Technology

My guess is it's just a car with a battery 5 times bigger than their comparison vehicle, can't do over 30, go up a hill, or pass any safety standards.

Or it's fictional.

Well, Toyota seems to be promising something around 700-800 miles range with solid state lithium battery tech, but as you say, the proof is in the pudding, and the pudding isn't ready yet.

Shit I already have one up on the Chinese. I have invented an all electric rocket capable of boosting humans into LEO.

Thank you for typing out my brain squiggles.

The real numbers we need to see are watts per volume, or watts per mass

You have to chase it down, following the link to electrek.co, but then it says: "the prototype cells house an energy density of 720 Wh/kg"

(of course, I'm just stating what is claimed, no idea how true)

Exactly. It’s like an article I saw about some new internet tech that was “X times faster than broadband”. Broadband is a type of transmission using multiple frequency carrier waves to transmit data. It ain’t a speed.

Wh/kg or yes maybe volume Wh/cm^3…

The only other thing I’d care about it charge speed. Maybe it doesn’t last as long but I can fully charge in 10 seconds? Yeah I’m interested. Hell I’ve never had a car yet get the estimated miles per gallon on the sticker. It’s all bistromathics as far as I’m concerned.

Range anxiety isn't about your daily commute, it's about the few times a year road trip you make across multiple states to see family on holidays. Having to stop and charge every 150 miles (as I wouldn't trust letting it go below 50) sucks if you're trying to go 500+ miles. Owning a gas car taking up space in your garage and costing you taxes and registration just to use a handful of times a year is wasteful. Renting a car is an option, but it's cumbersome and if you plan to stay a while, expensive. I would not want an EV with less than 300 miles range. You have to factor in worst case scenarios as well, sometimes it gets dreadfully cold and windy in the winter. When it's -10F and the wind is howling you're cranking the (usually resistive) heat and driving head first into the wind kills your efficiency. These are real scenarios I have had to drive in my current car (Volt, so plug in hybrid) and my battery range can be halved (from 35+ miles under 20) in these worst case scenarios, but at least I can fall back on gas. I want to go EV for my next car but if I can't reliably make it to and from my parents' house 300 miles away on a bad winter's Christmas break then it's just not a feasible option yet, even if my drive to work is maybe 15 miles round trip. Also, charging station density is an issue. I would need to go half way to their house, 150 miles, to reach a charging station. You can't just stop anywhere to recharge if you have a low range EV.

Hardly anybody needs an EV with more than 200 miles of range if they're plugging in each night.

Speaking of big IFs. Not everybody lives where a charger is convenient or can have one installed in their residence.

Range anxiety is in the what if scenario, can I go from Los Angeles to Las Vegas on one charge, batteries need to last longer and be cheaper or charge quicker. being universal and swappable wouldalso work.

We're considering a new car (current car is an old econobox that's been to the moon), and range anxiety does factor in for the "weekend adventure" use case. We live in CA, and something like a trip to Yosemite or Tahoe requires refuelling/charging. But these places can get inundated with weekend warriors (like us!), who are all on the same schedule. We've had friends who have had stressful incidents e.g. charging in Yosemite valley, or on the way back from Tahoe. Add a toddler in the mix and it gets even less fun.

Not insurmountable, but infrastructure and timing are still not as good as for dinosaur blood.

For 95% of the time though yeah

commuting, single-day adventures, or bopping around the city would be no problem at all.

Ha, why was this downvoted? Sketchy website "reports" proprietary Chinese research firm's accomplishment by rehashing the firm's press release about an unbelievable claim with no other evidence. This got more red flags than the beach before a hurricane.

At best, this is something they actually did approximate in some kind of lab setting that might be years and years away from being some kind of marketable product.

The (translated) press release even has a stench all on its own:

It is expected to fundamentally solve the battery life and safety anxiety of traditional lithium-ion batteries.

Powered by the cold fusion process they unveiled last year.

Most I use don't give any warning at all, so that's a step up.

First they need Toyota to test their chemistry and develop their battery production system....it's part of the way Chinese companies develop technology.

If Toyota can do it, China will too! A win-win!

China makes those, too.

Toyota is promising 700-800 miles range soonish (3 years?), and I believe them a lot more than the CCP.

I don't believe either though, but I do think Toyota is more trustworthy in general. I'll wait until I see an actual product with independent reviews.