Misuse Case@GhostOnTheHalfShell @Ilka4You @azonenberg @petergleick People be like “sunshine is free and it’s everywhere,” but the rare earths for making solar panels and batteries are not.
Connor Cadellin@MisuseCase @GhostOnTheHalfShell @Ilka4You @azonenberg @petergleick on the battery front there's been progress recently on sodium ion, which doesn't require rare earth metals. The first sodium ion EV is launching this year.
@cadellin @GhostOnTheHalfShell @Ilka4You @azonenberg @petergleick Well if we could stop using lithium and cobalt mined with child slave labor that would be nice.
Valdus@MisuseCase
For grid storage, lithium ion batteries, which contain cobalt and nickel, aren't suitable. Lithium iron phosphate has only lithium as a rare mineral, so it's cheaper, and it's also more durable, safer, and more cold tolerant, so it's already becoming the default for all large scale batteries. And even the lithium is eliminated in sodium batteries, which improve again upon cost, durability, safety, and cold temperature performance; they lose out on energy density, but noone cares about that for grid storage.
@cadellin @GhostOnTheHalfShell @Ilka4You @azonenberg @petergleick
For grid storage, lithium ion batteries, which contain cobalt and nickel, aren't suitable. Lithium iron phosphate has only lithium as a rare mineral, so it's cheaper, and it's also more durable, safer, and more cold tolerant, so it's already becoming the default for all large scale batteries. And even the lithium is eliminated in sodium batteries, which improve again upon cost, durability, safety, and cold temperature performance; they lose out on energy density, but noone cares about that for grid storage.
@cadellin @GhostOnTheHalfShell @Ilka4You @azonenberg @petergleick