Stanford's nanowire battery holds 10 times the charge of existing ones http://news-service.stanford.edu/news/2008/january9/nanowire-010908.html
If it's good I hope a company that will readily use the technology (Toyota) gets hold of it before a company that want to lock it away from the world (oil companies and US car makers) to extend the status quo.
Lock it away? Won't happen. Patents on an evolutionary development of this scale will be worth hundreds of billions of dollars over the patent's lifetime . . . and Stanford is going to want their royalties. No oil company or car maker has that kind of money to throw down a drain without their shareholders demanding heads to roll if the patents aren't developed to their fullest potential for the shareholders financial gain. Imagine every single battery in the world becoming obsolete virtually over night. Imagine the new potentials and markets developing because of this new super battery. The energy from wind farms and solar panels can now be captures and used as a base source . . . not just when the wind is blowing or the sun is shining. Living 'off the grid' could now become a simple reality of life for all, not just the granola crunchers and the third world.
Remember the silicon based battery only manages about 10 charge cycles before it's dead. There's a long way to go before that issue is sorted. Anyway, Polyplus lithium-air batteries have a theoretical energy density of 11,600 Wh/kg... compared to 46 Wh/kg of the current Prius battery!
If you read the actual paper presented by the team, they have only managed to show 10 cycles of the new battery, to 75% discharge. http://www.nature.com/nnano/journal/vaop/ncurrent/abs/nnano.2007.411.html
man oh man oh man!!! once again, we are screwing ourselves... so it takes 2 years to get the battery, another 2 years to get the car... if EV's were already mainstream, or at the very least a healthy niche in the southern tier states, we would have money behind the manufacturing process already in place and new battery tech would be in the cars in 12-18 months...instead we are looking at 4 years minimum... all because the oil companies want to eek out every last penny from us first... we are PATHETIC!! you all can start calling me Dolly... OH WAIT!! i do have an EV... ok, fine.... call me Dolly Junior then
There are some REAL good new advanced batteries out there. ALTI altair nano lithium, A local Phoenix AZ guy has set a EV dragster World speed record with his new set. The Phoenixmotor cars SUT all electric truck will use them. http://www.altairnano.com/index.html Aeroenviroment tested them for 10 minute recharge and 1-2 hour EV discharge with no problems. Also many good lithium battery companies like Valence out of Autin Texas and A123 combines with hymotion to make 100 mpg plug-in hybrids. http://www.valence.com/products/ucharge_overview.html None are cheap but all are very good with long life.
This is an important breakthrough. But it's only a small step towards a commercially available battery. It will take a lot more R&D before this leads to a battery for any real-world application. It's promising. But it's not tomorrow. Altairnano's battery has several very important advantages over lithium-ion, but it has slightly less energy density and it costs more. I believe it's similar to the one presently being installed in my Xebra. I think it's worth a try, or I would not be having it installed. But it's beyond the financial reach of most Xebra owners. I also believe the Phoenix Motorcars SUT uses the Altairnano batteries, and costs more than anyone on this board would be willing to pay.