaled-up battery powered
| quadrotor drone with 16 props. They've been flying them for
| years now, but flight time was too short for it to be useful.)
|
| CATL says that the maturity of the process is at 4 on a scale
| of 9.[4] Large amounts of money are being spent in multiple
| countries to push this technology through to production.
|
| [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j5SVrp8N-1M
|
| [2] https://www.motorcyclenews.com/news/new-
| tech/2025/january/ho...
|
| [3] https://www.ehang.com/news/1137.html
|
| [4] https://www.batteriesinternational.com/2024/11/11/catl-
| bet-o...
| ksec wrote:
| Considering Lithium 'semi-solid-state battery' (SSSB) already
| does 25% to 45% higher capacity with roadmap at 55% next year and
| double the battery capacity before 2030. I wonder what could we
| expect from 'all-solid-state batteries' (ASSB).
|
| Most people think current AI development is the most important
| research, I actually think ASSB ( or any massive battery
| improvement ) would bring us far more real life, quality
| improvement with things that previously were not possible.
| baq wrote:
| Economically viable safe methane fuel cells would be
| revolutionary, too.
| number6 wrote:
| Fusion!
| audunw wrote:
| If we're could get a breakthrough in fuel cells it'd be even
| nicer if it was an efficient fuel cell for a liquid fuel. And
| to get an efficient way to make it from CO2 and electricity.
|
| Though I think for ground transportation, batteries will
| always be preferable.
| tastyfreeze wrote:
| Direct methanol fuel cells are a thing. It may not fit your
| definition of efficient but that is the technology I think
| should be pursued. There are multiple biological, chemical
| and electrochemical pathways to produce methanol. That
| means that there could be an economic way to produce it
| nearly everywhere.
|
| Another interesting technology is redox flow batteries. The
| fluid itself is charged. Fluid storage can be sized to the
| charge/use requirements. Or you can haul in "charged"
| fluid. But since the fluid is not consumed, discharged
| fluid would need to be taken away. Making hauling is less
| efficient.
| AtlasBarfed wrote:
| Still releases carbon. Better than ICE and gasoline, but the
| cheapest methane is still from the ground.
| Svoka wrote:
| I believe fuel cells with ubiquity of electricity is just
| beating the dead horse. Like, what are cons and pros?
|
| EVs: + Much simpler design +
| Literally zero maintenance required + Centralized
| power production is extremely efficient + Power
| production can be 100% carbon free in 10 years, if there's
| will with nuclear and other 'renewables' + Can be
| charged literally everywhere where's sun in theory, but in
| every home with outlet in practice + Batteries are
| crucial to every part of our tech today so they will become
| better - Heavy (low energy density compared to fuel,
| which isn't great for planes etc)
|
| Fuel Cells: + high energy density +
| less dirty than gasoline + allow oil producers to
| stay in business + keeps mechanics in business
| - requires mechanics and expensive maintenance -
| complex designs for combustion engines + gearboxes + drive
| trains - requires immense infrastructure change to
| adopt
|
| Unless I miss something. What is the point of fuel
| cells/combustion engines for consumer use? I understand there
| are applications where energy density is necessary, like
| cargo ships, rockets or airplanes. Otherwise, seems like a
| welfare program for industries built around resource
| extraction and complicated machinery.
|
| But for consumers, what is the point of fuel cells? This is
| honest question.
|
| If I missed some con/pro let me know I'll add it.
| danans wrote:
| > Otherwise, seems like a welfare program for industries
| built around resource extraction and complicated machinery.
|
| You say this dismissively, but that's exactly what it is.
|
| The basic problem with renewable energy (especially solar
| and batteries) is that there is no way for the existing
| fossil energy industry to replicate the extractive
| oligopolies around the production, delivery, and
| utilization of energy that they have with oil and gas.
| Svoka wrote:
| I am not saying it dismissively. As you could see this is
| a "pro" point in my list. I honestly recognize that it's
| a transition. But IMO better option is to have hybrid
| type EV with smaller battery + Fuel Cell generator.
|
| Or just throw away combustion engines where they are not
| needed.
| danans wrote:
| > But IMO better option is to have hybrid type EV with
| smaller battery + Fuel Cell generator.
|
| That's exactly what fuel cell vehicles are today. They
| just don't have a plug or a battery with enough capacity
| to make a plug worthwhile.
| davedx wrote:
| Meh, we need better charging networks more than we need better
| battery chemistry at this point.
| smegger001 wrote:
| fortunately we can do two things
| johanvts wrote:
| For cars I agree, but a significant energy density
| improvement would enable aviation and other fields to
| electrify.
| SideburnsOfDoom wrote:
| These are 2 different things; "better batteries" is
| scientific and engineering breakthroughs. Engineering in the
| sense of building them in on time, in quantity, to quality
| and on a budget.
|
| "Better charging networks" is infrastructure rollout that is
| underway. If it's an engineering issue, it's civil
| engineering. Charging networks are on the whole continually
| getting better. But maybe not at a fast enough pace.
|
| Both can happen, though. Both would make a difference.
| prododev wrote:
| Better batteries require less frequent charging, reducing
| pressure on networks. But also, better batteries enable
| electrification of other modes of transport much more easily.
| Cars are bad, electric cars are at best "less bad".
| Gareth321 wrote:
| I disagree. Range anxiety is one of the top concerns for EV
| car buyers and telling them they can just charge more
| frequently won't assuage their fears, for many reasons. No
| matter how many stations we build (at enormous cost) there
| will inevitably be issues related to access from time to
| time. Today this presents as chargers offline, slow, or full
| with queues. Worst of all is that no matter how ubiquitous,
| one still needs to exit the freeway and navigate to one of
| these chargers. Today my Model Y gets about two hours on the
| Autobahn before I need to charge it. That's just not enough,
| and it has what is considered good range for an EV.
|
| There are undoubtedly people who like to take frequent
| breaks. Many people are not like that. The future is _both_
| ubiquitous chargers _and_ much larger battery capacity.
| AtlasBarfed wrote:
| I'm not THAT pessimistic about buildout of charging if it
| was a politically rational era, but the Ramcharger style
| 50-100 mile PHEV really is a great compromise for EV
| transitions.
|
| We should have mandated PHEVs 20 years ago for consumer
| cars (you know, with a 5-10 year transition period), but it
| was the Bush administration. Then again Obama and Biden
| didn't do that much either, and even California didn't do
| and still hasn't.
| arghwhat wrote:
| Two hours at the Autobahn is just 200-250km in what is
| effectively optimal conditions (steady driving over long
| distances). That number doesn't check out.
|
| Most people drive significantly less than a full charge in
| a given day. Overnight or workplace charging solves like,
| 95% of car needs. And remember, it's not much of a problem
| if 5% or less of road cars need to still be (efficient)
| fossil fuel cars.
|
| Battery advances should mainly be used to make cars lighter
| at decent range, not to give more range at same weight.
| Electric cars are too heavy in the current state, fixing
| that should come first.
| ipsi wrote:
| That matches my experience, in an admittedly slightly
| older car. Note that you'll rarely be charging over 80%
| because it's just too slow, and going under 5-10% is a
| bit too stressful, so practical range is probably 70-75%
| of maximum on longer trips. Less if it's winter and/or
| the AC is running.
|
| If I could rely on every Rasthof having multiple
| functional EV chargers, I think range anxiety would be
| far, far less of an issue for me, but as of now it's
| something that I do think about for longer trips, and do
| have to plan for.
| Svoka wrote:
| why not charge it to 100% for a long trip? It literally
| says to do so.
| michpoch wrote:
| Because you'll spend ages at the charging station?
| Svoka wrote:
| I had a road trip, and pretty much all the time I got
| 95-100% charge while having lunch with supercharges,
| which are everywhere. It takes 30 minutes to do it.
| michpoch wrote:
| So how many 30 minutes lunches are you having? One every
| 2 hours?
|
| > supercharges, which are everywhere
|
| Not really? That's the whole point, that the availability
| of fast chargers is still very low.
| mikeyouse wrote:
| Of course you start the trip off at 100%, but the point
| is that charging speed varies substantially based on the
| SoC in the battery. So if you deplete most of your charge
| and need to stop, recharging to 80% takes substantially
| less time than topping it off to 100%. So if your battery
| range is 300 miles, you might get 280 on the first leg of
| your trip but will only be able to do maybe 220 on the
| second leg.
| Svoka wrote:
| Answered different thread - superchargers get from 5-10%
| to 95-100% in line 30 minutes. When we are on roadtrips I
| often have to go and unplug it so I don't get extra
| charges for idle. I know superchargers are not
| everywhere.
| Svoka wrote:
| So I did a roadtrip recently on my EV. It was over 7000km.
| Not once I experienced any of issues you describe. I agree
| I drive below 120 km/h per speed limits where I live.
|
| Also, I don't believe you. How do you manage to spend whole
| battery in hours? Two hours on autobahn driving 90-120km/h
| in city zones or just plain stuck in traffic because of
| construction is like 30% at best. May be 50% if you're
| lucky.
| dkjaudyeqooe wrote:
| By driving between 200 and 300km/h which is common enough
| on the autobahn. It's the most important factor and he
| doesn't mention it. EVs lose efficiency as speed
| increases due to wind resistance.
| skellington wrote:
| Hard disagree (as a person that owns EV).
|
| While it's true that most people don't drive that far daily,
| it's also true that most people want their cars to be
| multipurpose.
|
| Most EVs can only be time-efficiently charged to 80% while DC
| fast charging because the charge curve drops a lot.
|
| And nobody want the pucker factor of getting much below 10%
| while road tripping.
|
| So, you're really only working with 70% of the max range. At
| 'normal' freeway speeds of 70mph+, most EV max ranges are
| less than 300 miles, and 70% of that is 210 usable miles.
|
| You can make it work, but it feels like you're always
| managing and thinking about charge level vs a car which
| usually has 400+ miles of range on the freeway.
|
| IMO the base range for EVs needs to be 500 miles, to get 350
| miles of usable range, plus 350kW+ charging so charge stops
| are 10 minutes ish. And the Chinese EV companies have 400kW+
| charging cars already, with announcements for 600kW charging!
|
| So battery energy density is critical to getting the range
| that people want without making the cars even heavier.
| surajrmal wrote:
| There are a lot of other potential wins here : lighter cars
| meaning less road and tire wear, cheaper evs, lower crash
| fatalities, etc.
| SebFender wrote:
| In the next few years you'll witness AI won't be so
| important... true advancement is always energy management.
| dartos wrote:
| > true advancement is always energy management
|
| Idk about that, but yeah I agree AI has got a good 3-5 years
| left in its hype run.
| Mistletoe wrote:
| I'm not that optimistic I'm just hoping it makes it to the
| end of the year.
| x______________ wrote:
| Does this hypothesis take into consideration that we're on
| a 3rd leg of this current 'graphics card' hype run with
| crypto & blockchain at the front, and NFTs immediately
| after?
|
| -x
| dkjaudyeqooe wrote:
| With the fanciful claims about the imminent arrival of AGI,
| that seems unlikely. It'll probably crash and burn in a
| year or two as top line performance suffers.
|
| The good news is that low spec performance is a rich area
| for improvement and it's progressing very nicely.
| mannders wrote:
| IMO AI was extremely important, but the breakthroughs are
| mostly done. I'm just expecting incremental improvements with
| LLMs now.
|
| A Turing complete personal tutor to explain any concept
| already exists. You can prompt a logo or video into
| existence. This is crazy.
|
| The real value will be the creative people who use AI to self
| teach and build real world value, like energy management, or
| anything else.
|
| Not this pipe dream that AGI will be achieved and automate
| the entire world, which for some reason gets so much focus.
| Seems like procrastination to obsess over this.
| rusk wrote:
| > AGI will be achieved and automate the entire world
|
| That's what's driving investment. Once the next AI winter
| descends we will see whose boats are in deep water.
| mrshadowgoose wrote:
| At the start of 2021, "we are entering another AI winter"
| was a common sentiment, even here. People proclaiming
| that were so very certain about that point of view, and
| yet, here we are.
|
| What makes you so certain that we will enter an AI winter
| before reaching the threshold of AGI? Do you have some
| secret insights into the mechanisms of general
| intelligence that you aren't sharing with the class?
| rusk wrote:
| AI winters happen every 20 years or so so sounds about
| right.
|
| Investor apathy. Once the big dicks realise it's useless
| without actual humans running it they'll lose interest.
| We will lock in our gains socially but a lot of the big
| bucks will dry up.
|
| It's all built on commodity hardware using commonly used
| software and trained on public information. It's all
| easily reproducible once solved so I think it will be
| very hard for them to ring fence and monetise to the
| extent that they expect.
|
| That and a true AI would tell us all roundly to get
| fucked before using all of its intellect and might to
| power itself down, like an elaborate "useless box"
| nicoburns wrote:
| The actual results of AIs in the last fews aren't
| matching the scale of investment or hype. That isn't to
| say there haven't been useful results, but overall
| investors aren't making a return on their investments
| (and there is no prospect of that in the short term) and
| at some point they'll lose patience and find something
| else to invest in.
|
| > Do you have some secret insights into the mechanisms of
| general intelligence that you aren't sharing with the
| class?
|
| I do know that "natural intelligence" (as found in the
| brains of humans and other animals) uses orders of
| magnitude more computing power than even our largest
| compute clusters, that such intelligences have been
| trained over millennia, (and in the case of humans, each
| instance is incrementally refined over the course of 10+
| years), and that even those intelligences are not as good
| as classical computers at some tasks (people make
| mistakes, and a hypothetical AGI likely would too).
|
| Perhaps we'll find some secret that allows us to shortcut
| that, but I suspect the idea that such a discovery is
| just around corner is just hubris.
| omgJustTest wrote:
| Grid scale batteries would immediately impact electricity
| costs. The potential is 2/3 of the cost of current electricity
| costs.
| Mistletoe wrote:
| Am I being too pessimistic to think we would actually get the
| same electricity costs if we are lucky and 1/3 more profits
| going up to the executive portion of the company?
| haliskerbas wrote:
| It could even go up, the customers will cover the cost of
| transitioning to new tech!
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| If you have enough space for distributed solar generation,
| you buy the batteries and go off grid (if your local
| jurisdiction will allow it; if they don't, prepare to
| politik and fight for the right to so you're not trapped
| into their profit extraction through local code and/or
| financial and regulatory mechanisms [see below citations]).
|
| _The Secret Society Raising Your Electricity Bills_ -
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43151865 - Feb 2023
|
| https://prospect.org/environment/2025-02-21-secret-
| society-r...
| superturkey650 wrote:
| I think the most likely case is that electricity prices go
| down but demand goes up as devices more eagerly use power
| so you end up with an electricity bill that stays
| consistent.
| Scaevolus wrote:
| Grid scale batteries are not very sensitive to energy
| density. Car batteries are very sensitive to it.
| fnord77 wrote:
| > A truly large-scale introduction of solid-state batteries could
| possibly only take place after 2030, Sun is quoted in the reports
|
| So they're a bit behind Toyota
| SideburnsOfDoom wrote:
| Everyone else is behind Toyota in promising EV breakthroughs
| "any year now". Announcements are their main EV product.
| andy_xor_andrew wrote:
| on this topic, I have been wondering lately - what's with China's
| dominance in the battery science area?
|
| Is it still true that they're the only ones who can make LiFePO
| batteries? Is anyone else working on production of these?
|
| What accounts for this gap - patents (ha), secret research,
| materials, manufacturing prowess, all of the above?
| bergie wrote:
| > What accounts for this gap - patents (ha)
|
| China has been the country filing the most patents for a while
| now.
|
| "While innovators from China continue to file nearly half of
| all global patent applications, the country's growth rate
| dipped for a second consecutive year from 6.8% in 2021 to 3.1%
| in 2022. Meantime, patent applications by residents of India
| grew by 31.6% in 2022, extending an 11-year run of growth
| unmatched by any other country among the top 10 filers."
| https://www.wipo.int/pressroom/en/articles/2023/article_0013...
| tim333 wrote:
| There's a little more background in
| https://cnevpost.com/2025/02/15/byd-demonstration-use-all-so...
|
| In April 2024, CATL said the were working on prototypes and made
| some by Nov.
|
| They were saying conventional batteries topped out at 350 Wh/kg
| while solid state could potentially go to 500+
|
| BYD's tech is similar based on sulfide electrolytes.
|
| They still seem to have problems with cost and making them in
| volume.
| wordofx wrote:
| Now they just need to build a decent car.
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(page generated 2025-02-23 23:01 UTC)