Category: Technology

Business, Innovation, Technology

Battery Drama Remains

pollywannamath

In 2004, Demetri Martin observed that batteries are “the most dramatic object.”

They’re either working or they’re dead.

Looking back, I wish this joke did not age as well as it has. Why, when I go to the the store, do I still see disposable batteries as the primary option?

In 2004, we were using a mix of rechargeable AA and regular alkaline AA batteries to power our household accessories. Now, my devices either have an internal lithium-ion battery that I can recharge, or I pick up a disposable AA battery at the store and replace the battery when needed.

In 2004, my family and I were not trying to reduce our use of single-use plastics. My body wash had microbeads that polluted the great lakes. Telling people that you recycle was a liberal status indicator. Our lights were incandescent. But in 2004, we had rechargeable alkaline batteries to power our digital camera and TV remote control. These rechargeable batteries were easy to find, they were sold along with single-use batteries at our local grocery store.

When I go to the stores near my home, I see only single-use alkaline batteries on the shelves. Ideally I would have an analysis of the cost differences per milliampere hour and the environmental impacts of the primary battery technologies available:

Unfortunately, I cant find consistent data that would make that analysis possible for me, and I don’t know enough about battery technology to create a model for the environmental and cost outcomes that would be necessary without the observed data.

Without that model, I’m forced to make an assumption. At least one of the rechargeable battery options above are cheaper to use and better for the environment than disposable alkaline batteries. The New York Times agrees with this assumption as well. So why am I not buying AA lithium-ion batteries?

My inability to escape alkaline batteries isn’t unique to me. An analysis from 2006 (nearest to the 2004 date above) projected that Alkaline batteries would retain market dominance through 2015 at minimum and that the battery market would continue to grow. That analysis proved correct. An analysis that covers 2018-2023 (gated) appears to forecast continued market dominance of disposable alkaline batteries over rechargeables.

I think there are a few likely causes, convenience and market concentration being the two primary.

  • When I need a battery, I need it urgently. I probably am not willing to wait for overnight or two-day shipping from Amazon to find lithium-ion AAs. I may not even be willing to wait through the charging period (I know, I’ll work on it). Disposables are more convenient.
  • I would not be shocked to learn that the best and most innovative brands in lithium-ion batteries are not the household battery companies. It might also be true that none of the best lithium-ion (or similar) companies would be strategic acquisitions for the known battery companies. If either of these things prove true, I should expect that it will be hard to find good rechargeable batteries at the store.

Hopefully, by 2025, batteries will have caught up with other household good, or that all new household accessories will have long-lasting internal batteries that recharge. But in 2004, I would not have assumed that AA batteries would have regressed by 2020.

Observations, Technology

Should we care more about UFOs?

pollywannamath

During the COVID-19 pandemic, the US government released confirmation that three military videos containing unidentified objects are real and that the unidentified objects are unidentified. Does that mean that these unidentified objects are extraterrestrial? Alien UFO theories have been popular since the 30’s and provide a possible explanation for Fermi’s paradox.  Since the UFO sightings in Roswell, the mainstream dismissed those who believe in alien exploration of earth and that the UFOs are alien vehicles as kooks. Many are.

During this crisis, the UFO news passed with little fanfare. In the past, UFO sightings were explained as weather balloons, government experiments, or camera errors. In this case, the US government admits that it is not aware of the objects’ identity? With better cameras than were possible in the earliest conspiracies, what is the explanation now?

  • Extraterrestrial  activity
  • Civilian/NGO Prank
  • Other country’s military activity
  • US government attempt to downplay covid by creating a compelling news story
  • Other

None of the explanations above are comforting. Yet, UFOs have less interest than murder hornets in a google trends report.  Even if there is a 1% chance it is alien activity and a 1% chance that it is military action, we certainly aren’t concerned enough about UFO activity. The possible implications of military action the US can’t explain, or alien visitors are significantly larger than even the COVID-19 pandemic.

 

Prediction, Technology

When will we drive flying cars?

pollywannamath

Since before the Jetsons, we have dreamed of owning a flying car. The idea of leaving your house in the sky and flying to your destination without the humdrum of ground traffic is exciting. We already have helicopters, private drones, and airplanes, why not flying cars too?

In fact, there is a flying car on sale today (well….preorder). It isn’t quite the Jetsons, but it confirms the base technology is possible and not too far away. So when will the average person drive a flying car and will it bring the freedom we hope?

I’m not sure flying cars will ever be in our future. And if flying cars see widespread adoption, I don’t think it will offer a superior product to ground transit. I have a few reasons for my thinking:

  1. There aren’t many helicopter pilots. An ultralight helicopter can cost as little as $20,000 and the range would suffice for daily commutes. Ultralight helicopters are as close as we have to the cars of the Jetsons and are possible for wealthy individuals today. The regulatory limitations of helicopters are much lower than that of airplanes. Getting a private helicopter license is expensive, but can happen in a year. There are a number of reasons more people don’t take helicopters to work including safety concerns, noise, licensure, and a lack of flexibility, and it isn’t clear that a driving car will fix them.
  2. Regulatory requirements. It’s clear that even if flying cars exist, and are capable of autonomous/semiautonomous flight, there will be regulatory barriers of entry. People that own them will need to be licensed. Traffic will be regulated. The end product between self-driving  ground cars and self-driving flying cars will not be sufficiently different to justify the cost of licensure for widespread adoption of the flying product. If neither are self-driving, flying will be too hard for the general population.
  3. NIMBY-ism. Why will skys be congested? Because people will not want flying vehicles over their property. Property lines will extend 5,000-10,000 ft above the ground and cities will not allow flying except for specified flyways. Flying will lose its luster quickly when it has the same traffic, speed, noise, and route limitations of the ground.
Observations, Prediction, Technology

Posts I wish I had the vocabulary to write

pollywannamath

I’ve had a few recurring thoughts this year that I haven’t been able to materialize into ideas and write about. I’m posting introductions to each in the hopes that I will be able to write more concretely about each in the coming year.

  • A societal need for religion— I firmly believe it is important for a society to have a number of anchors that oppose each other to maintain the right amount of societal tension necessary for growth and to hedge against extreme thoughts. In this worldview, organizations that no longer appear beneficial to society perform key functions and are necessary to hold the collective together. We should hold unions, children’s clubs, and organized religions in far greater esteem than we do. Once an anchor is dislodged, it is much harder to reestablish and crucial elements of society will be destabilized.
    • What’s holding me back:
      • I can’t identify the production function that argues for trade unions and organized religion at the expense of secular neoliberal policies and improves outcomes.
      • Viewing organized religion as a pacifying and necessary force is a hard position to defend currently. I have true ideas on how a move toward spiritualism destabilized the religious anchor, but those deserve their own post.
      • What are the links and harms? Destabilization captures the essence of my concern, but it isn’t a tangible fear. How do we get to the bad place?

        The Bad Place

 

  • Data Privacy falls far too low on the societal priority stack–We lost the war for our data with big corporations; trying to live without Google or Amazon would be lunacy. However, we are lucky that the corporations currently mining data have been relatively responsible to date. Even the instances where companies have faced public outcry for data privacy violations (e.g.Cambridge Analytica) have been relatively minor compared to the potential data privacy violations that are possible. A mix of policy updates, public behavior changes, corporate incentive shifts, and technological advancements are needed to usher in a safer connected world.
    • What’s holding me back:
      • Links to harms. It’s really easy to look at health data companies like 23andMe and identify risks that come from selling health and consumer data. I can imagine a snake oil company targeting populations at increased risk of cancer with high mortality rates based on data purchased from a company like 23andMe. It’s much harder to identify a likely harm to the average healthy 25-year-old that could come from her Facebook data without inventing a terrible conspiracy.
      • Policies have too many unintended consequences. Sound policies like GDPR might not be so sound in practice. Without a good sense for a better path forward, its hard to formulate an idea for why the status quo isn’t good.

 

  • We shouldn’t conflate self-driving and alternative fuel cars– Okay, so this one has an idea, but I can’ t vocalize why it matters. There are a few items that are clear:
    • Alternative fuels are a net benefit and should be pursued.
      • It isn’t clear that electricity will be the best source, but it is probably the most flexible alternative source.
      • Combustion engines will be the most flexible fuel option for a long time to come.
      • There is probably a link between alternative fuel and aggressive copywrite legislation that prevents home and mechanic repair (similar to the farming industry’s relationship with new tech).
    • Self-driving cars will benefit society when adoption is high. Self driving technology should be pursued.
      • The link between self-driving cars and car ownership rates is not obvious (deserves its own post).
      • Self-driving technology will see widespread adoption much faster in commercial fleets than with the public-at-large.
      • The implementation requires as much policy change as it does technological change. Not enough attention is paid to the policy implications.
      •  Self-driving cars may increase congestion and urban sprawl in the short to medium term. Self-driving technology is not, at its core, green technology.
    • Wide adoption of self-driving technology in new cars that use internal combustion energy presents a worse ecological future.
    • What’s holding me back:
      • Too many competing thoughts–There is, somewhere in my thoughts, a unifying theory of the suburbs, automotive advancement, and societal good. I haven’t found it.
      • Competing visions of self-driving cars–In a world where every car is self-driving are there a greater or fewer number of cars on the road? If there are many more, do the efficiency gains outweigh the additional cars? Are parking lots an orderly place? What is the role of public transit? What do the cars do during the workday?
      • Timeline–If pervasive green technology is 25 years away, and self-driving tech is 5 years away, then its likely that green tech and self-driving policy will be in sync. It isn’t clear to me where we are in the development of either technology; it is clear that we have not started on the necessary policy changes.