John – The British media is bought and paid for. It’s basically its owners using money to shout at us.

Leaving the EU can be made a success but this deal agrees to make sure it isn’t a success from the start, that simple. If Labour abstains it will be testament to their lack of backbone. They BS’d their way through the last election, pretty much pretending they wanted the same Brexit as the Tories in order to make the election about a manifesto of mathematical garbage instead of the Brexit issue. Now they’re avoiding revealing their position again, even assuming they have one. Sorry but that isn’t leadership material. If you can’t even stand up and be counted, you sure as hell can’t lead.

Looks like 40 F-35Bs, so an extra 60 F-35As making 102 As and 40 Bs in total.

https://defence-blog.com/news/japan-to-buy-vertical-takeoff-f-35b-lightning-ii-aircraft.html

Mil Design Bureau to develop fast-speed combat helicopter for Russian Army

A Chinese startup may have cracked solid-state batteries

A Chinese startup may have cracked solid-state batteries

Solid-state batteries have long been heralded as The Next Big Thing after lithium-ion, with companies from all quarters racing to get them into high-volume production. Dyson, BMW and car manufacturer Fisker are just a few names that have been working on the tech for the last few years, but now, reports suggest a Chinese start-up might be the first to have cracked it.

According to Chinese media, Qing Tao Energy Development Co, a startup out of the technical Tsinghua University, has deployed a solid-state battery production line in Kunshan, East China. Reports claim the line has a capacity of 100MWh per year — which is planned to increase to 700MWh by 2020 — and that the company has achieved an energy density of more than 400Wh/kg, compared to new generation lithium-ion batteries that boast a capacity of around 250-300Wh/kg.

Details beyond this are sparse. The headline news here, if accurate, would be that the company has managed to put solid-state batteries into high volume production, but it’s not clear how Qing Tao Energy Development has achieved this, nor what price points are involved. Furthermore, while a capacity of 100MWh is not to be sneezed at, it still only equates to fewer than 2,000 long-range EVs per year. Nonetheless, the news demonstrates that progress is happening in the solid-state battery arena. We might not feasibly yet be at high volume production, but we’re on our way.

Maybe they need to do something to prevent them. I do not accept the fact that there is nothing that can be done to prevent fires. If a company took that attitude they would find themselves in court very quickly.

I just find it strange how they got through June, July and August with no fire and then, just after things have gotten considerably cooler, a fire.