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Coin-sized nuclear 3V battery with 50-year lifespan enters mass production
(www.techspot.com)
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this post was submitted on 04 Apr 2025
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Technology
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I always wondered why there weren't any nuke batteries available. We have had the technology for decades.
I imagine large part of it is that it's at odds with capitalist drive to increase consumption.
Planned obsolescence? Now in upgraded, more flashy version!
They use a more efficient process. Something about a diamond semiconductor that turns beta particles into electricity instead of relying on heat.
Can’t imagine why we don’t put nuclear material in consumer products, seems practical.
You mean like Microwaves? Or Smoke detectors? Granite countertops etc. Or watches, and Energy Efficient CFLs?
In smoke detectors and tritium watches the quantity of radioactive material is minuscule compared to the beta emitter in the battery, as in multiple orders of magnitude less. None of the things you mentioned have radioactive material in any significant quantity. If you swallowed or inhaled this battery you’d be exposed to significant amounts of radiation.
A microwave is not an ionizing radiation source.
I think you're in trouble if you swallow or inhale any batteries.
"If you swallowed or inhaled this battery you'd be exposed to significant amounts of radiation."
It's beta radiation, which can be stopped by a layer of tin foil, I think. So yeah if you ate the source itself that would be bad, but if you eat the battery with the casing, probably much less bad?
There is nothing nuclear about microwaves.
Sure, but they are radiation sources and beyond microwaves, "nuclear" material exists in several consumer products, so that isn't really a reason we haven't had consumer nuclear batteries.
“Drinking hot tea is safe so drinking boiling water, which is also hot, should also be safe”
The quantity of radioactive material and what form of radiation it emits is extremely relevant to this discussion.
We have seen nuclear batteries - it’s decades old technology at this point. They were used in pacemakers. They stopped in the 80s because it’s too expensive and dangerous. You have to track radiation sources like this.