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	Archive through May 18, 2026	25		05/19 02:15am

On the battery front, there's been some developments in the past couple of years... developments that mean that when it's time to replace the traction battery in my Prius, it won't be with a lithium ion battery. It'll be a sodium ion battery (which has already been available aftermarket for my car for the past year).

While the energy density is slightly less than that of lithium ion, sodium ion batteries do away with the three big problems of lithium: mining lithium, lithium ion battery's tendency toward self-combustion under certain conditions, and the decrease in efficiency of lithium ion batteries in colder conditions.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Monday, May 18, 2026 - 05:00 pm: Edit

There are also the new silver batteries which are much improved over the original ones. That is partly what drove silver from $25 to $125 and then dropped it to $75.

By Mike Grafton (Mike_Grafton) on Monday, May 18, 2026 - 06:17 pm: Edit

Solid State batteries are probably going to hit big in a couple years.

By MarkSHoyle (Bolo) on Monday, May 18, 2026 - 07:49 pm: Edit

Since we are on hydro....

Haven't heard much on "Tidal Generators" in years....

By Paul Howard (Raven) on Tuesday, May 19, 2026 - 02:15 am: Edit

Mark

The UK did have a huge one planned for 'Swansea Bay' - and costs went up AND there was significant environmental issues (Marine Life would have been majorly effected - spawning routes etc).

Can't remember which was the more major reason - but it got cancelled.

I think smaller "free floating" long barriers are being used rather than larger wide barriers so some are being built.

By Paul Howard (Raven) on Tuesday, May 19, 2026 - 02:21 am: Edit

Duplicate Post - FEAR

By Douglas Lampert (Dlampert) on Tuesday, May 19, 2026 - 05:02 pm: Edit

I heard something about floating tidal bouys, the bouy is anchored, and rises and falls with the tide/waves, allegedly generating noticable power at a reasonable cost.

I'm dubious, seems likely to be expensive, and it suffers from intermitancy problems, but someone was working on it.

OTOH, the ability to draw from waves as well as tide is an advantage to a float rather than a tidal barrier.

By William Jockusch (Verybadcat) on Tuesday, May 19, 2026 - 05:20 pm: Edit

The issue has got to be that the ocean will try to destroy whatever they put in place

By MarkSHoyle (Bolo) on Tuesday, May 19, 2026 - 06:22 pm: Edit

Early tries were set up a river bed, just far enough for the tide to have an affect and close enough where it wasn't just the river flow doing the work....