NOVEL ELECTRODE: By adding silicon to the anode, pictured here, among other improvements, Envia has more than doubled the energy density of current lithium-ion batteries.
Image: Courtesy of Envia
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NATIONAL HARBOR, Md.—A company founded in the Palo Alto public library has taken a dose of government money and technology and turned it into the most energy-dense battery ever. Envia System's new lithium-ion battery packs roughly twice as much energy per gram as present batteries, the company will announce here at the third annual summit of the Advanced Research Projects Agency—Energy (ARPA–e).
"We achieved 400 watt-hours per kilogram," explains materials scientist Sujeet Kumar, Envia co-founder and chief technology officer. "We have made a 40 ampere cell in a large format that automakers can recognize and use," and one that has been validated by independent energy density tests at the Naval Surface Warfare Center in Crane, Ind.
With a $4 million grant from ARPA–e, the Envia technology builds on work done at Argonne National Laboratory that found that including manganese in a mix of materials for the cathode—the electrode to which the lithium ions flock—better energy densities could be achieved. The team then switched focus to the anode—the electrode from which lithium ions flow to produce the electric current—and boosted its performance by incorporating silicon along with the typical graphite.
By blending silicon with carbon, the researchers claim to have gotten around the problems of silicon anodes that have disabled other batteries ability to charge and discharge time and time again. Simply put, silicon swells. "It will hardly last 10 cycles because of the high volumetric changes," admits Kumar. But by encasing it in a carbon coating—as well as interlacing carbon fibers—the Envia team argues it has surmounted that problem and its battery has cycled 400 times—and counting. "Even if the silicon pulverizes in the first cycle, connectivity is maintained through the carbon fibers," Kumar adds, though that impacts the voltage.
Then there is so-called "thermal runaway," an engineering euphemism for batteries bursting into flame—a persistent problem with energy-dense storage devices based on lithium-ion technology. This is particularly true in cars where batteries must undergo a test in which an 8-millimeter nail penetrates the battery at speed. Envia claims its batteries pass that test. "It's mainly that the cells are much thinner," Kumar says. "It's very easy to remove the heat," though it will be up to each individual automaker whether they want to employ air or liquid cooling of battery packs.
The slim, energy-dense batteries developed at an Envia center in China could reduce the number needed per car by half. And the batteries are cheap at $125 per kilowatt-hour, less than half what current batteries cost, an expense that contributes some 65 percent of the cost of an electric car. But, in addition to further independent testing, the Envia battery must now embark on the multi-year process of testing by actual car-makers. GM is an investor, but Envia declines to identify who is interested. "We are working with all the brand name [carmakers] around the world," says Atul Kapadia, Envia chairman and CEO. The idea is to either form joint ventures to produce the batteries in tandem or to license the technology to pre-existing partners.
But, assuming a single nail doesn't bring down the new technology, the battery could boost the range of electric vehicles, such as GM's Chevy Volt. The more watt-hours per kilogram, the farther an electric car can travel. That means a Nissan LEAF boasting Envia's batteries might be able to travel the 300 miles between St. Louis and Chicago on a single $10 charge, rather than the roughly 80 it can travel today. "We expect Envia's next generation lithium-ion battery will revolutionize the [electric vehicle] industry by eliminating the three remaining barriers to mass adoption: cost, range and safety," Kumar said in a statement announcing the breakthrough. "The ability to drive up to 300 miles on a single charge will eliminate 'range anxiety.'"
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27 Comments
Add CommentBattery technology continues to amaze. All power to them.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisVery promising. Well done, Envia. Even if this doesn't work out, the lessons learned will surely lead to more breakthroughs in the near future.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIf the president would offer to buy American made plug-in hybrids as replacements for US government fleets (think of how many cars the government owns!) many thousands of american jobs would be created, the price of plug-in hybrids would drop for all of us, and the amount of oil we use to fuel cars would drastically drop.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHey, we agree on something! See what happens when I stop people from hacking my account?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI think that it is premature to say too much about this specific claim, because there are a number of potential battery technologies that making exciting claims that raise the hopes of a major leap forward in this area.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisBut having followed a number of them over the last two years we have yet to see any of them come close to delivering anything real as yet.
It is easy to say that it is only a matter of time .... but that is not the way things always work in Science :-)
So fingers crossed :)
howard: "It is easy to say that it is only a matter of time .... but that is not the way things always work in Science :-)'
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisso true. As a geologist I've always cringed when I hear that or similar euphanisms. The properties of matter and energy do not change.
This might be a promising development. Unfortunately Scientific American can be a bit pollyanish and doesn't have journalists to evaulate much of the cannned info it is fed.
As a former vehicle dealer in the eighties I was a dealer board member in my state. We had access to some pretty objective data on vehicles in general. Including electric vehicles. As you mostly and probably know the electric vehicle predates the internal combustion engine. Little progress has actually been made in the last 100 years. Hopefully this new battery is some real progress, it has been really more of an entertainment political point till now. One of the main bottlenecks has been power to weight ratio. This battery is an attempt to address this challenge. I agree the proof is in the virtual pudding. Additionally, as of now remember electricity is not a power source, it is a power transmission and storage medium. You have to get the power and put it in that system. Most of that power now comes from coal at this point. Thus, partially, the entertainment point.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhile I am overjoyed that battery technology is advancing (that is what has held back wide spread use of the electric car), soon LENR will power vehicles, so no battery will be necessary:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThere is a new clean energy technology that is one tenth the cost of coal. LENR using nickel. Incredibly: Ni+H(heated under pressure)=Cu+lots of heat.
This phenomenon (LENR) has been confirmed in hundreds of published scientific papers: http://lenr-canr.org/acrobat/RothwellJtallyofcol.pdf
"Over 2 decades with over 100 experiments worldwide indicate LENR is real, much greater than chemical..." --Dennis M. Bushnell, Chief Scientist, NASA Langley Research Center
"Energy density many orders of magnitude over chemical." Michael A. Nelson, NASA
"Total replacement of fossil fuels for everything but synthetic organic chemistry." --Dr. Joseph M. Zawodny, NASA
By the way, here is a survey of all the companies that are bringing LENR to commercialization: http://www.cleantechblog.com/2011/08/the-new-breed-of-energy-catalyzers-ready-for-commercialization.html
This is quite interesting. May be we will be having that electric car sooner than expected.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisNot needed.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisA solid solar infrastructure (along with other renewables) will accomplish "range anxiety" with current technology. Many other countries are using millions of consumer owned rooftop solar to assist with battery charging, as well as using a quick change battery. These will also minimize your monthly utility bill. Why the existing monopolies skip and hop around this solution in order to keep control of their wealth (and their favorite politicians) is the real problem (XL pipeline is a good example).
Too many of our 2% wealth owners are stopping America from growing and from moving ahead with changes that will allow everyone a higher quality of life.
Notice how all these solutions are coming in a few years? It takes that long for the 2% to figure out how to maintain financial control of the product (energy in this case).
Not needed. A solar infrastructure (along with other renewables) will accomplish this with current technology. Many other countries are planning on using consumer owned rooftop solar to assist with battery charging, as well as using a quick change battery. Why the existing monopolies skip and hop around this solution in order to keep control of their wealth (and their favorite politicians) is the real problem.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisToo many of our 2% wealth owners are stopping America from growing and from moving ahead with changes that will allow everyone a higher quality of life.
Notice how all these solutions are coming in a few years? It takes that long for the 2% to figure out how to maintain control of the product (energy in this case).
There will always be a need for more compact energy storage as the use goes well beyond electric cars.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIf it can also be done cheaply, that will be a boon to small or remote communities who are trying to integrate renewables.
Still seems like quite a lot of wishful thinking and a long way from a deliverable product for any of these companies.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisDo batteries in current hybrids have to be replaced during the lifetime of the vehicle? Does it have to be the same type of battery, or can it be an improved type?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisProbably some right-wing religious nut Conservative responsible. Well, I stopped 'em in their tracks.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisQUIT HACKING MY ACCOUNT YOU COWARDLY LITTLE MONSTROSITY! IF YOU'RE TRYING TO POSE AS ME, WHY IN THE HECK WOULD I TALK TO MYSELF? YOU HAVE TO BE TRULY DERANGED TO THINK THIS IS GOING TO FOOL ANYBODY!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisOr maybe I should take this as a form of flattery since I have been hitting on a raw nerve with your corporate paymasters...Thanks for cluing me in!
Regarding: "We have made a 40 ampere cell..."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAm I right in thinking "40 ampere-hour" was intended?
I was really enthusiastic until I came to "Made in China". We develop technology just to ship it overseas? Isn't shipping jobs overseas what destroyed our manufacturing base in the first place. Why can't we build them here?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI was really enthusiastic until I came to "Made in China". We develop technology just to ship it overseas? Isn't shipping jobs overseas what destroyed our manufacturing base in the first place. Why can't we build them here?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thiswhat the f___k is LENR?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisTo Sault and, of course, Sault. I'm confused as to which one is real and which one is Memorex.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisMaybe one Sault is talking in his "out loud" voice and the other is using his "in his head" voice.
No matter; the message makes the same amount of sense in both cases.
No matter; the message makes the same amount of sense in both cases.
While these improvements in battery specific energy is very welcome, how many electric vehicles can we realistically build? There are currently over 1 billion vehicles on our roads.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisUnofficial estimates for world lithium reserves (from brines) figure about 20-30 million tonnes. The Nissan Leaf gets maybe 100 miles in range (very optimistic) with about a 300 kg battery. So, maybe we're talking 50-100 million electric vehicles using half of these reserves (not insignificant, but definitely not a solution). And still, the charging time is significant and becomes a problem for any lengthy trip. Fast-charging is nice, but significantly reduces battery life. There are maybe 250 BILLION tonnes of lithium in the world's oceans, but that is only available at a much higher cost.
Of course, we may be looking at lithium-air batteries in another decade or so....
Unfortunately, I cannot help ut worry about the success of electric vehicles. The movement cannot reach the needed momentum without support of the government, and how is that supposed to happen when so many congressmen are in the pockets of oil companies? If I remember correctly, in the film "Who Killed the Electric Car?", one of the battery technicians said they had already come up with batteries superior to what was being released at the time, but the companies had told them to hold off. Shell was also able to get the California Air Resources Board to change it's Zero Emission mandate, allowing the EV1 to be taken off the market. While I truly hope for the widespread success of electric vehicles, I'm afraid they cannot become affordable enough to be popular without the support of our government.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisthe huge demand on Li would cause the prices of the cars to rise. it is still a rare metal that even with new technologies (packing more energy in less Li) still is not available to provide for all.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAs a frequent driver I'm always concerned about several issues; the mileage, safety & weight of vehicle, costs and charging time.
Will a solar storm in December 2012 destroy electric power etc.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisLENR....Low Energy Nuclear Reaction. ....Google Rossi E-Cat.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisNo guarantee that it is real ;however, I bet $5 on it.
In the early 1950s the last of the old battery operated delivery trucks left the streets of Baltimore, Maryland. The last battery operated automobile had left many years earlier. Electricity had proved competitive with gasoline for local delivery trucks long after it had ceased to be competitive for automobiles. An organization like UPS that has a lot of vehicles would gladly go over to electricity if it would save a few pennies a mile. Such an organization would also be able to put trucks on routes whereby they would not run out of electricity.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhen I read that batteries for transportation have become efficient enough for the last people to give them up to adopt them again, then I will become interested.