I mean, lithium cells were used for fringe use cases 20 years ago, now they are seemingly everywhere. The difference with this tech is that they know it’s currently expensive, so are aiming for use cases where the added cost is justifed. Give it 5 years and the tech will more than likely become easier to produce, lowering costs. That and sodium batteries are probably going to dramatically lower cost for grid storage, which should make it easier to have consistent power delivery.
I read your argument as being that since we aren’t quantum leaping ahead with technology, it’s a bit of a wash with the pushes for future battery standards. But my point is that this battery update, while not being a 10x in performance, is more likely a 2x and will be viable to scale with pricing decreases as time progresses. I’m in the trucking sector, and one of the things I have noticed about transitioning to electric heavy duties is that a lot of the issues aren’t completely on battery density, but rather that there isn’t an infrastructure that can charge the batteries at high voltage without beefing up the power grid around stations. If you could instead give a cheap enough battery backup to create a buffer that fills up during lower use hours, then a lot more of the solutions for that could charge ev trucks quickly would make more sense (it’s actually what has made the Tesla Semi have such good numbers). It’s stuff like this that actually might push the transition, which has to happen, not waiting for next quantum leap.
