Wall Street Journal: “The Battery Is Ready to Power the World”
February 7th, 2021While everyone has heard of Elon Musk, relatively few have heard of Tesla co-founder, J. B. Straubel, who, to put it bluntly, was the “brains” behind the operation. In 2017, Straubel founded Redwood Materials. The company is going to recycle automotive battery packs on a large scale.
I thought that it was very interesting and illuminating to see Straubel mostly step back from Tesla in order to focus on battery recycling. It indicates that the issues and opportunities with battery recycling are extremely difficult, but potentially rewarding.
Although Tesla’s lead over the rest of the energy storage industry may be insurmountable, even Tesla has been unable to scale battery production to meet demand. Several products are on hold due to unavailability of cells.
Keep an eye on Straubel and Redwood Materials. That’s a huge and mostly ignored story.
Of course, The Wall Street Journal piece below doesn’t mention them.
Via: Wall Street Journal:
After a decade of rapidly falling costs, the battery has reached a tipping point. No longer just for consumer products, it is poised to transform the way the world uses power.
In the energy sector, affordable batteries are making it possible for companies to store electricity and harvest renewable power. In the auto industry, they are set to challenge the gas-powered engine’s centurylong domination. Costs have come down so far and so fast that most car makers expect that electric vehicles, which are currently more expensive than their gas-powered counterparts, will cost the same amount to build within the next five years.
The gains are likely to continue. Electric vehicles are currently the main source of demand for battery cells. As demand grows and costs fall further, batteries will become even more disruptive across industries. Batteries recently scored a win at General Motors Co., which said it hoped to phase out gasoline- and diesel-powered vehicles from its showrooms world-wide by 2035.
The battery boom could erode demand for crude oil and byproducts such as gasoline—as well as for natural gas, which is primarily used in power plants.
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The rise of rechargeable batteries is now a matter of national security and industrial policy. Control of the minerals and manufacturing processes needed to make lithium-ion batteries is the 21st-century version of oil security.
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In recent years, prices have fallen more quickly than expected due to demand from auto makers. Electric vehicle battery packs and motors currently cost about $4,000 more to manufacture than a comparable fossil fuel-burning midsize sedan engine. By 2022, the difference will be $1,900—and will disappear by mid-decade, according to investment bank UBS Group AG.
Ken Morris, the head of electric vehicles at GM, said in September he expects cost parity in five years. Auto makers such as Volkswagen AG, Tesla Inc. and GM are pushing battery prices down further as they race to lock up the giant capacity needed to power millions of EVs. The rise of electric transportation is also drawing in some of the biggest tech companies, including Apple and Amazon.com Inc.
China’s Space Probe Sends Back First Image of Mars
February 7th, 2021Via: AFP:
China’s Tianwen-1 probe has sent back its first image of Mars, the national space agency said, as the mission prepares to touch down on the Red Planet later this year.
The spacecraft, launched in July around the same time as a rival US mission, is expected to enter Mars orbit around February 10.
The black-and-white photo released late Friday by the China National Space Administration showed geological features including the Schiaparelli crater and the Valles Marineris, a vast stretch of canyons on the Martian surface.
The photo was taken about 2.2 million kilometres (1.4 million miles) from Mars, according to CNSA, which said the spacecraft was now 1.1 million kilometres from the planet.
The robotic craft ignited one of its engines to “make an orbital correction” Friday and was expected to slow down before being “captured by Martian gravity” around February 10, the agency said.
The five-tonne Tianwen-1 includes a Mars orbiter, a lander and a rover that will study the planet’s soil.
China hopes to ultimately land the rover in May in Utopia, a massive impact basin on Mars.
New Quantum Receiver the First to Detect Entire Radio Frequency Spectrum
February 7th, 2021Via: phys.org:
A new quantum sensor can analyze the full spectrum of radio frequency and real-world signals, unleashing new potentials for soldier communications, spectrum awareness and electronic warfare.
Army researchers built the quantum sensor, which can sample the radio-frequency spectrum—from zero frequency up to 20 GHz—and detect AM and FM radio, Bluetooth, Wi-Fi and other communication signals.
The Rydberg sensor uses laser beams to create highly-excited Rydberg atoms directly above a microwave circuit, to boost and hone in on the portion of the spectrum being measured. The Rydberg atoms are sensitive to the circuit’s voltage, enabling the device to be used as a sensitive probe for the wide range of signals in the RF spectrum.
CIA Counterterror Chief Suggests Going To War Against ‘Domestic Insurgents’
February 5th, 2021Mmm hmm.
Via: Summit News:
The former head of the CIA Counterterrorism Center has suggested that counterinsurgency tactics used by the military in Iraq and Afghanistan should be applied to ‘domestic extremists’ inside the US.
NPR reports that Robert Grenier, who directed the CIA’s Counterterrorism program from 2004 to 2006, declared “We may be witnessing the dawn of a sustained wave of violent insurgency within our own country, perpetrated by our own countrymen.”
In an op-ed for The New York Times last week, Grenier suggested that “extremists who seek a social apocalypse … are capable of producing endemic political violence of a sort not seen in this country since Reconstruction.”
Related: Libertarian Terrorists?
U.S. Navy Tests 3D Printers In Move To Shore Up Supply Chain
February 5th, 2021Via: ZeroHedge:
The race is on, and the US military is preparing to shore up its complex supply chains with 3D printers. The military wants to transform how supplies are deployed in a conflict.
The US Naval Postgraduate School (NPS) partnered with Xerox to pilot test the Xerox ElemX Liquid Metal 3D printer on its university campus, according to 3D Printing Industry.
Bay Area Gym Stays Open to Defy COVID-19 Guidelines, Gets Hit with $550,000 Fine
February 5th, 2021Via: SF Gate:
From a passerby’s point of view, California Ripped Fitness looks (mostly) plucked out of pre-pandemic times.
People walk in and out of the San Jose gym, clad in workout leggings, shorts and sneakers, continuing to work out despite state and county regulations that prohibit gyms from operating indoors.
California Ripped has some acknowledgments of the realities of the pandemic — a mask requirement and materials to wipe down equipment after use. It is unclear if there are any social distancing guidelines or capacity limits.
But the gym marches on, remaining open despite more than $500,000 in fines and the threat of legal action by Santa Clara County. In fact, it makes its feelings about the county shutdown abundantly clear.
“We’re not saying that there’s no virus or we don’t believe it,” said the gym’s manager to Bay Area News Group in an anonymous interview, “but we do believe that we can provide a place where people can come safely and stay healthy — and also provide the ability for us to pay our bills and make a living.
Robot Motherships To Launch Drone Swarms From Sea, Underwater, Air And Near-Space
February 5th, 2021Via: Forbes:
Last week Louisiana-based shipbuilder Metal Shark announced that the U.S. Marine Corps had selected them to develop a Long Range Unmanned Surface Vessel (LRUSV), an 11-meter robot boat capable of operating autonomously and launching loitering munitions to attack targets at sea and on land. The unmanned boat is just the latest of a series of new platforms for launching drone swarms.
“This tiered, scalable weapons system will provide the ability to accurately track and destroy targets at range throughout the battlespace,” according to Metal Shark’s press release.
Starbucks, Microsoft and Costco to Help with COVID Vaccine Rollout in Washington State [???]
February 4th, 2021I queued this Last American Vagabond video to the start of the discussion about this extremely bizarre situation.
Via: Government Technology:
In an effort to streamline the delivery of Washington state’s COVID-19 vaccines, Washington Gov. Jay Inslee announced on Monday the state’s plan to create the Washington State Vaccine Command and Coordination Center to meet a goal of vaccinating 45,000 citizens per day.
The center — a statewide public-private partnership consisting of Washington corporations, labor unions, health-care groups and government entities — will work together to coordinate all available resources to create an infrastructure to deliver vaccines across the state as efficiently as possible.
The organizations working with the center include Starbucks, Microsoft, Kaiser Permanente, Costco, Service Employees International Union 1199NW, United Food and Commercial Workers 21, the Washington State Nurses Association, Sea Mar Community Health Centers and the National Guard.
U.S. Deploys B-1 Bombers To Norway For First Time
February 4th, 2021Via: ZeroHedge:
In recent years there’s been a noticeable uptick in large-scale NATO exercises in the Barents region in response to what’s perceived as Russia’s own arctic ambitions to militarize the far north.
And now the US Air Force has announced that for the first time ever it will deploy B-1 Lancer bombers along with 200 airmen to Norway, no doubt in order to “confront Russia”.
“More than 200 Air Force personnel from Dyess Air Force Base, Texas, were expected to arrive at Orland Air Base with an expeditionary B-1 Lancer bomber squadron to support missions in the region, U.S. European Command said in a statement Tuesday,” according to Stars and Stripes.
High Levels of Toxic Heavy Metals Found in Some Baby Foods
February 4th, 2021Via: Reuters:
U.S. congressional investigators found “dangerous levels of toxic heavy metals” in certain baby foods that could cause neurological damage, a House Oversight subcommittee said in a report released on Thursday.
The panel examined baby foods made by Nurture Inc, Hain Celestial Group Inc, Beech-Nut Nutrition and Gerber, it said, adding that it was “greatly concerned” that Walmart Inc, Campbell Soup Co and Sprout Organic Foods refused to cooperate with the investigation.
The report said internal company standards “permit dangerously high levels of toxic heavy metals, and documents revealed that the manufacturers have often sold foods that exceeded those levels.”
