So I want to ask a question. What in this study would throw the HN people off as incorrect or raising a flag? Is terminology being used incorrectly? Is data vs shown photographs not quite matching up with what is being stated? I'm no battery expert, so I'm quite curious as to why I'm hearing that this is fake from people that work directly in the battery industry (and they're not big companies, most of them are individuals providing various services, some in recycling, some in custom manufacturing, some in installation.)
In this case the electrode is metallic lead and the electrolyte is water containing sulfuric acid.
The electrode-electrolyte "interphase" is a solid coating based on lead sulfate, that forms on the lead plates after extended recharge cycles. This doesn't redissolve very well during use after a while when the electrolyte has become oversaturated with lead ions, and the electrodes have been "replated" so many times. Especially when recharged from near-death.
One antique way of restoration without disassembly was to agitate the battery using an industrial vibrator to loosen up the solids, then dump out the (highly toxic lead-containing) electrolyte to physically remove as much sludge as possible. Followed by repeated filling using distilled water, agitation, and dumping until the waste water looks OK. One final fill with DI water (which acts as a very weak electrolyte at this point) and a reverse charge until an amp or two has been reached for a bit, to deplate as much oxidized coating as possible into a virgin solvent.
More agitation, dumping, rinsing, and finally replace with fresh acid.
Desperate measures for desperate times, not too economical today unless similar wastewater is already being handled in a scale that dwarfs a single battery, and fresh acid is obtained surplus or purchased at bulk pricing as well.
If they were easier to reuse like that and it was done more often then disposal for that lead saturated acid would likely be more available.
Restoring the functioning of the original electrodes in situ is a bit of a different ordeal. But they're working on it :)
Good rundown of the process here: https://batterycouncil.org/battery-facts-and-applications/ho...
Longest 3 hour tour ever.
Lead-acid batteries do that while being charged, so it's an engineering problem to solve, not some insurmountable challenge.
Li-poly, which are in just about every electronic device, on the other hand...
https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/f9f4/681cf6d36adc72ae643555...
LiPo packs are rarely used in consumer electronics, they're mostly used in toys and drones as individual pouch packs. NMC is the most common battery chemistry used in consumer electronics. You might be confused because NMC is available in packaging including prismatic, pouch, and cylindrical configurations.
Apples and oranges strawman. In very small quantities that can be managed by simply dumping it overboard using small diameter tubing.
Watch the StacheD YT channel about the structures blown up by deflagrating LFP packs because they lacked constant igniters like Megapacks. Also, the Moss Landing LFP fire reignited after 20 months. LFP aren't anywhere close to "safe", they're just relatively safer compared to NMC.
I watched the clip and the youtuber himself says the facility was poorly designed and should not have been built at all.
I've read ProLogium's press release when it came out and while their progress is impressive, I don't see their batteries making it to grid storage anytime soon. For one, they don't have the production capacity yet.
My bet is that for the time being it's cheaper to just build facilities with good fire prevention measures than have a technology which is just scaling up take over right now.
These scientists are monitoring the impact on a local wildlife and are finding Nickel, Manganese and Cobalt traces:
https://elkhornslough.org/reserve/research/moss-landing-batt...