• JeffKerman1999@sopuli.xyz
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    1 year ago

    Isn’t titanium expensive? I would guess they’d try something like silicon or graphite that is way much abundant

    • Pirky@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      While it is relatively expensive compared to iron, we actually use 95% of all titanium mined for white paint since titanium dioxide is really white.

      So if we’re able to put almost all titanium production into white paint, I think we could take some of that capacity and put it towards batteries.

      • JeffKerman1999@sopuli.xyz
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        1 year ago

        Yeah a friend told me something like that but he forgot to compute how much energy is needed for silicon and how much for titanium. Like aluminium is one of the most used materials but it still is a massive use of energy to refine it from bauxite or what-you-have.

        Don’t know, I’d say the mainstream is trying to go grapheme and or silicon and these dudes are trying different stuff for the sake of doing it differently.

    • FleetingTit@feddit.de
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      1 year ago

      Metallic titanium is just really difficult to work with, apparently. It doesn’t like being machined, requires very large presses to be cold or hot formed, and eats drill bits for breakfast. Basically stainless on steroids.

      But titanium itself is one the most abundant minerals on earth.