The Radioactive Diamond Battery That Will Run For 28,000 Years

www.popularmechanics.com... gn=socialflowFBPOP&utm_source=facebook&fbclid=IwAR1m70Kw2UvWA-rNVblbLc0VDD64MQF63340cbBxqwzjz46GWggBiCwQ8fg

You’re probably wondering what the catch is. The diamond battery uses nuclear waste, lasts thousands of years, and involves layers of only the tiniest possible diamonds? That all sounds fantastic. But the truth is more complicated. Each battery cell will produce only a minuscule amount of energy, so the cells must be combined in huge numbers in order to power regular and larger devices.

not just an energy storage gadget, but an energy producing one.
man I hope they get these going.

a reply to: ElGoobero

If not for anything a useful way to recycle radioactive waste would be huge.

a reply to: ElGoobero

Ahhhh, the good old days, where you carried a bag of batteries to power your mobile phone (and the phone wasn't even smart) and STILL had to plug the phone into a cigarette lighter in the car if you wanted to make a call.

a reply to: ElGoobero

A decent video on the topic, but it kind of suggests these batteries are BS

originally posted by: UpThenDown
a reply to: ElGoobero

A decent video on the topic, but it kind of suggests these batteries are BS

First, yes that's a must watch video.
Second, the video suggests the battery from NDB mentioned in the pop Mechanics link in the OP is a hoax based on unrealistic claims, which appears to be correct.

Third however, is that there are other legitimate companies working on similar legitimate battery technology, but, they are not promoting any hoax claims about the technology which is far more limited than NDB claims.

Here's a thread about it from last year, with some of the hoaxed claims discussed, and I made some comments about how the claims completely fall apart:

Energy firm says its nuclear-waste fueled diamond batteries could last thousands of years

originally posted by: Guyfriday
Hold up, so I can have an electric car that would never need to be recharged? EVER! I think this could be a great thing, but then again It would probably cost too much for any normal person to buy.

originally posted by: Arbitrageur
These figures from the thunderf00t video were for a mobile phone using 1/5 of a watt:

So for a device that uses 1 watt, you need to multiply those by 5, which I can do, it comes to
$5,000,000,000,000 cost
3000 kg (6600 lbs) weight

The Tesla electric car is said to use 15,583 watts when driving 55 mph. So just multiply the 1 watt figures by 15583:

15583 x $5,000,000,000,000 = many times more than the global economy of 80 trillion USD or so, so there's not enough money in the entire world at those prices, to buy a battery that would power a car.

15583 x 3000 kg = 46,749,000 kg (or 46,749 tons). This is a problem because the Tesla suspension can't handle that, and with all that extra weight you would need more power to go 55 mph. Another problem: There is probably not enough nuclear waste in the world to supply that much carbon-14. I couldn't find precise figures for the total amount of graphite nuclear waste in the world, but let's estimate that at 300,000 tons. I also couldn't find a figure for how much C-14 is vaporized when that is heated, to form the radioactive diamonds, but let's guess 1% of the total mass (let me know if you have a better figure)

So if processing 300,000 tons of the Earth's existing graphite waste yields 1% or 3,000 tons of C-14, that's only 6% of the 46,749 tons of C-14 you would need to power your car. There's not nearly enough of that type of nuclear waste in the world, if those estimates are correct. Even if the 300,000 tons of graphite waste was pure C-14 (which it most definitely is not) that could only make 6 batteries in the entire world with the ~50,000 tons needed to power a car. You could probably be adequately shielded from the radiation as long as you weren't in an accident, but if you got in an accident and the car caught fire, can you imagine the disaster of releasing that much C-14? Diamonds will burn, thunderf00t demonstrates that in his video, and vehicle fires can get very hot.

So I wouldn't believe a word NDB says, but there really are radioactive batteries that DO work from other companies. They are very expensive, and produce very little power, so they are only practical for very niche applications like maybe satellites or something where you can afford to pay a lot for the battery since you can't change it when it dies.

originally posted by: ElGoobero
www.popularmechanics.com... gn=socialflowFBPOP&utm_source=facebook&fbclid=IwAR1m70Kw2UvWA-rNVblbLc0VDD64MQF63340cbBxqwzjz46GWggBiCwQ8fg

You’re probably wondering what the catch is. The diamond battery uses nuclear waste, lasts thousands of years, and involves layers of only the tiniest possible diamonds? That all sounds fantastic. But the truth is more complicated. Each battery cell will produce only a minuscule amount of energy, so the cells must be combined in huge numbers in order to power regular and larger devices.

not just an energy storage gadget, but an energy producing one.
man I hope they get these going.

Who tested this to guarantee it will last 28,000 years?

a reply to: Arbitrageur

we have spoken in that thread, that was my old login...........shhhh

originally posted by: UpThenDown
a reply to: Arbitrageur

we have spoken in that thread, that was my old login...........shhhh

*whispers*

what happened to you?

originally posted by: LSU2018
Who tested this to guarantee it will last 28,000 years?

Radioactive decay rates can be measured and predicted with a reasonable degree of statistical accuracy, so the long life claims are based on the radioactive fuel source half life. However as pointed out in the Thunderfoot video, there's more to the battery than the fuel, and in fact it probably won't last that long. I wouldn't be surprised if they started having problems after 100 years, not from running out of fuel, but suffering from radiation damage to the battery components.

originally posted by: UpThenDown
a reply to: Arbitrageur

we have spoken in that thread, that was my old login...........shhhh

While ATS has rules against multiple IDs, if you make a new one, and stop using the old one, I don't think they have any problem with that. What they are trying to prevent with the multiple ID rule is people carrying on conversations with their own sock puppets, so I wouldn't worry about it, since you're not doing that as far as I can see.

a reply to: LSU2018

a reply to: Arbitrageur

I used farcebook to login previously but for about the last 5 months I have not be able to login with farcebook, I tried contacting tech support prior to making new login but had zero response, so I decided to make another