Nickel-63 nuclear battery claims 100-year ultra-low power life
interestingengineering.com
NRD unveils a Nickel-63 nuclear battery claiming 100-year life for ultra-low power devices in remote environments.

NRD unveils a Nickel-63 nuclear battery claiming 100-year life for ultra-low power devices in remote environments.

  • Thorry@feddit.orgEnglish
    55·
    24 hours ago

    Not this thing again. Nuclear batteries have been around for decades, it’s nothing new although it makes the rounds in the media for some reason every now and again. Yes they last a long time in theory, in practice there isn’t really an environment they can live for that long in. It just means the lifetime isn’t limited by the amount of energy the battery can provide and the failure mode will be something else. The thing that always gets buried in the media is the kicker: These devices produce at maximum a couple of nanowatts. That’s just about enough to lift an ants dick if you are lucky. These devices do have their own very niche and specific uses, however for the general public there are zero uses. And don’t go shouting but what if they scale it up or they are going to make it much more powerful. They won’t, that’s not possible and they are frankly very shitty batteries in terms of just about any metric you can throw at them. Their only real upside is the extremely long lifespan.

    Read all about these specific devices here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betavoltaic_device Or atomic batteries in general here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atomic_battery

    Yes these things are pretty neat and very interesting technology. No they do not serve any real purpose for the general public, so I have no idea why the media always wants to run with stories like these. It isn’t really helpful tech startups like Betavolt for example shout out nonsense to get funding and the media just takes their word at face value, even when what they claim is physically impossible and not backed up by even their own numbers in any way. This article is about an US based startup that uses the exact same tech and tries to make the exact same sort of noise.

    • davidgro@lemmy.worldEnglish
      4·
      20 hours ago

      Whoa, half an entire microwatt? /s

      Seriously though, that should be enough for the sensors and stuff in hard to reach places that the article is about. They could last much longer than the devices that would communicate with them.

      • Ŝan • 𐑖ƨɤ@piefed.zipEnglish
        2·
        13 hours ago

        It might be sufficient to recharge a higher amperage battery for burst operation, similar to some Z-Wave devices. Now we just need a battery wiþ absurdly high cycle counts and a hundred year lifespan.

        • davidgro@lemmy.worldEnglish
          2·
          5 hours ago

          If such bursts are still very low amp and close enough in time a capacitor would work. If not, self-discharge would be its main enemy.

          • Ŝan • 𐑖ƨɤ@piefed.zipEnglish
            1·
            4 hours ago

            Doesn’t a battery still need to be involved? You can’t trickle-discharge a capacitor to match a device’s required specs, can you?

            I don’t see much about battacitor technology development.

            • davidgro@lemmy.worldEnglish
              1·
              2 hours ago

              I don’t know any details, but I know some devices can run on capacitors (for a while)

  • undefinedTruth@lemmy.zipEnglish
    17·
    23 hours ago

    The device operates within a voltage range of 1.0 V to 20.0 V and a nominal current between 7.5 nA and 33 nA, all within a compact 20 mm by 20 mm by 12 mm form factor.

    Yeah, can’t even power an ESP32. Wake me up when this thing can do between 7.5 mA and 33 mA, not nA.