Tesla and the science behind the next-generation, lower-cost, ‘million-mile’ electric-car battery New battery technology is possible, allowing cars to go 400 miles or more between charges and lasting as long as 1 million miles. That could spur EV sales the same way the first 100,000-mile warranties on gas cars once did. .......... Vehicles with lithium-ion batteries, also used in cellphones, are expected to give way over the next few years to cars and trucks made with lithium-iron phosphate and other chemistries. This will cut costs, extend vehicle ranges to 400 miles or more between charges and enable batteries to last as long as 1 million miles. ............ “If you’re talking about batteries that can last twice as long for the same price, it completely changes the math for the consumer......... Iron phosphate batteries are safer, and they can have second or third lives as electricity storage.″ ........ Canning cobalt is one of the biggest elements of cutting the cost of batteries below the $100/kWh threshold that is a rough proxy for making electric vehicles as cheap as those powered by internal combustion engines .......... Today’s batteries cost about $147/kWh, down from about $1,000 in 2010 and $381 in 2015 ........... The most obvious is that the cost of electric vehicles — which recently has reached parity with gasoline-powered cars and SUVs in some luxury niche segments — could catch up to internal combustion engines by about 2023 ........ “I hope we get there sooner than 2025. Lithium-iron phosphate and its upgraded versions will have a major role in the future of EVs and fundamentally change large-scale energy storage.”
The flying taxi market may be ready for takeoff, changing the travel experience forever The goal is to link urban centers with suburbs while leapfrogging traffic — air taxis could cruise at 180 mph at altitudes of around 1,000 ft to 2,000 ft. But NASA has reported they can go at an altitude up to 5,000 ft. ......... The autonomous urban aircraft market may be worth $1.5 trillion by 2040 ....... The start-up is building a prototype that it says should eventually approach the cost of ground transportation and help a billion people save more than an hour in commuting time every day. ............ “Joby Aviation’s aircraft is designed for four passengers plus a pilot. It can travel more than 150 miles on a single charge, is 100 times quieter than conventional aircraft during takeoff and landing, and is near silent in flyover.” ........ It aims to make flying taxis cheaper than owning passenger cars. .......... “Air taxis are definitely the next phase of mobility” ....... They will usher in a nimble form of intracity travel, transporting people on the shortest possible route between two locations ........... “Everyone in the industry proceeds as though safety is guaranteed and technology will solve everything, which, as we know, is never the case” ........... Personal helicopter travel has been around for a long time but hasn’t expanded beyond wealthy passengers ........... “If they are priced correctly, air taxis may be able to democratize travel in cities where there is no public transport alternative or where the congestion and size of the urban area (Sao Paulo is the classic example) are so great”
5G is accelerating factory automation that could add trillions to the global economy Imagine a manufacturing plant in which all the production equipment is continually changing in response to market needs. .......... Also known as Industry 4.0, the smart factory runs on data and artificial intelligence, but connectivity forms the backbone of operations. The new fifth generation of mobile networks (5G) is a catalyst for this new industrial revolution because it offers much greater speed and bandwidth than previous networks, as well as low latency, or time required for data to travel between two points. 5G will work with and in some cases replace existing fixed, wired connections, making manufacturing more flexible and ready to implement innovations. ............ 190 million 5G subscribers by the end of 2020 and 2.8 billion by the end of 2025. ........... “In the future, we might be able to create ‘what we want’ in smart factories and receive it in a short time as we do purchase mass-produced products at online malls like Amazon” ........... “For the customer experience, products will become unique, customized and enriched with services.”
U.S. Intel: China Ordered Attack on Indian Troops in Galwan River Valley Gen. Zhao Zongqi, head of the Western Theater Command and among the few combat veterans still serving in the People's Liberation Army, approved the operation along the contested border region of northern India and southwestern China, a source familiar with the assessment says on the condition of anonymity. Zhao, who has overseen prior standoffs with India, has previously expressed concerns that China must not appear weak to avoid exploitation by the United States and its allies, including in New Delhi, the source says, and saw the faceoff last week as a way to "teach India a lesson." ........ the deadly and contentious incident – in which at least 20 Indian and 35 Chinese troops died, and reportedly a handful on each side were captured and subsequently released – was not the result of a tense circumstance that spiraled out of control, as has happened before, but rather a purposeful decision by Beijing to send a message of strength to India. ........ Beijing's attempts to make India more amenable to future negotiations, including about contested territory, instead appear to have pushed the economic giant closer to the U.S. .......... Much is at stake, far beyond territorial control. The U.S. has pressured India for months to back away from employing Chinese tech company Huawei to help build its 5G infrastructure. In the aftermath of last week's incident, Indians were reportedly deleting Chinese social media app TikTok and destroying phones made in China. "It does the very opposite of what China wanted," the source says. "This is not a victory for China's military." ........... On June 15, a senior Indian officer and two non-commissioned officers traveled unarmed to a meeting place where they expected to be met by a comparable delegation of Chinese troops to discuss the withdrawal, according to the source familiar with the U.S. assessment of the incident. Instead, dozens of Chinese troops were waiting with spiked bats and clubs and began an attack. Other Indian troops came in to support, leading to a melee that caused more casualties from the improvised weapons, rocks and falls from the steep terrain.
1 number that proves 2020 is *nothing* like 2016 "After Trump's unexpected victory in 2016, there's a temptation to avoid making political projections. But one election result shouldn't cause us to ignore the data. And right now the preponderance of data points to a great election for Democrats." ....... At this point in the 2016 race. Clinton had a 1.1-point lead over Trump in the national polling average. Right now, Biden has a 9.1-point average lead over Trump in national polls. ....... Biden is also running close to Trump in longtime Republican strongholds like Texas, Arizona and Georgia.
‘Zero percent’ chance of U.S.-China decoupling Now, Washington is reportedly considering a blanket ban on Communist Party members (and maybe their families) in the United States. It's one step short of a "nuclear option" in U.S.-China ties — consider it heavy ordnance that would personally affect Chinese leaders and their families in a way that sanctions and tariffs don't. .......... could render as many as 270 million ineligible for Stateside travel. Countermeasures could be massive. Beijing loves the appearance of symmetry; what if it banned all registered Republicans from China? ......... shows just how far Washington is willing to go, as Trump stakes his re-election on the China question. ......... Chance of full decoupling is “zero percent,” but the era of seamless globalization is over. ......... The rise of the digital Renminbi. Expect a rapid move toward the use of digital currencies, either privately organized or through central banks, Friedlander said, part of “a race to see who will control global payment systems.” ........... "What the U.S. policy toward China needs is ‘social distancing.’” ....... “In a world where Covid-19 shows emerging threats don’t respect national borders, decoupling the two largest economies in the world is unrealistic.” .......... “The tech world is now starting a much broader China [versus] everyone else Great Schism, moving well beyond the Great Firewall, to encompass access to advanced CPUs, 5G telecom equipment, and access to consumer and business user bases.” .......... Analysts seem to think that political repression and lifetime tenure for despots like Xi are good for Party longevity. Actually, history suggests that lifetime tenure leads to madness and dissolution.” .......... The CCP’s Leninist metal does not seem destined for American bending under Xi Jinping .......... “Until recently, China had an ability to sense where the line was for international business interests — and stop just short of crossing it.” ............. “In January 2018 I observed that the foundation of U.S.-China engagement – the presumption of gradual if slow convergence – was deteriorating, due less to China’s intention than inability to take the next steps on its self-assigned reform and opening journey.” ........... “the coming 120 days [leading up to] the presidential election will not just make U.S.-China relations unworthy of optimism, it will make them extremely dangerous.” ........... Beijing thinks the real power in America lies with Wall Street, not Washington ........... “overlook[ing] the vital fact that, when it comes to dealing with an external threat, fear always trumps greed … Washington has seldom capitulated to commercial interests when American security is at stake.” ............ Half of Hong Kongers are contemplating exit, but only four percent list the U.S. as their first choice, and 10 percent the U.K. ....... The top choice: Taiwan, followed by Canada and Australia. ........... Average Chinese are not sympathetic to their sometimes wealthy, often liberal-minded compatriots abroad. .......... What do authorities really mean in Article 38, which technically gives them jurisdiction over everyone in the world? .............. “TikTok doesn’t appear to grab any more personal information than Facebook. That’s still an appalling amount of data to mine about the lives of Americans,” Fowler wrote. “But there’s scant evidence that TikTok is sharing our data with China.” ................ Is a U.S. WeChat ban in the cards? .. WeChat is an essential tool for Chinese living abroad to stay in touch with friends and family, and they’d need to use a VPN or other workarounds if there were a ban — in other words, they’d feel like Americans in China have for about a decade.
Op-ed: Hyperwar is coming. America needs to bring AI into the fight to win — with caution It is important officials in each nation understand how emerging technologies speed up decision-making but through crisis acceleration run the risk of dangerous miscalculation. ........ For not only is technology changing, the rate of that alteration is accelerating. ......... AI, once fully realized, has the potential to be one of the single greatest force multiplier for military and security forces in human history. ......... AI-enabled capabilities could be used to threaten our critical infrastructure, amplify disinformation, and wage war .......... The distinctions between hybrid warfare and hyperwar are important. ........... “Hybrid threats combine military and non-military as well as covert and overt means, including disinformation, cyber attacks, economic pressure, deployment of irregular armed groups and use of regular forces. Hybrid methods are used to blur the lines between war and peace, and attempt to sow doubt in the minds of target populations.” ............. By contrast, hyperwar may be defined as a type of conflict where human decision-making is almost entirely absent from the observe-orient-decide-act (OODA) loop ............. the time associated with an OODA cycle will be reduced to near-instantaneous responses. .......... While AI has the capacity to magnify military capabilities and accelerate the speed of conflict, it can also be inherently destabilizing. ........ Now is the time for the U.S. and China to have the hard conversations about norms of behavior in an AI enabled, hyperwar environment. With both sides moving rapidly to field arsenals of hypersonic weapons, action and reaction times will become shorter and shorter and the growing imbalance of the character and nature of war will create strong incentives, in moments of intense crisis, for conflict not peace. This is foreseeable now, and demands the engagement of both powers to understand, seek, and preserve the equilibrium that can prevent the sort of miscalculation and high-speed escalation to the catastrophe that none of us wants.
