The Guy Who Just Won The Nobel for the Lithium-ion Battery Has An Idea For the Next Generation of Batteries

As promised in "Nobel chemistry prize: Lithium-ion battery scientists honoured" here's what Professor Goodenough is up to these days.
First up, from the University of Texas:

28 Feb 2017
Lithium-Ion Battery Inventor Introduces New Technology for Fast-Charging, Noncombustible Batteries
John Goodenough and his team have developed the first all-solid-state battery cells that could lead to safer, faster-charging, longer-lasting rechargeable batteries.

AUSTIN, Texas — A team of engineers led by 94-year-old John Goodenough, professor in the Cockrell School of Engineering at The University of Texas at Austin and co-inventor of the lithium-ion battery, has developed the first all-solid-state battery cells that could lead to safer, faster-charging, longer-lasting rechargeable batteries for handheld mobile devices, electric cars and stationary energy storage.

Goodenough’s latest breakthrough, completed with Cockrell School senior research fellow Maria Helena Braga, is a low-cost all-solid-state battery that is noncombustible and has a long cycle life (battery life) with a high volumetric energy density and fast rates of charge and discharge. The engineers describe their new technology in a recent paper published in the journal Energy & Environmental Science.

“Cost, safety, energy density, rates of charge and discharge and cycle life are critical for battery-driven cars to be more widely adopted. We believe our discovery solves many of the problems that are inherent in today’s batteries,” Goodenough said.

The researchers demonstrated that their new battery cells have at least three times as much energy density as today’s lithium-ion batteries. A battery cell’s energy density gives an electric vehicle its driving range, so a higher energy density means that a car can drive more miles between charges. The UT Austin battery formulation also allows for a greater number of charging and discharging cycles, which equates to longer-lasting batteries, as well as a faster rate of recharge (minutes rather than hours)....MORE

There are skeptics who raise doubts and criticisms but former GOOG honcho Eric Schmidt and Elon Musk are paying attention (if not money) and there are a few startups trying to figure out how to optimize the solid state battery.
The Energy & Environmental Science link above just goes to the abstract. If interested here is the full paper, hosted at the Royal Society of Chemistry:

Alternative strategy for a safe rechargeable battery