There are several articles in the public press saying that Boeing will conduct two test flights approximately this weekend, and that the new system will be / has been subjected to the 2008 RTCA standards. One article
NewsDaily: Boeing puts 787 battery to tough tests it once avoided includes some comment about how difficult it will be / was to pass the test with LiCo:
Lukso, who left SecuraPlane to start his own lithium-ion battery business, acknowledged that the RTCA standards are tough. At his new company, he spent $6 million and several years without successfully building a battery that could pass the test now in front of Boeing.
Another battery maker, EaglePicher Technologies, of Joplin, Missouri, passed tests modeled on DO-311, but used a less volatile chemistry than Boeing, known as lithium-iron phosphate.
"To successfully pass the containment (test), we needed iron phosphate," Ron Nowlin, general manager of aerospace systems for EaglePicher, said in an interview earlier this year.
So I wonder how Boeing accomplished that result in a few weeks. Anyone think they've changed chemistry and aren't hooting about it?