Silver-Zinc Batteries Coming in 2009

[MacRumors]

A company called ZPower announced (PDF) last week that they were demoing Silver-Zinc battery technology at the 2008 Intel Developer Forum.

Silver-Zinc is new technology for the consumer market which promises a higher energy density than existing Lithium Ion batteries. According to the company, Silver-Zinc can offer up to 40% more runtime than today's batteries. ZPower has been in the news before, with previous claims that the first Silver-Zinc batteries would come to the market in summer of 2008. It seems that estimate has been pushed back to 2009 with new promises from the company that battery option will be rolled out "in a major notebook computer in 2009."

Aside from increased run-time, ZPower also claims that Silver-Zinc is safer and more environmentally safe. Silver-Zinc is said to be far more chemically stable than Lithium Ion which has had widely publicized problems with overheating and igniting. As well, 95% of battery elements are said to be recyclable with financial discounts offered to customers when they trade in their old Silver-Zinc batteries.

Existing laptop owners will be unable to take advantage of Silver-Zinc batteries when they arrive on the market. New laptops will have to be specially designed to handle the new batteries but can be "dual chemistry enabled" allowing them to use both Lithium Ion and Silver Zinc. Silver Zinc is expected to be initially offered as a premium upgrade option.

There's no reason to believe that Apple is the unidentified manufacturer, but as this technology matures, Apple would naturally have an interest in it for Mac notebooks as well as iPods and iPhones.

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[Eidorian]

Battery technology has been pretty stagnant for some time. It's good to see electronics use less power along with more robust energy storage methods.

[TuffLuffJimmy]

Soon our precious mobile Macs won't have such laughable battery life.

[WildCowboy]

Wonder what the price premium will be at launch...might not be pretty.

[carfac]

Originally Posted by MacRumors

There's no reason to believe that Apple is the unidentified manufacturer...

No reason at all. Apple seems to get beat to new tech on their laptop line regularly, and seems rather loathe to add it until well after HP, Dell and others have been using it for 6 months or more. It WOULD be nice if Apple would step up quickly to new laptop tech... but that does not seem to be what they do in practice (Blu-Ray, LED, new chipsets, etc...)

Obviously, Jobs knows better what I need in a laptop than I do....

[SFStateStudent]

40%, dang, I would be happy with 10% increase...

[chopper dave]

I recall that the major sticking point with silver-zinc was they were only good for a dozen cycles, not even close to the 500+ needed for a consumer device. Has anyone read otherwise?

[TuffLuffJimmy]

Originally Posted by chopper dave

I recall that the major sticking point with silver-zinc was they were only good for a dozen cycles, not even close to the 500+ needed for a consumer device. Has anyone read otherwise?

I assume they've been refining the technology enough that it will be ready for consumer use by the time it's released.

[JCC]

Originally Posted by chopper dave

I recall that the major sticking point with silver-zinc was they were only good for a dozen cycles, not even close to the 500+ needed for a consumer device. Has anyone read otherwise?

According to wikipedia, they have "a long life and very high energy/weight ratio." That would imply that they're good for more than a dozen cycles. The main problem appears to be the cost of silver.

[Fleetwood Mac]

This is good news. Any push in the battery field is a good one. I'm hoping for better batteries not only for my computer, but in other ares such as in electric cars that are currently limited by old battery technology.

Hopefully they can work out the kinks and show us something.

[bigmc6000]

Ok - what am I missing here. Apple stopped using Lithium-Ion batteries a while ago and switched over to the more efficient Lithium-Polymer batteries. Why are they doing tests against the Lithium Ion battery that nobody uses anymore?

"...the energy density of Li-poly batteries is over 20% higher than that of a classical Li-ion battery..."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithium_polymer

[bigmc6000]

Originally Posted by Fleetwood Mac

This is good news. Any push in the battery field is a good one. I'm hoping for better batteries not only for my computer, but in other ares such as in electric cars that are currently limited by old battery technology.

Hopefully they can work out the kinks and show us something.

The new vehicles are actually running on Lithium-Ion batteries so they really aren't that far removed from what's being shoved into laptops (way, way, way better than Nickel-Cads) and they are having to sport a ton of them so it's just not economically efficient right now and that's the main reason the Volt is going to be 35k and the tesla is running about 100k.

[Mykbibby]

I actually really believe that Apple is the company. Whenever a big contract for something is signed, and the partner is unidentified, its usually Apple, but thats not the reason I believe that its Apple. It said "a major notebook computer", not a major notebook computer line. Apple has only three notebook options available, as opposed to other companies who have many more. Wouldn't it make sense for the company to be Apple? Also, Steve Jobs' obsession with having the best battery life would make Apple a top contender for this new technology.

Then again, its probably the fanboy in me getting a little too excited. I guess all my blogging about Apple has led me to believe it can't be anyone else.

[kjs862]

Great news, bring it on!

[elppa]

If it was Apple, they wouldn't be talking about it.

[sparkleytone]

Whatever happened to the fuel cell technologies that were supposedly right around the corner 3 years ago?

[MrCrowbar]

Hell yea, 10 hours of Battery on Macbooks!
That's like 5 hours of real world use.

I don't get why Laptops would have to be redesigned though... maybe those batteries have to be charged differently. I know there were NiMh Batteries that you couldn't charge in normal chargers for some reason.

[Hattig]

If a large portion of the cost is the silver and the zinc, but these are fully recoverable (according to the PDF) during recycling, I would hope that there would be a recyling program that gave you back money or a sizeable rebate on a new Apple product.

I'm going out on a limb here, but guessing that the device will cost $500 for the battery, hence why it would be a premium product. If you could get $300 back from recycling, it would encourage recycling (and theft of such batteries) and reduce the up-front barrier.

Indeed if the number of charge cycles is still low (<200) then maybe battery exchange programs for recycling could be free - hand your old one in, get a fresh one, and the old one is recycled. That's the only way it would work in my mind, a 200 charge cycle battery isn't useful.

[popnfresh]

I noticed that the ZPower folks aren't talking about charge cycles. LiOn batteries typically can go 500 charge cycles and still retain 80% of their original capacity. I'm suspicious that Silver-Zinc batteries may not do nearly as well. We'd all love longer runtime, but if getting that means your battery loses 25% of its capacity after 100 charges, then who cares?

I want to see specs on charge cycles before I get excited about this technology.

[twoodcc]

sounds like a win-win for everyone (except maybe the price of these things). still, i am looking forward to better batteries

[CWallace]

Originally Posted by WildCowboy

Wonder what the price premium will be at launch...might not be pretty.

Likely won't matter for Apple, since Mac buyers are far more "price elastic" then Wintel buyers. And being more environmentally friendly would appeal to Apple's image and many Mac buyers.

[eidrunner247]

I think there are still too many unknowns out there. How long will the battery last? How much will it cost? It's supposed to last up to 40% longer than normal batteries, but is 40% only going to be for a select group of batteries (perhaps for small phone devices? or will this include laptops as well).

Sure, this is good news, but way too speculative. How did this make the front page?

[bug67]

Oooh. I want one in my Prius! Oh, and my MacBook Pro. Oh, and my iPhone. Oh, and my iPod too.

[8CoreWhore]

Wake me up when it can use the heat generated from my lap.

[bbplayer5]

<3 iphone batteries!