This from the people that gave us fireworks… traditions disappear so fast…
God forbid someone does a humor
Wut
the chinese invented gunpowder centuries ago
For the occupants, any pedestrian hit by an EV will generally be in worse condition than if they were hit by an ICE vehicle.
While this is ultimately good, the benefit can’t be applied so broadly as “the breakthrough that makes EVs safer than ICE cars”.
The solution as always is to reduce car dependence.
wouldn’t the increased weight due the battery be partially compensated by a more lightweight motor? electric motors are significantly simpler and less heavy than ICE motors.
There’s a horde of petrolheads trying to make problems out of nothing. Don’t waste your time.
Do we have cars made of ice?! Cool
We almost had ships made of mostly ice a while ago, but it never took off https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Habakkuk
the breakthrough that makes EVs safer than ICE cars
Did Toyota write this? EVs already are much safer than ICEs, the headline reads like it’s trying to gaslight people into thinking otherwise.
Except their weight which leads to insane amounts of energy transfer and also none of the intrastructure, like guardrails, is built to handle that much weight so low down.
The way to safer is to reduce the amount of cars.
First time I ever heard about guardrails having issues with EVs. Do you have a source for that?
Also the comment was about the fire risk, which the article was about.
The way to safer is to reduce the amount of cars.
Hersey! Blasphemy! Unamerican!
EVs already are much safer than ICEs
You do realize that article neither negates or supports the above statement.
“But Teslas are electric and Teslas are bad!” -the person we’re replying to.
It’s like the commenter doesn’t realize there’s more electric cars than just Teslas.
So the article’s source has been updated. Tesla was number 1 in the last year’s report (2024’s numbers) but it’s number 3 now (2025’s numbers).
Source used by the article you shared
TLDR: It’s a close battle between BMW (44.9 per 1000), Ram (44.7 per 1000), and Telsa (42.8 per 1000)
EDIT: “That includes accidents, DUIs, speeding and citations” If you instead just isolate accident rates it’s slightly different: Ram (23.9 per 1000), Subaru (23.2), and Tesla (23.1).
I should clarify that I’m not a fan of Tesla AT ALL. I’d love to see Tesla fail (in particular Elon failing especially). There’s more electric car’s than just Tesla’s.
It probably has more to do with the people that buy BMWs, Rams, and Teslas driving like fucking idiots than with the cars themselves.
I was about to say that when I am near a tesla, bmw, or ram truck I anticipate them driving like jackasses. teslas can go both ways though, either unnecessarily slow or crazy bmw style impatient driving
Except ones with no handles. You’re supposed to burn alive in these.
Which has nothing to do with the drive train.
Except the fact that batteries burn extremely rapidly. In case of fire you have seconds to open the door and help the driver/passaners escape out of the vehicle
I’ve heard that gasoline also tends to burn rapidly. The Mythbusters usually had to add gas to make their explosions look cooler
Not as rapidly as lithium batteries. From firefighting perspective this is much uglier case. Bonus issue: unlike gasoline, you can’t extinguish it reliably - it has to burn out on its own
So? Overall risk is still much lower.
EVs already are much safer than ICEs
For the occupant or those who are involved in a collision with one?
EVs are heavy
They don’t catch fire that often though.
Which is what that headline is about.
Do ice car catch fire more often?
⛏️
EVs already are much safer than ICEs
That’s new to me. Why exactly?
The article is about batteries that might catch fire less often.
ICEs catch fire much more often than EVs already. The comment was specifically about that.
The fires from EVs (ones that use lithium batteries that is) are incredibly hard to extinguish.
Sodium ion batteries don’t ignite which makes them even safer.
The main thing is there’s no big engine in the front, so your entire hood can now be a crumple zone, and it’s easier to design to be safe in impacts. The center of gravity is also much lower so there’s a lower chance of a rollover.
On the other hand… Tesla’s have a habit of locking their occupants inside when the car is on fire because SOMEONE decided mechanical latches were too expensive.
And as others have mentioned… the added weight also makes it less safe for everyone else outside the car.
This battery is even safer than Li-ion cells, why is that “gaslighting”?
Because the headline is not making that comparison?
Came here to say exactly this.
But it was already said so…
Maybe a bit irrelevant but why is the article calling it “China’s battery“? I feel like if the researchers were from any other countries academy of science, say France, the title would have simply been something like “scientists discover new ways for fireproof battery”. Maybe it’d say French scientists or so, but not simply “France’s battery”?
Because it’s written as Chinese propaganda.
“China Battery!” typically trips everyone’s “Fake News! Evil Company! Communists Killed 100 Billion People!” alarm
Classic fluff piece to make China look more innovative than they actually are. I wouldn‘t be surprised if we never heard of this tech or if they recycle the same article next year. Tech ‚journalism‘ about China is a mine field of false claims and exaggerations.
These batteries are already in production cars. Have been for a while. If you don’t have access to them it’s because of your regressive protectionist government.
No no no. China is Fake News. They don’t even make cars. If they made cars, I would have seen Chinese cars driving around in America.
Regressive protectionism isn’t exactly unique to the American auto industry but yea.
Sodium ion batteries are already in cars in China, this iteration is even safer. You should read the article.
Na+ batteries are really cool tech, and with a few more iterations of R&D they can potentially replace Li+ batteries, removing the need for rare earth elements that are toxic to people and the environment, dangerous to extract, and more often than not extracted by child slave labor (such as in Xinjiang and Congo).
It doesn’t matter how you feel about China, although framing Na+ as “China’s battery” is problematic for other reasons.
Sodium batteries won’t fix the mining issue for rare earths. Lithium is not rare.
My understanding is that the lithium itself isn’t the issue, it’s that lithium batteries require other rare earths like cobalt where as sodium itself is not only more common than lithium, but it uses more common material like iron or tin in its battery chemistry that are also less problematic.
This is recycled I read about about this last year in the same kind of context on Reddit.
Separately though I have read there are hundreds of chemical combinations that produce electricity and only a handful have been researched for batteries.
Because cool China is so totally innovative unlike the boring west! We gotta hype them up, no one else ever does cool stuff only China brand is cool.
They have been trying to murder the US and EU auto industry and dumping biblical shittons of money into battery technology. the EU and the US aren’t trying to compete.
Its still an advancement for all mankind, even if my countries leadership wont let me have one.
They have been trying to murder the US and EU auto industry and dumping biblical shittons of money into battery technology. the EU and the US aren’t trying to compete.
China invests in R&D, Trump slashed scientific research.
Not only in R&D but market development… Like, finding out what people want and selling it to them, exporting them… The Americans are trying to push pickups on europe…
Actually it’s the other way around.
The internet is all about “China Bad” so calling it China Battery is a way to depreciate this obviously positive discovery.
Is this “china always bad” internet in the room with us right now? Do you deny the positive sentiment in this very thread you’re posting in right now?
Type china into a search engine. Guaranteed it returns a negative sounding article.
“Should we just not talk about this awesome new tech?”
“No, let’s put China in front of this totally awesome thing so people will think it’s bad while we hype it up as such a great invention in the article. Oh and don’t mention working conditions, state subsidies, mineral extraction, or any of the usual anti-China talking points, that might make them think it’s not bad”
I’m sorry you live with so much gratuitous hatred in your heart and I pray you can recover some day.
How is pointing out the flaw in your logic “gratuitous hatred”? It doesn’t make any sense that the rationale for calling it “China’s battery” is to make it sound bad, when the article is clearly extolling the virtues of the battery.
Or is it the part where the other commenter brought attention to the working conditions in China? Because that’s not motivated by hatred, but rather class solidarity. How badly do you have to hate Chinese people to believe Chinese workers don’t deserve better conditions? What about ethnic minorities in China who are having their cultural heritage stripped away from them?
Is it because the government officials aren’t white, so you believe they can do no wrong? So you’ll just call any legitimate criticism of them racist? That’s like Israel calling anti-zionism anti-semitic. There’s nothing sinophobic about legitimate criticisms of the PRC.
Nice argument you’re having with yourself there, buddy. Seems like you have quite a lot to pour out.
I don’t have any affinity for China, but I also don’t like the gratuitous hate they get all over the internet, nor the reduction of Chinese people’s experience to work drones (what you’re doing).
I had hoped that Lemmy wasn’t gonna be like that, but alas.
People who support China don’t seem to comprehend that shitty countries aren’t a zero sum game.
You can shit on China’s government while also shitting on the US government.
No one says it’s a zero sum but you people always assume it’s a shitty government without any real information to back that up besides NED-written or sponsored articles.
Like if you admit the US sucks, why believe their propaganda?
Because (most people believe) China controls its scientists with iron fist and they only research what the state wants them to research.
For me it’s because they have a tendency to… exaggerate, their research results.
LOL. Americans don’t?
Sodium batteries are real though. You can buy them today, their big promise was that they would be cheaper than lithium batteries because sodium is abundant and readily available whereas lithium is a rare mineral. Then lithium prices fell through the floor and the value proposition failed, at least for now. They’re also not as energy dense, which is probably what will hold then back from EV use for a while yet, but the claim around being safer holds up.
Sodium explodes on contact with water, having a barrier or two is great, if you use them in cars it’s going to get punctured at times, what with tons of vehicle crashing into things at high speeds and all.
Sodium ion batteries don’t use sodium metal. They use sodium oxides as the cathode.
shhhh…no chemistry allowed
Some sodium ion batteries use an aqueous electrolyte, meaning they’re full of water.
Ah, so they’ve already exploded, thus rendering them safe for use.
You could still stub your toe on them, so not completely safe
“sodium batteries, pre exploded!”
I thought sodium batteries had considerably less energy density than conventional? Is that not a problem anymore? If that hasn’t been solved, I don’t see how this helps make EVs safer.
They have considerably less energy density yes, but that was also the case for LFP batteries in the past.
LFP batteries have improved now though over the years and can now go quite reasonable distances, making the more expensive higher energy density batteries like NCM only needed for the longer range or performance variants.
The same should happen to the sodium based batteries, and LFP will eventually get to the point of the longer range types in the future.
Eventually, the range of the higher density types won’t be needed, and they’ll simply start including fewer cells of them to get the sweet point range which will then bring their costs / weight down when compared to lower density types, but it’s possible by that point maybe the lower density types simply dominate due to their general lesser cost?
All of this of course assuming something like solid state batteries don’t have their breakthrough low cost long lifespan moment.
Yea but if it’s half the price people are willing to put up with a lot of inconveniences.
Idk about that. Electric cars have been half the price to drive and people still buy gas cars due to the ‘inconvenience’ of long charge times on road trips.
And no amount of performance improvements is going to change the minds of those people. Either they’ll finally try electric and realize how great they are or eventually die out. Either way ICE is going to be the oddity one day.
They indeed have less energy density, but I don’t get your point about less safety.
They work better in high and low temperatures, can be charged a lot faster and don’t degrade as fast. Sodium isn’t as reactive as Lithium, lowering the risk of fires.
My point is that if they have less energy density, they aren’t a particularity great choice for EVs, as the increased battery size to get the same capacity makes the whole thing much heavier, requiring even more battery to move it.
I guess for like short range vehicles, it might be fine, but at least around here, thats gunna be a pretty tough sell, because everything is spread out.
It can’t really make EVs safer if its not being used for them due to the drawbacks, is all.
ICE engines use a bunch of physical space for accessory components related to the engine. Li-ion powered e-cars reclaimed a ton of that space (i.e. Tesla has a frunk)
Perhaps next using a bit more space for a less dense sodium battery in exchange for a vehicle that is 0% explodable is a worthy trade (if claims are true).
Putting part of the battery in the front, in the crash zone, is going to reduce safety, not improve it.
One of the main things that improved EV safety over ICE cars is the frunk itself. By removing that massive engine from the front and replacing it with a crumple zone, the car becomes much safer in front impacts.
Do you have a source for that or is it just a conclusion you reached?
The reason I ask is that I vaguelly remember of seeing somewhere that the way the front of modern ICE cars is designed makes the engine literally fall when a high-speed frontal collision happens exactly so that the front can act as a crumple zone rather than the engine being pushed inside the passenger compartment. That being so, things aren’t quite as simple as you say and I think we need actual real world test results showing that difference in safety rather than mere expectations extrapolated from superficial knowleged about cars.
I looked it up. 2022 IIHS crash tests showed the Tesla model 3 as being much safer in front impacts.
Modern cars may make the engine fall in a crash, but it’s still better not to have that mass there in the first place. Having said that, the safety advantages of a frunk may be reduced if you have a bunch of heavy cargo in there.
The safest car is the one that crashes less.
Is frunk what elon rebranded his fupa? His fat upper penis area?
Battery density is energy per kilos. The problem is not only were to put the battery, but also the added weight.
Leave the weight as is, accept lower range which is offset by faster charging speeds. Or just buy a car with a lithium battery if you cannot accept this.
The issue with that is that your range at least needs to make it between charging stations on the highway to be a realistic choice for many people. That might not be a problem in major corridors, but in sparser areas like the US midwest, it’s a legitimate concern.
Doesn’t mean Na+ is bad, it’s just a young technology. In the next few years I expect to see the energy density increasing rapidly.
We have faster charging speeds with lithium today, 800v cars that can charge at 300KW+ have been on the market for half a decade, BYD has launched cars that can charge at 2-3x that speed. The charging infrastructure is the bottleneck there, even if all new cars could charge at those speeds it wouldn’t mean much because hardly any chargers can support it.
Besides it’s almost moot, most EV owners aren’t charging via fast chargers like you would fill up an ICE car, they’re charging at home at much cheaper rates and only using fast chargers for particularly long trips.
Exactly. Fast charging is for long trips.
Same compromise I made when I bought the base range version of my car with LFP chemistry. But I would not go lower in range than that. LFP is already much safer than any gasoline engine. I would like sodium just for the reliable range on low temperatures. Probably in the next years we will reach comparable density for sodium.
I guess they suggested, that the batteries won’t be used in EVs, as long as their capacity is significantly lower.
I recall reading the same.
Sodium batteries make loads of sense for house batteries like solar storage.
Sodium chemistry works in cold temps, lithium does not.
I would love this for my home, as well as at a smaller scale for my homelab, and even potentially things like power tools.
Just recently a friend doing a home reno project had one of their drill batteries achieve thermal runaway, fortunately while they were home. Made me really think twice about the pile of tools in my garage.
I’d trade in just about every portable-scale Li-ion battery I own for a slightly less energy dense but safer alternative.
I was hoping eBike could use them. I’ve seen one too many of those go up. Possibly from shoddy 3rd party batteries.
They should be the default for solar installations and grid-level storage, but are too new.
They can also replace lead-acid batteries for many applications.
Lithium will still rule microelectronics and wearables, but all lower density stuff should switch to sodium.
That being said, for cold environments like Scandinavia and the US Midwest & canada, sodium ion works better in both cold and heat swings than Lithium variants that it might be worth the tradeoff in capacity because in the long cold months, the reduced capacity and performance of lithium chemistries would completely close the gap anyways.
Technically correct.
Sodium blows up when exposed to water.
they’re not using raw sodium but obviously mixing it with other chemicals. so it’s not relevant.
Jesus Christ you all want to discount Chinese innovations so bad. America won’t fund anything that doesn’t immediately return anymore. They’ve fallen off.
So does lithium, even more violently, good thing is that nobody is using pure lithium or sodium
So does lithium. Not relevant for battery tech, tho
Very relevant for firefighters who have to deal with lithium and sodium fires.
BTW: Explosion in case of lithium is indirect since you need a hydrogen buildup first. In case of sodium plus water it goes boom almost instantly
