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submitted 9 months ago by floofloof@lemmy.ca to c/technology@lemmy.world
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[-] Telemachus93@slrpnk.net 122 points 9 months ago

Nothing factually wrong with the article, but it has this sound of "this technology will solve all our problems" to it that I find highly problematic. Seven out of nine planetary boundaries are exceeded, climate change just being one of them. And all of them are exceeded because of our wasteful and growth-oriented way of life.

[-] Diplomjodler3@lemmy.world 30 points 9 months ago

We can change our technology to be more sustainable or we can regress to a pre-industrial society with 90% of the population dying in the process. Which do you prefer?

[-] Telemachus93@slrpnk.net 47 points 9 months ago

That's a false dichotomy. We can also improve our technology while ditching capitalism.

[-] Diplomjodler3@lemmy.world 23 points 9 months ago

That's reductive. Seeing capitalism as the root cause of all problems is disingenuous. The particular ideology oligarchies are using to justify their rule is incidental.

[-] TheJesusaurus@sh.itjust.works 17 points 9 months ago

But... It is the root of a lot of problems and it helps the oligarchs... And it just sucks and makes no sense in general?

[-] sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works 8 points 9 months ago

It makes a lot of sense, but I doubt we can have a rational debate about that. In short, people tend to be motivated by profit, so theoretically productivity goes up when the economic system rewards that.

The root of the problem has little to do with the economic system, and it's like blaming bombs for war. The real problem is government structures that reward and encourage consolidation of power, both in the government itself and in the private sector. If you strip away capitalism, you just consolidate that power into the public sector, and for examples of that look at China and the USSR.

I would think that people on Lemmy who likely left other social media due to centralization wouldn't be so enamored w/ more centralization in the government space. We need solutions that look like Lemmy in the public space to decentralize power so we don't run into this type of problem. I don't think there's a magical structure that fixes everything, and I don't even necessarily think that capitalism has to be the dominant economic system in play, I just think we need to come up with ideas on how to reduce the power of those at the top.

Specific example of the US militaryWe should dramatically reduce the federal standing military, increase the National Guard to match, and put stricter limits on when the President can use the National Guard. IMO, the only way the President should access the National Guard is if one of the following happen:

  • governor explicitly yields control, or the state's legislature forces the governor to yield control
  • states vote with a super majority to declare war
  • legislative branch votes to declare war with a super majority

That's it. The President would otherwise be left with a small standing military that's enough to deter or perhaps assist in peacekeeping, but nowhere near large enough to invade another country.

I personally think we should embrace capitalism as it's decentralized by nature, unless forces centralize it, and then create rules that discourage/punish over-centralization. For example, I think small companies should have liability protections, and larger companies should lose it, such that lawsuits could target specific individuals in the organization instead of allowing the organization to be used as a shield. For example, if a company files bankruptcy and it's over a certain size (maybe $1B market cap? $100M?), then shareholders and top executives become responsible to cover whatever the debts are still unresolved after liquidation. If a crime is committed, it shouldn't simply result in a fine that's factored in as the cost of doing business, it should result in arrests. The problem isn't capitalism, it's corruption and protectionism.

[-] arrow74@lemmy.zip 7 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago)

In short, people tend to be motivated by profit

Only in a society that commodifies your existence and success based on the wealth you generate/hold

Unless we're changing the definition of profit to status

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[-] Telemachus93@slrpnk.net 5 points 9 months ago

No, it's not. Not seeing that it's capitalism is the reductive view. Instead of trying to type down a huge text while I'm tired, I'd like to introduce a 112 year-old text that still seems extremely relevant today:

Moreover, capitalist production, by its very nature, cannot be restricted to such means of production as are produced by capitalist methods. Cheap elements of constant capital are essential to the individual capitalist who strives to increase his rate of profit. In addition, the very condition of continuous improvements in labour productivity as the most important method of increasing the rate of surplus value, is unrestricted utilisation of all substances and facilities afforded by nature and soil. To tolerate any restriction in this respect would be contrary to the very essence of capital, its whole mode of existence. After many centuries of development, the capitalist mode of production still constitutes only a fragment of total world production. Even in the small Continent of Europe, where it now chiefly prevails, it has not yet succeeded in dominating entire branches of production, such as peasant agriculture and the independent handicrafts; the same holds true, further, for large parts of North America and for a number of regions in the other continents. In general, capitalist production has hitherto been confined mainly to the countries in the temperate zone, whilst it made comparatively little progress in the East, for instance, and the South. Thus, if it were dependent exclusively, on elements of production obtainable within such narrow limits, its present level and indeed, its development in general would have been impossible. From the very beginning, the forms and laws of capitalist production aim to comprise the entire globe as a store of productive forces. Capital, impelled to appropriate productive forces for purposes of exploitation, ransacks the whole world, it procures its means of production from all corners of the earth, seizing them, if necessary by force, from all levels of civilisation and from all forms of society. The problem of the material elements of capitalist accumulation, far from being solved by the material form of the surplus value that has been produced, takes on quite a different aspect. It becomes necessary for capital progressively to dispose ever more fully of the whole globe, to acquire an unlimited choice of means of production, with regard to both quality and quantity, so as to find productive employment for the surplus value it has realised. From Rosa Luxemburg: The Accumulation of Capital, Chapter 26 - The Reproduction of Capital and Its Social Setting

This passage is kind of an introduction to Rosa Luxemburg's definition of imperialism. Back then, capitalism was not yet developed in the whole world and she argued that simply because it's a question of survival for companies, these companies will push for the right to exploit the whole world. And now, 112 years later, I'm pretty sure we can agree that happened. And in the past few decades, when they can't expand spacially, now it's all about squeezing every last bit of profit from nature, the workers and the consumers.

The particular ideology oligarchies are using to justify their rule is incidental.

Here, we have a point of agreement. The USSR developed into something that was no better than capitalist states. In my opinion, that's because it's bureaucracy developed into something very similar to the burgeoisie in capitalism, resource hoarders led by self-interest.

But I believe your answer built on another false dichotomy here. The alternative to capitalism I have in mind isn't a one-party state with central planning and communist aesthetics. I'm more of a proponent of decentralized power, dismantling the state and people governing their surroundings cooperatively.

[-] melfie@lemy.lol 4 points 9 months ago

Capitalism may be workable with strict regulation and proper social safety nets. The problem is that we have crony capitalism, which allows billionaires to essentially control the laws, which concentrates power into too few hands, similar to other oppressive forms of government. A key piece we are missing to make capitalism more workable is right in the word itself: “cap”. There should be a cap on how much wealth any one individual can accumulate.

[-] FlyingCircus@lemmy.world 8 points 9 months ago

Capitalism is not reformable because it fundamentally relies on ever increasing rates of profit and exploitation. The first is impossible in a finite world, and the second is untenable to anyone who believes in justice.

[-] melfie@lemy.lol 5 points 9 months ago

Corporations that are incentivized to make number go up and grow indefinitely at the expense of all else are a big part of the problem. Proper anti-trust regulation that is actually enforced to limit their size, as well as an aggressive wealth tax to limit individual wealth would go a long way.

Fundamentally, though, capitalism rewards those who seek power over those who contribute to society and also doesn’t incentivize long-term societal well-being. Regulation would only limit how much power any one psychopath can gain. If we could start from scratch and create a new society with any system we wanted, it would not be Capitalism.

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[-] Diplomjodler3@lemmy.world 4 points 9 months ago

I agree. The US have oligarchic crony capitalism supported by an utterly corrupt political system. Trying to abolish capitalism without restoring democracy and the rule of law is a fools errand. Not like it's never been tried. And every time it just replaced one ruling clique of assholes with another one.

[-] save_the_humans@leminal.space 4 points 9 months ago

Personally when I say I want to ditch capitalism, the first thing I think of, among many, is simply about democratizing the workplace. Cooperatives have proven themselves to be superior than the current private model in a variety of metrics. If we reduce the defining characteristic of capitalism as needing capital to produce more capital, the current issue is that cooperative enterprises struggle to obtain the initial capital necessary to get started. Even though they have much greater success rates, banks have historically refused to give loans to these endeavers. There exists non profits to try and fill this void but its not enough.

Question: would I have to give up my exploitative companies that fuel my bid to become the first King of Internet? Because that's kind of a dealbreaker for me.

[-] Diplomjodler3@lemmy.world 4 points 9 months ago

What are you talking about, you filthy usurper? I'm the only legitimate king of the internet!

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[-] unexposedhazard@discuss.tchncs.de 4 points 9 months ago

The world isnt binary. There are plenty of options in between those two. We could reduce our global emissions drastically without any noticeable difference in quality of life for most people. There is so much junk and single use stuff being produced that we could replace or simply stop producing. Banning all forms of commercial AI would hurt literally nobody except the idiots that decided to make it their career. If governments were serious about fighting climate change they would just take control of large parts of the industry and force them to stop making pointless shit that nobody actually needs.

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[-] FlyingCircus@lemmy.world 24 points 9 months ago

Because of ~~our wasteful and growth-oriented way of life~~ capitalism.

FTFY.

[-] Enkrod@feddit.org 8 points 9 months ago

I don't doubt for a moment that humanity can be extremely wasteful in any economic system. But capitalism sure embraces and enhances our worst tendencies.

[-] sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works 6 points 9 months ago

Partially. It's more that people don't click unless the headline is sensational.

[-] melfie@lemy.lol 92 points 9 months ago

While Sodium-Ion sounds legitimately promising, we’ve all read so many articles about “revolutionary new battery tech” over the years that the default response is “cool, let me know when mass production starts.”

[-] signalsayge@infosec.pub 29 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago)

The article literally starts off with a mass produced $800 Sodium Ion battery that you can buy right now.

[-] SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.ca 19 points 9 months ago

Because it's an ad..you all know that,right?

[-] MojoMcJojo@lemmy.world 24 points 9 months ago

Did..did you want them to keep it a secret?

[-] Soup@lemmy.world 20 points 9 months ago

It being an ad doesn’t change anything in an of itself. They’re correct in saying that there is a mass-produced, consumer grade product available. Unless that is a lie, or said product is complete trash, this solves the “call me it’s mass-produced” problem the original commentor has.

[-] davidagain@lemmy.world 8 points 9 months ago

You don't generally advertise things that you don't mass produce, though.

[-] gandalf_der_12te@discuss.tchncs.de 27 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago)

“cool, let me know when mass production starts.”

("to the best of my knowledge, that is now, immediately.")

HiNa opened a 1 GWh sodium-ion battery factory in December 2022. Since then, both BYD and CATL have opened huge sodium-ion battery factories.

[-] davidagain@lemmy.world 6 points 9 months ago

Yup. BYD's 30GWh/year means 1kwh/second!

I can't resist cancelling the units even though it doesn't actually make sense because it's a capacity not a volume, as it were, but that's a 3.6kw factory!

[-] Krelis_@sh.itjust.works 4 points 9 months ago

3.6 MW even. :)

3.6 kW is what a 50cc internal combustion engine typically produces

[-] davidagain@lemmy.world 4 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago)

Here's my working. There are about 31.56 million seconds in a year, which I rounded to 30 million, and so

30 GWh/year
= 30x10^9 Wh / year
~ 30x10^9 Wh / 30x10^6 s
= 10^3 Wh/s
= 1 kWh / s
= 3600 kWs / s
= 3.6 kw

I used the duckduckgo autocalculator just now, and 30/31.56*3.6 is about 3.4, so it's much closer to 3.4kW.

(It's not power output, it's manufactured storage output. I think of it as like a factory that produces 3.4 litre capacity jugs per second, but they're not jugs, they're actually batteries. Big ones.)

They could make a 120kWh battery (which would give a family car a range in the region of 450 miles) every two minutes.

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[-] OctopusNemeses@lemmy.world 21 points 9 months ago

Did you read the article? This isn't about a research paper that talks about theoretical lab experiments. Sodium batteries are in real world application right now. Mainly in China and South America.

You can buy sodium batteries from AliExpress. It's been available for a while. I was thinking about ordering a few but I ended up spending my hobby budget elsewhere. There's no economies of scale yet for sodium battery tech. You can get the battery but there is zero electronics available for it. Mainly you'd have to design your own charger and battery management modules. That's out of my pay grade. I've been waiting for Chinese engineers to mass produce such things.

[-] SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.ca 9 points 9 months ago

You can buy sodium batteries from AliExpress.

You can buy a lot of bullshit from AliExpress.

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[-] rcbrk@lemmy.ml 4 points 9 months ago

you’d have to design your own charger and battery management modules

Just searched for "Sodium-ion BMS" on Aliexpress:
screenshot of aforementioned search's results, showing listings for sodium-ion bms boards for AU$10~AU$40 or so

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[-] GreyEyedGhost@lemmy.ca 9 points 9 months ago

The sub is about technology, not industry. Also, look at the advances in battery technology in the last 30 years. There have only been 3 notable technology advances in the last 40 years from a consumer perspective, but there have been significant advances within each of those major technology changes, resulting in Wh/kg increasing by 6 to 10 times and $/Wh dropping about 99%.

If you want to hear about things that could happen or are about to start happening in industry, this is the right community. If you want to know what you can buy tomorrow, try Amazon.

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[-] sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works 4 points 9 months ago

Yeah, I want to buy a car w/ reduced range at substantially lower prices, but I can't do that right now. Give me a sub-$20k option to get to work and back and then I'll get excited about the tech.

[-] mr_strange@discuss.tchncs.de 5 points 9 months ago
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[-] supersquirrel@sopuli.xyz 32 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago)

HiNa supplied sodium-ion batteries for JAC Motors in 2023. Early batteries had lower gravimetric energy density (145 Wh/kg) and volumetric energy density (330 Wh/liter) than LFP, but sodium-ion batteries have already improved since then. They have outstanding temperature range, yielding 88% retention at -20°C. For reference, the discharge capacity of NMC at 0°C, −10°C and −20°C is only 80%, 53%, and 23% of that at 25°C. The HiNa batteries had a cycle life of 4,500 cycles with 83% retention and a 2C charge rate, but even better sodium-ion batteries are on their way.

...

These developments point the way to much more. The cost of sodium battery materials is much lower than for any lithium battery. There are no resource bottleneck materials like cobalt or lithium to contend with. In addition, aluminum can be used for electrodes, whereas lithium requires copper for one of the electrodes. Carbon or graphite and separator materials will be similar, but in all other respects, sodium has much lower material costs. Compared to LFP, sodium does not require phosphorous, a substance that is almost exclusively sourced from one state in north Africa, nor lithium, a relatively abundant but more expensive substance than sodium. LFP cannot compete on material costs or temperature range, and both BYD and CATL expect to phase it out first in energy storage. ‌

[-] progandy@feddit.org 14 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago)

Early batteries had lower gravimetric energy density (145 Wh/kg) and volumetric energy density (330 Wh/liter) than LFP, but sodium-ion batteries have already improved since then.

OK, and where are the new numbers? 1% better, but still much worse than lfp?

Edit:a bit later they mention 175 Wh/kg and 10,000 lifetime cycles for some catl cells, that is not too bad, but still not great with lfp at about 200 Wh/kg which still is less than ~~Lithium Ion~~ NMC.

[-] Telemachus93@slrpnk.net 8 points 9 months ago

with lfp at about 200 Wh/kg which still is less than Lithium Ion.

LFP is a lithium-ion technology. You probably meant "worse than NMC", which is another, older, higher density but less safe lithium-ion technology.

[-] progandy@feddit.org 3 points 9 months ago

Right, thanks. did not remember that name and searching yielded articles writing it like that so I went with it.

[-] GreenShimada@lemmy.world 21 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago)

As bullish as I am on Sodium-ion batteries, only very recently did researchers figure out how to boost the charge capacity, making any attempted commercial models in use so far nice, but not the final form where normies are buying them from Home Depot.

The Sehol car mentioned is a niche configuration of a common model, because the Li-ion model goes farther between charges. Other than the launch in 2023, and articles recycling the same info, find me 1 article that doesn't use words like "could" or "will" or "might" about sales of this model? Same thing for the BYD Seagull with Na-ion batteries. It's all greenwashing news where if you dig at it even slightly, you see how not real any of it is.

It's closer than it was 5 years ago, but it's still not a "revolution" by any means.

[-] YiddishMcSquidish@lemmy.today 15 points 9 months ago

This has got to be better than lithium mining.

[-] Simulation6@sopuli.xyz 14 points 9 months ago

The article has so many acronyms in it, I had to give up reading it. I assume this isn't just cat like typing?

[-] SirMaple__@lemmy.ca 10 points 9 months ago
[-] Evil_Shrubbery@thelemmy.club 4 points 9 months ago

3kW vibrator?
15m42s

:'''(

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this post was submitted on 23 Oct 2025
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