Nuclear batteries for drones?

[PHZ]

Apparently China company is developing small nuclear batteries that will fit in phones and drones to power them for years, safely. Claims they can be sized up for use in EVs as well. Sounds exciting until you consider the military applications sure to follow.

A tiny radioactive battery could keep your future phone running for 50 years

A glowing horizon for phones

www.techradar.com

That is how the Mars Rover is powered, and other equipment like that, e.g. satellites, etc.
The US government will not let this into civilian hands, but maybe China will sell us some?

 

[Mrprop365]

Been using them in my MPP for years.

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is that a normal for the props to start 1 at a time?

 

[RadioFlyerMan]

is that a normal for the props to start 1 at a time?

No… I hacked into the settings. It serves no purpose other than to be different.

 

[GregS]

Apparently China company is developing small nuclear batteries that will fit in phones and drones to power them for years, safely. Claims they can be sized up for use in EVs as well. Sounds exciting until you consider the military applications sure to follow.

A tiny radioactive battery could keep your future phone running for 50 years

A glowing horizon for phones

www.techradar.com

I watched TED and a guy talked about a nuclear battery about the size of a AA that is made from nuclear waste; which we have litterly tons of waste. It is safe and will last for 200 years; (nuclear waste has a certian life span). Still working on it.
Not for sale, but they are here......

 

[PHZ]

No… I hacked into the settings. It serves no purpose other than to be different.

Ha, ha. It’s cool. Now, just grab a .wav file of a Pratt and Whitney R 2800 starting up to play on the controller at drone startup and you will be all set. Kudos.

 

[BobaFut]

Would be super if the article could get its terms correct. Not atomic or nuclear (there's no fission happening, just radioactive decay) and not a battery (electricity is generated not stored). It's a radioisotope thermoelectric generator, which is not a novel concept.

 

[Droning on and on...]

Would be super if the article could get its terms correct. Not atomic or nuclear (there's no fission happening, just radioactive decay) and not a battery (electricity is generated not stored). It's a radioisotope thermoelectric generator, which is not a novel concept.

Uh, radioactive decay IS a nuclear process that occurs at the atomic level – i.e. the nucleus (hence "nuclear") of an atom (hence "atomic") undergoes a process of natural transformation via the weak nuclear force emitting an alpha particle (helium nucleus), or through electromagnetic and strong force interactions a beta particle (electron) or gamma rays (photons).

Fission is not radioactive decay.

 

[stubaz]

If they do get to the drone market, I know one company who will be ensuring every model drone the manufacture will have a custom made battery for that model and that model only. But let's play "What If" If they do appear and the price is say $2,000 each. How many would buy one? I don't think $2,000 is too much, after all I've seen prices of over $300 for a bog standard LiPo which only lasts 20 minutes per charge.

One thing's for sure, the government will insist they're registered and require an application form matching War and Peace in size.

 

[mavic3usa]

If they do get to the drone market, I know one company who will be ensuring every model drone the manufacture will have a custom made battery for that model and that model only. But let's play "What If" If they do appear and the price is say $2,000 each. How many would buy one? I don't think $2,000 is too much, after all I've seen prices of over $300 for a bog standard LiPo which only lasts 20 minutes per charge.

One thing's for sure, the government will insist they're registered and require an application form matching War and Peace in size.

I think those $300 batteries come at such a low price because you can sell 100k+ of them. Such an extraordinary battery that only a couple thousand people would want to buy is likely priced at $20,000 but that's just a guess.

So how does that work, you can buy the standard drone kit at $2,500 kit with a lousy regular 25 minute battery and buy any type of extra battery you want on your own, or they offer the "Fly Forever" kit for $22,500 which has a drone +battery *and* the nuclear battery included so you can have both because obviously there will be dozens of locations, cities, states, maybe even federal restrictions that will ban nuclear-powered chinese drones. Why? For sure they will fear you might crash the drone and either can't find it or refuse/fail to report it and therefore *everybody* lives are in trouble. Wow, wonder what Care Refresh/Flyaway insurance looks like for that.

Then there will be news about nuclear fires that cannot ever be put out....the price would skyrocket to @ $80,000 because all of a sudden the manufacturer would have to revise his original estimate of selling a couple thousand down to the few dozen folks (like me) who would have originally stick their neck out to buy one.

A nuclear battery for a non-military drone would be a disaster at this point.

 

[mdallen]

Maybe "Dilithium Chrystals"

 

[finity]

Wouldn't just the shielding required to keep it "safe" to be around make it prohibitively heavy to do much with?

It works well for space craft because 1 - there's nobody around to get blasted with a dose of radiation that emits from the battery and 2 - weight is only really a concern on take-off and landing.

But for drones and cars I doubt it would be viable

 

[Droning on and on...]

Wouldn't just the shielding required to keep it "safe" to be around make it prohibitively heavy to do much with?

Yes, and it's the reason we don't have a decay-driven nuclear battery today in general use.

The technology's nothing new. The problem is physics... The power output of any quantity of radioactive material is proportional to the decay rate, as expressed through its half life. Anything with enough power to make a usable battery would be prohibitively large and heavy due to the necessary metal shielding, lead being the most efficient.

The battery in this article produces microwatts. It's tried and true RTG technology. There really isn't anything new and exciting here, IMO this is over the top hype looking for investors and a market. Nothing "breakthrough" here that solves an old problem at the heart of why we don't have small nuclear powered electronics.

As for the RTG power sources in satellites, they're anything but small! How about the size of a small cube dorm-room refrigerator. And as correctly noted, that's not with the shielding necessary for a ground application where people might be around.