Researchers predict a new type of lithium battery under development could give an electric car enough juice to travel a whopping 800 kilometers before it needs to be plugged in again—about 10 times the energy that today's lithium ion batteries supply. It is a tantalizing prospect—a lighter, longer-lasting, air-breathing power source for the next generation of vehicles—if only someone could build a working model. Several roadblocks stand between these lithium–air batteries and the open road, however, primarily in finding electrodes and electrolytes that are stable enough for rechargeable battery chemistry.

IBM plans to take lithium–air batteries out of neutral by building a working prototype by the end of next year. The company announced Friday it has stepped up development efforts by adding two Japanese technology firms—chemical manufacturer Asahi Kasei Corp. and electrolyte maker Central Glass—to the IBM Battery 500 Project, a coalition IBM established in 2009 to accelerate the switch from gas to electric-powered vehicles among carmakers and their customers.

The lithium ion batteries used in today's electric vehicles rely on a metal oxide or metal phosphate (typically cobalt, manganese or iron-based materials) cathode as a positive electrode, a carbon-based anode as a negative electrode and an electrolyte to conduct lithium ions from one electrode to the other. When the car is driven, the lithium ions flow from the anode to the cathode through the electrolyte and separator membrane. Charging the battery reverses the direction of ion flow.

Most fully charged lithium ion car batteries today will take an electric vehicle only 160 kilometers before petering out. (Nissan says its all-electric Leaf has a range of about 175 kilometers.) Plug-in electric vehicles such as the Chevy Volt have an even more limited range of up to 80 kilometers before its gas-powered motor must kick in.

The specifics of how lithium–air batteries will operate is still being determined, but the general principal is that, instead of using heavy metal oxides, oxygen would be collected from the air while an electric vehicle is in motion. The oxygen molecules react with lithium ions and electrons on the surface of a porous carbon cathode to form lithium peroxide. This lithium peroxide formation during discharge leads to an electrical current that powers the car's motor. When charging, the reverse reaction takes place—the oxygen is released back to the atmosphere. The anode, meanwhile, is made of lithium, the lightest metal. Without the need for heavy metals the battery would be several times lighter while being able to store more energy than its lithium ion cousin.

Although this works in a computer simulation, lithium–air batteries have specific requirements in practice that scientists are still trying to meet. "We found out pretty early in the project that the electrolytes currently used in lithium ion batteries do not work in lithium–air batteries because the oxygen in a lithium–air battery attacks and destroys the electrolyte," rendering it unable to conduct a charge, says Winfried Wilcke, Battery 500 Project's principle investigator. One solution, he adds, would be to use two different electrolytes, one for the cathode and a second for the anode, with a membrane in between to keep them from mixing.

That is where IBM's new partners come in. Asahi Kasei will develop a membrane the batteries can use to separate their electrolytes while allowing lithium ions to pass from the anode to the cathode. Central Glass will create a new class of electrolytes and high-performance additives specifically designed to improve lithium–air battery performance.

Another way to gauge the lithium–air battery's potential is to compare it to other batteries in terms of specific energy, or how much energy it produces in relation to its size. Whereas a conventional lead–acid car battery will produce up to 40 watt-hours per kilogram, a lithium ion battery maxes out at 250 watt-hours per kilogram. A lithium–air battery's potential far exceeds 1,400 watt-hours per kilogram. "I'm shooting for 1,000 watt-hours per kilogram, but we won't have real number for the energy density until we've built a larger prototype," Wilcke says.

The Battery 500 Project is not the only game in town when it comes to developing lithium–air batteries. Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology are developing a lithium–air battery with carbon nanofiber electrodes. And, Yangchuan Xing, an associate professor of chemical and biological engineering at the Missouri University of Science and Technology, received an Advanced Research Projects Agency–Energy (ARPA–E) award for $1.2 million last year to develop lithium–air batteries.

Wilcke estimates the lithium–air batteries might be ready for production by 2020 at the earliest, "if we don't find any show-stopping technology along the way." He adds: "The only thing I'm certain of is that it won't happen this decade."

33 Comments

1. 1. Carlyle 04:58 PM 4/20/12

   The holy grail for energy. I wish them well. It is hard to think of anything that would have a bigger impact, particularly if it becomes feasible to scale up to industrial storage. The hurdles are likely to be tremendous. If it is feasible & costs are reasonable it will rank with the greatest technical advances ever. Efficiency over the charge discharge cycle & battery lifewill be crucial also of course.

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2. 2. Roto2 06:37 PM 4/20/12

   Nice article. Damn difficult to reach practicality nevertheless. At least the article appears honest with respect to the challenges. If they succeed, and I hope they do, then it will be very useful but not a panacea. So long as most electricity comes from natural gas and coal, the total pollutants per mile will not differ much from best practice ICE technologies. Turns out all current power plants (natural gas, coal, nuclear) have net thermal efficiency of 35%. Add transmission line, battery, electric motor, electronic controls, etc, and the net is 22% to the wheels. About the same as best practice ICE (40% thermal diesel and HCCI gas combustion about them same). These figures, all back to the energy source (mining, refinement, transportation, etc). That said, renewables, if cost effective (without tax subsidies) could make electric transportation considerably more attractive (cost, pollution, longevity, etc). We'll see what develops.

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3. 3. Carlyle 08:12 PM 4/20/12

   Nuclear power stations cost virtually the same amount to run at full capacity as throttled back. This gives the opportunity for storing excess generating capacity during low demand, virtually free if only there was a satisfactory method of storage.
   Coal fired power stations also to a lesser degree, would benefit.
   

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4. 4. nuboat 08:12 PM 4/20/12

   OK please take this with a box of salt as I am a patent attorney and not an engineer, though I admire them.
   
   This air breathing Lithium ion battery is a noble pursuit. But the projected time frame and the political ownership of the technology seem to discourage individually achievable endeavors. To be able to drop a mere 1.5 million to get started is not a typical situation. Still it is a noble goal.
   
   In the mean time IBM: How about dropping $20,000 apiece on several auto mechanics to come up with a means to recharge a pneumatic tank? This would be to supplement pick up trucks in-town propulsion, via a simple pneumatic, rotary motor to rear wheel, friction drive. Thus greatly increasing the mileage of typical trucks used as transportation. This low tech approach would do much to help with the morale of the more "analog" thinkers and their perception of their more "digital" thinking techno-bro s.

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5. 5. outsidethebox in reply to nuboat 09:16 PM 4/20/12

   Given that TATA is supposedly coming out with a car this year powered by compressed air, yours seems a eminently reasonable idea.

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6. 6. Carlyle in reply to nuboat 10:26 PM 4/20/12

   Pneumatic & gyroscopic accumulators were extensively tested back in the sixties. Gyroscroscopes could not store sufficient energy as well as causing stability or rather too much stability problems. Pneumatic systems are inherently inefficient for many reasons. need to research it yourselves. Cannot work no matter how much they spend on it. I am not going to repeat the reasons. there was an extensive debate on compressed air a few months ago. Must be a lot of taxpayers dollars in it or it is just a sop to the Greens.

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7. 7. baileydh 11:20 PM 4/20/12

   Interesting article. But could the author look up in a dictionary when to use "principle" and when to use "principal"? In the above, the author writes "but the general principal is that" -- this should be "principle" (noun, meaning "idea"). Later, the author writes "Battery 500 Project's principle investigator" -- this should be "principal" (adjective, meaning "chief"). Cheers.

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8. 8. Carlyle 01:33 AM 4/21/12

   The last time energy storage was discussed extensively was here: http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=energy-storage-role-in-electric-grid
   

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9. 9. scudge 01:39 AM 4/21/12

   propylene carbonate is too unstable even if you put oxooxazolidines for non aqueous electrolyte... acids, bases and salts all decompose it... carbon dioxide froth is all you'll end up with...
   

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10. 10. JamesDavis 07:54 AM 4/21/12

    It is not going to take ten yeas or fifty years to get a supercharge long range battery, and the batteries do not need any exotic chemicals or mystical metals. Cellophane with liquid salt can boost a computer's use time by 75% or more and MIT's nanotechnology is producing a supercharge battery that has double the distance of the lithium air battery. Because it is unstable, lithium has always been a bad choice for electric car batteries, and it is only used by those wanting to discourage electric car production..
    
    You wouldn't allow a medical doctor fix your car, so why allow a computer company build your battery? IBM failed with computers, do you think they are going to be any more successful with batteries? They do not have a good track record with anything. When we get a long range, supercharge, quick charge battery, it will come from MIT's engineering department or the Rockey Mountain Institute's engineering department. Don't allow these failed, know nothing companies who is just looking for a little more lime light before their light goes completely out, disillusion you or depress the electric car. This time, the electric car is here to stay and it is going to be more incredible than the ICE vehicle ever was and it already has over 112 years of technology standing behind it, and we will not need fossil fuel to charge it.
    
    So all you deniers are trying to do is fake people out by barking at a paper moon and prolonging the misery of your fossil fuels. So get off the bandwagon, there is no more room for you.

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11. 11. HowardB 08:20 AM 4/21/12

    All pie in the sky for now .... like a number of new technologies being researched. remember the people working on the super fast recharging battery ? if they come in before this oxygen one then they will clean up.
    A battery that gives 100 miles but that can be charged in 30 seconds will be fine for motorists.
    There is a massive race on for the first 'workable' solution to make a breakthrough. The stakes are enormous because the people coming in second could lose everything.

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12. 12. singing flea 08:33 AM 4/21/12

    Body panels and auto glass that can double as solar chargers would be a better pursuit. Ultra-high capacity batteries would be dangerous in an accident and any terrorist with a little common sense could turn one into a bomb or a deadly weapon. It is the same principle of why gasoline is not a good idea in a ship. Too much potential energy in a confined space that burns too fast is not always a good thing.

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13. 13. HowardB 08:41 AM 4/21/12

    So ... smaller batteries with moderate range that can be charged quickly look a better and safer option.

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14. 14. singing flea 08:57 AM 4/21/12

    In defense of IBM, to say that they failed with computers is a ridiculous statement. Were it not for IBM the PC would be a pipe dream. Even Apple depends on technology designed by chip architects from IBM. The IBM platform captured 95% of the computer market and is still number one when it comes to software applications and industrial strength computers. IBM got out of the PC manufacturing market because they made a lot more money by licensing their technology to other manufactures who could not engineer a competitive product on their own. Yes, even Apple uses storage devices and chips invented and licensed by IBM. Punch cards, ram chips and even computer bus architecture was all invented by IBM. Computers are just a small part of IBM's accomplishments. In 2010 alone IBM received 5896 patents, a world record for the number of patents in a single year. If anyone can invent a better battery IBM can.

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15. 15. phalaris 09:15 AM 4/21/12

    Wow, yet another breakthrough in battery technology. So many recently, it's amazing we're still using petrol.
    
    It doesn't seem to say whether, as well as the 800 kilometres, we're going to be allowed to heat the interior of the car or run the air-conditioning.

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16. 16. geojellyroll 10:09 AM 4/21/12

    Article 12,475 on 'new breakthrough on batteries'. Hey,where's the actual journalists on Scientific American who can stop the cheerleading and actually ask the real questions and provide perspective?

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17. 17. euroflycars 10:42 AM 4/21/12

    "The only thing I'm certain of is that it won't happen this decade."
    
    The underlying message is: "A powerful company like IBM is funding an expensive long-term research programme on batteries -- so, you (private or corporate third party) out there, don't even think of spending valuable money on this kind of project".
    
    This sort of news is not at all untypical for transnational US companies who are generally abiding by the US government's vested (i. e. Big Oil's) anti EV policy -- whereby Big Oil isn't the only lobby likely to hide behind this, as the US Department of Defence is also deemed to have their saying, although for geostrategic reasons, which are best understood as follows:
    
    The Pentagon's stronghold being the absolute control of the global airspace (as a joker for global power enforcement) based on the supersonic fighters-bombers (and now increasingly on a huge fleet of drones of all sizes and performances), what they fear is the civil society taking possession of the global airspace with myriads of ultra-light personal aircraft threatening to jeopardize their global power enforcement joker.
    
    Now here's how this relates to batteries:
    
    The electric motor-and-battery assemblies of mass-produced EVs will virtually become affordable power plants for personal ultra-light electric aircraft; so much the more if energy density can be dramatically increased, along with a substantial loss of weight -- electric aircraft will then overcome the main hurdle towards massive popularization, i. e. noise!
    
    The 2011 winner of the LEAP (Lindberg Electric Aircraft Prize), the Electra One of the German ProAero Company, has already a range of over 300 miles... and with dramatic progress in terms of specific energy increase and weight reduction the personal ultra-light electrical VERTOL rotary-wing aircraft is just around the corner -- with the most eligible concept being the tilt-rotor aircraft.
    
    The latter is just another example of the same deterrant strategy: since 30 years the US military have been investing billions into this concept (the V22 Osprey) within a joint venture between Bell and Boeing, and since 2002 Bell has partnered with the European Agusta for the civil version (the BA-609 which I had immediately announced as a still-born!). Time has gone by only to confirm my forecast: 2 or 3 years ago, the BA-609 prototype was transferred to Italy where it has now come to a deadly standstill after Bell recently sold it to Agusta with the exclusive right to do any further development... (needs Agusta's complicity, doesn't it?)...

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18. 18. luhng 03:44 AM 4/22/12

    interaction of an organic solvent electrolyte (propylene carbonate) with lithium ions (white) and oxygen near a surface of Lithium-peroxide (the planar structure near the bottom of the screen). Molecular reconstuction of the human g-nome yes DNA or MNA which ever the populace chooses. We people in general have the molecular capabilities to power any device. meaning this u dumbfounded baboons. we can take the molecular structures of the human body to develope the power cell needed for the future. here is a clue, think of the ball under the ching dog. yes 64to the nth power. so we ask our selves this? HYPERMETAPHISICALPHISICS?

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19. 19. euroflycars in reply to euroflycars 01:07 PM 4/22/12

    Sorry, but the last sentence should read:
    
    "Bell recently sold it (the BA-609) to Agusta, WITHHOLDING the exclusive right to do further development AND SUPPLY NEW COMPONENTS...".

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20. 20. euroflycars in reply to singing flea 01:18 PM 4/22/12

    "If anyone can invent a better battery IBM can".
    
    Unfortunately your statement nearly sounds like the opposite: If anyone can prevent a better battery IBM can...
    
    See my previous post!

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21. 21. singing flea in reply to euroflycars 02:25 PM 4/22/12

    I fail to see what innovations IBM has prevented from benefiting the world. You are deluded and are mistaking Apple for IBM. Apple is the kind of company that will step on any competition rather then share its innovations with any other company. That is why IBM based computer technology is the heart of both Apple and Microsoft based home computers and for that matter Linux machines too. IBM licenses their technology to any company that wants it.
    
    If Apple were to develop a better battery you would have to pay three times what is was worth and could only buy it from Apple. It would be built with slave labor wherever the cheapest help could be hired and the toxic waste from the factories would be used to make fertilizer for food products distributed in America by Walmart.

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22. 22. Jimmmy2 09:18 PM 4/22/12

    Enron fits the profile feared more than IBM. The article lists the maximum power to weight ratio of lithium air as roughly 6 times more than lithium ion. That amount of improvement is not as important as is the fact of this bettering the power density of gasoline. That is the world changing aspect.

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23. 23. euroflycars in reply to singing flea 05:05 PM 4/23/12

    "I fail to see what innovations IBM has prevented from benefiting the world."
    
    Remember the daisy-wheel printer IBM had blocked for 20 years with their complex golf-ball printing head, ruining the nerves of millions of office employees with machine-gun-like noise?
    
    If "...IBM based computer technology is the heart of both Apple and Microsoft based home computers...", the Pentagon is very much likely to have IBM, Microsoft, Apple and Intel impose severe restrictions on the functionalities of a product the US Department of Defence is doubtlessly considering of highest strategic importance -- whereby the Pentagon is almost certainly haunted by the idea of huge subversive organizations operating in the outback through powerful networking based on grid-independent, solid-state, black-and-white-screen (i. e. low consumption) pocket PCs. Hence, the following list of restrictions:
    
    - no commercial-batteries for grid-independent operation
    - no black-and-white screen for long autonomy
    - no joy-stick in the center of the keypad for pocket-sized slimness and half-hight screen/keypad-cover.
    - no foldable keyboard either
    - no full solid-state design for ruggedness -- instead, mechanical harddisk mandatory (except for the 7-inch mini-netbooks which are yet just about to disappear from the shelves... like Sony's late(st) pocket-PC.
    
    You may also notice that Nicholas Negroponte's OLPC (the would-be 100$ PC for all children of the world) features a couple of the above listed advantages -- which may explain the political background of both its final price of 200$ and the largely missed production and distribution target...
    
    Alas, both the MIT and IBM are closely linked to the American would-be rulers of the world and their 600 billion per year war-machine...
    
    This said, IBM may well have been mandated by the Pentagon to develop a break-through battery for their drone fleet -- but don't expect the civil society to be offered early access to the eventual results...

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24. 24. conifer 06:04 PM 4/23/12

    It would be better if it captures CO2.

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25. 25. Apprentice Gnostic 03:33 AM 4/24/12

    "Wilcke estimates the lithium–air batteries might be ready for production by 2020 at the earliest, "if we don't find any show-stopping technology along the way." He adds: 'The only thing I'm certain of is that it won't happen this decade.'"
    
    Oh really? 2020 just so happens to be the last year of *this* decade.

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26. 26. profitsgood 05:36 PM 4/24/12

    Will the E=GREEN allow gas, coal and nuclear power plants to provide the electric generation required to power transportation. Grid needs to be improved, capacity must be increased by many factors. How will anyone approve of these changes when the creation of the electricity just moves C02 source to a new location.
    
    Fools idea of moving the cups around to hide the bean.

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27. 27. wsugaimd 03:30 AM 4/25/12

    I've been following this for years. This is a great idea, just don't use it in submarines, mines, spacecraft, and any where O2 is a premium.

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28. 28. rabarker 12:41 PM 4/25/12

    This stuff is really exciting. I read recently about the possibility of grid-scale Liquid Metal Battery technology that is being developed with the goal of creating a real storage capacity for the electrical grid. I sense that sometime in this decade we will quite suddenly reach an inflection point where all the pieces fall into place--the renewable generating plants, the grid and home-level storage, smart-grid technology, and new appliances (including cars) will enable a rapid switch of our present energy habits. Boy, will this be an exciting change to watch!

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29. 29. brasshopper 04:30 PM 4/25/12

    You know, I looked at the comments about the things that IBM could not deliver with pocket pcs. Hmmm. The original laptop produced by IBM had a black and white reflective screen, and two floppies - and you could sit under a tree for 10 hours on a single charge editing microsoft word documents on a single charge, and it did not sell - because people wanted color, backlighting so it could be used on an airplane...and all that kills battery - we are just back to where netbooks will run for 10 hours with backlighting. Remember the ads from the 1980's where Charlie Chaplin would open the convertible as the train went by and immediately start typing? It was just that fast to wake up from sleep. It did all these things that they are just recapturing with windows, and the market research at the time said that people just didn't care. 10 hour battery life? Instant wakeup? No, they wanted color backlights and windows and it was OK to take a minute. The little joystick, it was an IBM invention from IBM research, you can still get a PC keyboard (made by Lenovo) with that joystick. IBM's patent has expired, as has their patent on the cursor. The typeball typewriter that was made possible because IBM research invented a method for plating metal on to plastic when it had no commercial application, and the typewriter division grabbed it because it was light enough to move quickly - yes, it was complex, but daisy wheels were just as noisy as you still had to have something slam the wheel against paper, as were traditional moving carriage typewriters which slammed a key against paper, and I will submit that the moving carriage typewriter was more noisy and complex than the moving typeball. I had a daisy wheel from another company in the same era as IBM's selectric's heyday, and I had the daisy wheel because it was cheap used, while printers based on the selectric held their value. The daisy wheel basically did not provide as crisp typing as IBM's tech - because the edges wore off the plastic wheels very quickly, you could still recognize the letters easily but the quality was not there - a worn daisy wheel looked like a second carbon. The metal plated plastic maintained its integrity and sharpness and if a letter did chip off you could replace it in seconds. Some daisy wheels were replaceable quickly, some were not.
    
    

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30. 30. brasshopper 04:57 PM 4/25/12

    Then again, you probably have not heard about the large amount of basic research that IBM has done over the years, high temperature superconductivity, the fractal research that was done by that MIT guy was actually started when he was on visiting sabbatical at IBM, and the computing was done on the mainframes at IBM Research, back when the limit of computability was the CPU weekend and there was not a mainframe class computer in every home and a supercomputer class multiprocessor in every gamer's home. :-)
    
    The limits of computing in the 1980s and early 1990s was heat removal. IBM's technology was unique and developed at IBM - ceramic, multi-layer circuit boards, cooled by chilled water and helium. Now we have trivial circuts that are faster and run on a fraction of the power, but at the time, power equaled speed and cool equaled reliable. IBM was one of the largest memory manufacturers in the world, and used all they could make and bought more.
    
    It has been the fashion to bash IBM for many many years. People who worked there, well, they knew that IBM was not an evil empire. Yes, IBM developed into a monopoly, at one point, and there was a consent decree - and compare how well IBM complied with that consent decree to how other companies complied with their consent decree. IBM was a large bureaucracy, and that limited their flexibility. In many ways, the divisions of IBM competed among themselves more than with outside competitors, because the other divisions could quash their plans by escalating a business case (if you bring that out, it will cost the corporation X and you will only make Y) while other competitors didn't have that avenue.
    
    Outsiders sometimes looked at IBM and thought that they were suppressing technology in response to outside influence. Nothing could be farther from the truth.
    
    The limits of what could be shipped overseas were always codified in law, and publicly known. There were no secrets.

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31. 31. HubertB 05:13 PM 4/25/12

    Over 150 years ago Mr. Samuel Morse was using 2 half cells with an ion channel between them to run his telegraph. I think there is a good chance that today's scientists will be able to get 2 half cells with an ion channel between them to work.
    

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32. 32. eleaders 01:35 PM 4/26/12

    What will REALLY matter is how long the battery will be able to charge and discharge effectively. It makes no sense to design a cell that can do what they say but lasts only a year.

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33. 33. eleaders 01:35 PM 4/26/12

    What will REALLY matter is how long the battery will be able to charge and discharge effectively. It makes no sense to design a cell that can do what they say but lasts only a year.

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