U.S. Gave Battery Technology to China

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https://www.npr.org/2022/08/03/11149...china-vanadium

When a group of engineers and researchers gathered in a warehouse in Mukilteo, Wash., 10 years ago, they knew they were onto something big. They scrounged up tables and chairs, cleared out space in the parking lot for experiments and got to work.

They were building a battery — a vanadium redox flow battery — based on a design created by two dozen U.S. scientists at a government lab. The batteries were about the size of a refrigerator, held enough energy to power a house, and could be used for decades. The engineers pictured people plunking them down next to their air conditioners, attaching solar panels to them, and everyone living happily ever after off the grid.

"It was beyond promise," said Chris Howard, one of the engineers who worked there for a U.S. company called UniEnergy. "We were seeing it functioning as designed, as expected."

But that's not what happened. Instead of the batteries becoming the next great American success story, the warehouse is now shuttered and empty. All the employees who worked there were laid off. And more than 5,200 miles away, a Chinese company is hard at work making the batteries in Dalian, China.

[Glenn E. Meyer]

That's because some US guys figured out they would make more money by dealing with China, then making them here and 'theorists' thought that more commercial success for China would turn them into Jeffersonian Democracy and the world would be at peace!!

[HeavyDuty]

This is insane. It’s almost treasonous.

[Totem Polar]

We also gave solar power production to China, via the Scandinavians, IIRC. But I’ve slept since the early 90s. Maybe someone here knows more.

[Chance]

Department of Energy officials declined NPR's request for an interview to explain how the technology that cost U.S. taxpayers millions of dollars ended up in China.

Ha. Taxpayer money that's poured into research that never benefits - or even becomes accessible to - American taxpayers basically describes the fundamental model of funding research in the US.

Which isn't to say that this story isn't frustrating, just that stories like it happen all the time.

[SecondsCount]

We also gave solar power production to China, via the Scandinavians, IIRC. But I’ve slept since the early 90s. Maybe someone here knows more.

The Americans did as well. I know an engineer who brags about all the money he made contracting to China. He had worked for a company making silicon and took what he knew over there to get a plant up and running.

[RoyGBiv]

The Chinese aren't stupid.
You want cheap Chinese labor to make your silicone chips (or whatever)?...
The China company must be 51% owned by Chinese nationals and whatever special technology is involved in manufacturing must be transferred to the China entity. In most cases.

[UNK]

If Im remembering correctly NPR is the agency that broke this story.

[RoyGBiv]

The Chinese aren't stupid.
You want cheap Chinese labor to make your silicone chips (or whatever)?...
The China company must be 51% owned by Chinese nationals and whatever special technology is involved in manufacturing must be transferred to the China entity. In most cases.

Example:

Moderna turns down China request for vaccine technology

One individual close to the Moderna team in Greater China told the FT, the company had "given up" on its previous efforts to access the Chinese market, because of Beijing’s demand that it hand over the technology as a prerequisite for selling in the country

Well done Moderna.