Reasons why progress and price drops on battery storage will continue.
Above, breakthrough in Silicon nano-tech makes much more energy dense, faster charging battery possible.
Below, advances in Sodium ion technology promise batteries with no Lithium, nickel, or cobalt. Recharge News reports the new cell is “safer, more cost-effective and sustainable than ones based on nickel, manganese, cobalt or iron phosphate chemistries. It is also produced with minerals such as iron and sodium that are abundant on global markets.”
Swedish battery maker Northvolt AB has developed its first sodium-ion product, a technology that could cut reliance on scarce raw materials and lay the foundation for the company’s next generation of electric-car batteries.
The cell has a “best-in-class” energy density of more than 160 watt-hours per kilogram, and was made without any lithium, nickel, cobalt or graphite, the company said Tuesday. While the first sodium-ion cells are designed primarily for energy storage, coming generations may be able to deliver higher energy density for electric mobility.
“Our sodium-ion technology delivers the performance required to enable energy storage with longer duration than alternative battery chemistries, at a lower cost,” Chief Executive Officer Peter Carlssonsaid in a statement.
Northvolt’s new product, which is based on a hard carbon anode and high-sodium Prussian white cathode, is more cost-effective and sustainable than conventional batteries made with nickel, manganese, cobalt or iron phosphate, according to the company. And with better safety at high temperatures, Northvolt sees it as especially attractive for energy storage in markets such as India, the Middle East and Africa.
The company — Europe’s only major homegrown battery maker — is expanding EV battery production in Sweden and has plans to build factories in Germany and Canada. It has so far raised more than $9 billion in equity and debt, bolstered by more than $55 billion in orders from automotive clients including BMW, Volvo Cars, Polestar and Volkswagen. Northvolt has said it plans to eventually go public.
Even without major breakthroughs, MotorTrend reports how incremental changes will continue to push down prices and raise performance. Long, worthwhile article, brief excerpt here.
There will come a time when electric cars will routinely offer in the high hundreds of miles of range from batteries that last for decades and recharge even quicker than you can fill a tank of gasoline. Plenty of scientists around the globe are working tirelessly to make that sort of next-generation performance a reality. But those quantum leaps perpetually seem a couple of years away, which isn’t much good for anyone looking to buy an EV soon.
So does that mean we’re forever stuck with EVs that lose a third of their range in the cold and come sometimes take hours to charge? No way. The reality is that batteries get a little better every year, a steady march that has already made EVs a reality and promises to take us to those major breakthroughs in due time.
Let’s dig deeper on those promises and the various other changes coming to an EV battery near you both sooner and later.
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The final step forward is a technology called solid-state batteries. Most experts agree these are still a good decade or so away from mass production, so of all the improvements here, this one will require the most patience. But the technology is proven; engineers are just working through the finer details of bringing it to production.
You’ll want to check out our deep dive on solid-state batteries here if you’re curious about the technology, but the short version is that today’s typical lithium-ion batteries rely on a liquid electrolyte solution that allows ions to flow from anode to cathode, or vice-versa. In a solid-state battery, the separator between the anode and cathode is a solid, often ceramic material that allows the flow of ions directly without requiring an electrolyte.
This change should result in batteries that have higher density while charging far faster and being more thermally stable, as well, with greater low-temperature performance and dramatically lower fire risk. In other words, they could and should provide an across-the-board improvement in performance, but there are some problems. The biggest? Cost.
Solid-state packs will require upwards of five to ten times more lithium than today’s battery packs, a resource that is already in extremely short supply. Beyond that, some further research is needed to prevent the formation of internal defects called dendrites, which are like microscopic stalactites that can cause batteries to short-circuit and fail.
Once those issues are solved, we could look at batteries with densities of two to three times that of current cells.
Slow And Steady To The Future
Although solid-state has the potential to revolutionize the EV world, today’s humble lithium-ion battery and its various derivatives, like LFP, still have a long way to go.
“I think there’s always room for growth,” ONE’s Ijaz said. “If you look backwards and think about the year-over-year improvement, it’s something like 6 percent year over year, on average, that batteries have improved and materials have been evolving. So I think by no means are we done.”
And there are, of course, bigger steps on the horizon.
Ijaz points to fresh research into something called multi-electron conversion, which relies on the same fundamental battery design as today but dramatically changes the chemical reactions within. “Those chemistries are typically much higher in energy density because you’re getting more than one electron per ion,” Ijaz said. More electrons from the same size battery delivering the same number of ions would mean double or triple the range and output from packs no larger or heavier than today’s.
Ijaz says that type of cell is the next frontier. You know what that means: You’re going to have to be a little more patient on this one.