Lithium-ion batteries are defective and need to be upgraded

Believe it or not, the smartphone you hold in your hand was more powerful than the computing network of NASA, which was used to put humans on the surface of the moon in 1969, and with your smartphone you can make calls and send messages as well as other amazing features like playing games and playing videos Imaging, broadcasting and other features that we cannot fully list, but all the features that you get through a smartphone may fade and the device becomes useless if it does not have a powerful and rechargeable battery that can last for a long time, but the technology used is still defective and needs to be developed.

Lithium-ion batteries

The first lead-acid rechargeable battery was developed in 1859 by a physicist Gaston PlantyAnd in 1980, develop the world John Goodnav Lithium cobalt oxide cathode battery, which was marketed by Sony and used for cell phone batteries in 1991, and for this achievement, Godnav was awarded the Nobel Prize in October along with fellow chemists M. Stanley Whittingham and Akira Yoshino.

Lithium ion batteries work by combining the lithium oxide cathode (positive electrode) with the anode (negative electrode) and the electrolyte (separator) used as the conductor, when the battery is charged and discharged, the ions move between the electrodes and generate energy that the battery can then use.

Only five companies in Japan, China and South Korea produce 62% of the world's lithium-ion batteries. Demand has grown dramatically since 2015, when China began aggressively pushing domestic electric vehicle production along with continued global growth in sales of smartphones, tablets and laptops.

China currently manufactures 60% of electric vehicles in the world, and is trying to secure control of lithium, which is an abundant natural mineral found in salt water and is mostly produced in South America, specifically in Bolivia, Chile and Argentina.

Chinese company Tianqi Lithium last year paid $ 4 billion for a stake in the Chilean mining company Sociedad Química y Minera, effectively giving it control over half of the global production of lithium, and the industry that Tianqi focuses on is the lithium-ion battery market, which is expected to grow in size. From $ 33 billion in 2018 to more than $ 73 billion by 2024 according to market research firm Global Market Insights.

Disadvantages of lithium-ion batteries

Lithium (called white gold) is a chemically active element compared to other elements, and in South America, which produces the majority of lithium in the world, white gold is extracted from salt surfaces, but the method used is highly water-consuming in one of the most arid regions in the world, as for cobalt Another mineral required in the production of batteries, is almost exclusively found in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and it is mined through unsafe practices, including the use of children as labor to extract cobalt.

Moreover, lithium-ion batteries are currently too expensive to be recycled, which means that they often end up in landfills, and Americans dispose of around two billion lithium-ion batteries every year.However, there are projects in Sweden and Japan that have begun Recycle electric vehicle batteries that can still retain 70% of their charge even after many years of use.

Despite the rapid rise in demand for them, lithium-ion batteries have other disadvantages, such as safety issues and environmental damage, because lithium-ion is an inherently unstable material and this means that it may explode when damaged or exposed to high heat. 195 fires and explosions between 2009 and 2017, including notable issues faced by the Samsung Galaxy Note 7 in 2016.

alternative solutions

Some researchers and technologists are trying to address these challenges and disadvantages of lithium-ion batteries so far, while others are working on the slow evolution process to find an alternative to lithium-ion as ammonia, magnesium and sodium are all being developed at the moment and all have their drawbacks, including low energy retention and material volatility.

“There are two primary battery technologies that demonstrate amazing capabilities for the electric car industry over the next decade,” says Jarvis Toe, executive vice president of marketing and products at Enevate Corporation, a lithium-ion battery company based in Irvine, California. It is an active substance that can store lithium, and it has a high electrical conductivity.

Another major development is the reduction or elimination of cobalt, which currently accounts for 20% of the cost of materials used in a regular lithium-ion battery, and the price of cobalt has increased from $ 20 per metric ton in 2016 to about $ 80 today, so removing cobalt is the key to lowering the cost. Lithium-ion batteries, which is why Panasonic and Tesla are working to remove the cobalt from their batteries.

"Low-cobalt or cobalt-free cathode technologies can help continue to reduce the cost of EV batteries to get affordable, certified EVs faster, as cathodes continue to be the most expensive component within a lithium-ion cell today, and the anode technologies that dominate the Silicon offers very fast charging capabilities along with high energy densities and safety features. ”

Research teams have successfully explored the use of magnesium chromium oxide electrodes and gold nanowires to replace the cobalt that cathodes are usually made of, in addition to "refillable" batteries that can replenish electrolytes in. A future roadside power station could refill your electric vehicle with a new electrolyte when The need, which removes the range concern that is currently a major problem for lithium-ion batteries.

Bill Ray, in charge of the semiconductor and electronics sector at market research firm Gartner, says that copper foaming can replace lithium ion in less than five years, and it is close to production, and with a larger anode, which means it can be charged very quickly. Of course what consumers want. ”

Several companies, including Ford, are developing solid-state batteries that work by replacing a liquid electrolyte separator with a solid, and a range of potential materials are being researched including new crystalline materials, LTPS polycrystalline silicon, and the superionic lithium hydride conductor. , And the ceramic electrolyte.

Future technologies

The use of solids can result in a higher capacity battery while reducing the risk of fire or explosion, although these materials are far from mainstream production. The Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Science and Technology and the University of Geneva have also created a new battery prototype known as the 'solid state'. In full, this battery has the potential to be more efficient than lithium-ion, has greater capabilities, and provides high levels of safety.

"If you can master reliable wireless charging over a meter, the battery technology itself becomes much less important." “Although there are first trials underway with solid-state battery systems, solid-state technology currently has disadvantages in terms of technology and price,” says Sven Schulz, CEO of German company AKASOL for high-performance batteries.

He expects solid-state batteries to enter the market by 2030, although he believes that lithium-ion batteries will remain the best option for at least the next ten years because while the development of lithium-ion technology is not a revolutionary process, it is improving step by step by 2% to 5%. % Annually. Adhering to this technology until the emergence of a new experimental technology is the right thing to do.

In the long term, some experts have a completely different view of the future of battery power, Ray says that wireless or indoor induction charging via a cushion in a garage, street or city parking lot is commonplace.

"At the moment, wireless charging is not really better than charging with a cable. If you can master reliable wireless charging over one meter, the battery technology itself becomes much less important. Your device is constantly relying on charging."

Some in the energy industry predict that domestic energy storage, like Tesla's Powerwall, will become standard as the units contain rechargeable lithium-ion batteries that can store 13.5 kilowatt hours of electricity, enough to power a medium-sized home for a day. That demand grows as more homes are equipped with solar panels and wind turbines, and you need to store this energy.

Finally, as our dependence on different types of batteries increases, the commercial incentive will increase to explore new, more reliable and effective solutions, and for this we need to gain more experience in chemistry, physics, engineering and materials science in order to unite together and it is crucial that we have a massive collaborative wave that addresses the challenges. Development of new battery technologies.

Source:

medium