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Battery breakthrough: Double performance lithium battery that doesn’t catch fire
- curiousgal 8y agorevolutionary_battery_tech_news++
- castratikron 8y agoI wonder if a solid electrolyte would allow for sub-freezing charging of the batteries.
- craftyguy 8y ago> U-M engineers created a ceramic layer that stabilizes the surface—keeping dendrites from forming and preventing fires I'm curious how strong this ceramic layer is. When I hear 'ceramic' I think of 'brittle, fragile' materials, and I'm not sure having a battery that would explode if dropped or hit would be much of an improvement.
- yohann305 8y agoCeramic has been used in electronic circuits for decades. Take a look at these ceramic capacitors: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ceramic_capacitor https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ceramic_capacitor Also, the raspberry pi uses a ceramic heat sink.
- inamberclad 8y agoNot sure about this one, but GE is making engine components out of a ceramic composite: https://www.ge.com/reports/space-age-cmcs-aviations-new-cup-of-tea/ https://www.ge.com/reports/space-age-cmcs-aviations-new-cup-...
- dx87 8y agoI think the strength of ceramics varies greatly depending on how they're made. For example, ceramics are used to make armor plates that are strong enough to stop assault rifle rounds https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sapi_plate#Materials_and_capabilities https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sapi_plate#Materials_and_capab...
- AYBABTME 8y agoI used to have the same intuition but also just recently started to learn about material sciences. They refer to 'ceramics' as a wide family of material that is comparable to "metal" and "crystals" and the likes. These families are usually categorized by the type of atomic bonds found in them. Example, Wikipedia starts the article on "Ceramic" with: A ceramic is a non-metallic solid material comprising an inorganic compound of metal, non-metal or metalloid atoms primarily held in ionic and covalent bonds. At least, if your mental model was about ceramic vases and ornamental objects.
- pohl 8y agoThis reminds me of an article on Ars Technica a couple of years ago: https://arstechnica.com/science/2016/02/dutch-researchers-have-created-flexiramics-flexible-ceramics-for-circuit-boards/ https://arstechnica.com/science/2016/02/dutch-researchers-ha...
- craftyguy 8y agoInteresting, thank you for the explanation. I generally think of things like tiles (e.g. like the ones on the space shuttle that were fragile) when I hear ceramics.
- tlb 8y agoThe insulator in common aluminum electrolytic capacitors is also a ceramic -- aluminum oxide. The positive plate is aluminum, and the oxide grows on it because when the capacitor is charged, the positive plate attracts free oxygen atoms from the electrolyte (and hydrogen atoms are released at the cathode). While it is brittle, it's also self-healing. When it cracks and exposes the aluminum underneath, a new layer of oxide is plated immediately, as long as the capacitor is charged. Equipment that's been left powered off for a long time and then turned on can sometimes have caps explode because there's a lot of leakage current from holes in the ceramic until it heals (minutes to hours). Lithium batteries are usually completely ruined if they ever discharge down to zero.
- ddebernardy 8y agoWhen I hear ceramic, I tend to think kitchen knife or superconductor. There's a lot more to ceramics than pots and jars.
- int_19h 8y ago> When I hear 'ceramic' I think of 'brittle, fragile' materials You might be surprised to find out that the best body armor today - NIJ level IV (and similar standards in other countries), the kind that can stop armor-piercing bullets - is made either entirely of ceramic, or (lately) is a ceramic/polyethylene laminate. Side note: you probably wouldn't expect polyethylene show up in this context either - the one used is ultra-high-molecular-weight polyethylene, and much like ceramics used, it's pretty different from our "common sense" perception of the material. As far as fragility of such ceramics, this is a topic that comes up often enough to spawn an obligatory "will it ...?" genre on YouTube. So you can watch something like this, and judge for yourself: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YSK4U2Poo0k https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YSK4U2Poo0k
- dsfyu404ed 8y agoSounds promising but I'm not going to count my chickens until they're in high volume production. Lots of cool technologies never make it to the real world at scale because they can't be manufactured cost effectively at scale because of some little thing that doesn't seem like a big issue at first.
- danimal88 8y agoAgreed. Rooting for them but the number of battery and solar breakthroughs that don't get to market make it hard to get too excited on research + a pr push.
- driverdan 8y agoKeep in mind a few things here. This is a press release, and press releases always hype their topic. Researchers discover ways to improve batteries weekly. Until they can prove it's cost effective and mass producible it doesn't matter to most of the world. Don't get excited until they start using it in products.
- mavdi 8y agoBattery breakthrough articles are as reliable as apocalypse predictions.
- gameswithgo 8y agonot quite that bad.
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- smaddox 8y agoHaving previously worked in materials science (though not specialised in battery tech), this does sound promising, but without the academic paper (is there a prepub available?) it's impossible to know with any confidence.
- jryan49 8y agoAbout time for another amazing battery breakthrough! I haven't seen one in a few months. :P
- gruturo 8y agos/month/day/
- xvf22 8y agoCongrats, hard not to be jaded at this point though. Does this address the Nickel/Cobalt cathode issue at all?
- Animats 8y agoThe web site [1] shows a much lower level of hype. Listed problems: - Low-temperature performance - Density 1.8x to 5x liquid electrolyte - How to manufacture in quantity? The increased density is a big problem. The ceramic materials are much heavier than liquids. That seems inherent in using ceramics. This might be a good technology for stationary applications, because of the faster charging and lower fire risk. Depends on cost. [1] https://sakamoto.engin.umich.edu/ https://sakamoto.engin.umich.edu/
- 24gttghh 8y ago>Density 1.8x to 5x liquid electrolyte But if that is still less dense than say, a lead-acid battery, but with double the performance of a li-on/polymer battery, is that not still an improvment?
- tomp 8y agoWhy is density a problem? The article claims improved energy per gram (mAh/g), so the denser, the smaller, and thus the better...
- sometimesijust 8y agoThe article seems to skirt around this. It gives the energy per weight for just part of the battery and then gives a theoretical energy per volume for the whole battery. The claimed theoretical improvement for the whole battery per volume is 2x so if the density of the whole battery increases 1.8 to 5x then the solid state battery could be anywhere from slightly better (10%) to significantly worse per weight.
- tk75x 8y agoIf the weight is prohibitive in mobile applications (cars, portable electronics), this technology could be applied to stationary battery needs such as battery backups for local power grids or even a per-home basis. The longevity and safety factors of the ceramic electrolyte seem like perfect selling points for those applications.
- syntaxing 8y agoI'm kind of surprised how people are complaining how we hear about many battery break throughs yet we do not see any of them come to reality. Bridging science to reality through engineering takes time. Lots of time. Think of LEDs. We had those tiny dome shaped LEDs for the longest time. Yet it took over two decades to get to useful LEDS to consumers we have today (like CREE).
- apsec112 8y agoThis isn't a question of lag time. The overwhelming majority of these "breakthroughs" never come to market at all, and Li-Ion batteries are largely the same as five years ago, save some modest cost reductions from economies of scale. The big factors here are a) PR-driven media overhype, b) people not understanding that the big challenge in batteries is not making a few very high-performance batteries, but in building factories that can churn them out economically at enormous scale.
- syntaxing 8y agoI agree that a lot these new technology is overhyped. That being said, majority (I would anecdotally argue more than 99%) of new founded science never make it to the market usually due to market limitation (too expensive to make) and adoption (fear of new technology). Battery technology can definitely use a boost but 5 years is nothing on a project scale for a new technology. Making something is super hard. Making something that the market adopts is even harder. Think about the digital camera. Minus the amount of time to develop the CMOS sensors, the "first" digital camera was made in 1975. It took 20 years before it was a consumer friendly device. It took another 20 for us to have the cellphone cameras today.
- rasz 8y ago>Li-Ion batteries are largely the same as five years ago Try 20. Libretto 50 (Pentium 75MHz palmtop) was released in ~1998. It was powered by two 1300 mAh 17670 cells. Today top of the line 17670 come in 1800 mAh. 20 years, less than 50% improvement.
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- agumonkey 8y agoI wonder how much battery research as increased since ~Tesla
- sdinsn 8y ago"research secured"
- acd 8y agoThere is also another type of Lithium ion battery, LifePo4 which is lithium Iron posphate batteries. These type of Lithium ion batteries are much safer and are not likely to catch fire but they have slightly lower energy density. Hopefully the Umich breakthrough can be combined with LifePo4 to give it better energy density. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithium_iron_phosphate_battery https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithium_iron_phosphate_battery The common battery type Lithium ion cobalt is bad for the environment due to Cobalt mining in Congo. Cobalt is a conflict mineral. Lithium Cobolt batteries are the type that catches fire. Lithium Cobolt is an environmental risk if it leaks into the soil. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithium_cobalt_oxide https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithium_cobalt_oxide Positive electrode https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithium-ion_battery https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithium-ion_battery
- clankfan 8y agoHeadway cells!
- ChuckMcM 8y agoHaving read through a lot of battery breakthrough reports, I tend to zero in on the 'hard bit' which in this particular case is here: U-M researchers solved this problem with chemical and mechanical treatments that provide a pristine surface for lithium to plate evenly, effectively suppressing the formation of dendrites or filaments. My reading of that was if you create this pristine surface, you get a wonder battery. On the other hand, if the surface has a defect in it anywhere you get dendrites, and the subsequent shorts they cause. When I read that part I said "Ok, so this will make great bespoke batteries that the military can use for their human carried gear, but they will be too expensive to compete with the existing lithium ion technology." I really hope that I'm wrong here, and there is some process that can reliably make massive numbers of pristine plated lithium / ceramic nodes but until we see that I don't see this breakthrough making it out of the lab.
- tomp 8y agoIs “pristine ceramic” that much harder to create than e.g. “pristine silicon”? Cilicon chips seem relatively cheap these days.
- ChuckMcM 8y agoThat is an excellent restatement of the core question. Can the process that makes "pristine ceramic" be scaled. (harder is a dependent variable on scaling difficulty.) I don't know how much harder it is to make ceramics pristine. I am inferring that it is the thing in the article that wasn't already part of making batteries so the 'new' bit. And after seeing many, many breakthroughs where the 'new' bit was doable in small scales at great expense in a laboratory, but impossible to do at scale in an automated process, I've watched those breakthroughs go from 'world changing' to 'laboratory curiosity.' So when Nature Materials publishes the paper on the process to repeatedly make tons of pristine ceramic material, then I will be excited for the new batteries that my devices will surely get in an upgrade.
- tomp 8y agoThat's interesting perspective. > And after seeing many, many breakthroughs where the 'new' bit was doable in small scales at great expense in a laboratory, but impossible to do at scale in an automated process, Can you elaborate on that, maybe give a few examples? I always thought that inventions were mainly judged by their merit (efficiency), I guess I was blind to the "scaling" (i.e. "actual industry") variable, and just assumed that there must be some way to automate and streamline almost everything, as long as the demand is there (as Elon Musk has recently been showing, with batteries/electric cars and rockets).
- hcknwscommenter 8y agoPaper here: doi: 10.1016/j.jpowsour.2018.06.055 Not a material's scientist, but it seems that they identified the importance of having a "pristine surface" and then developed a process of mechanical and chemical treatments to obtain the "pristine surface" which involves sputter coating with Au?
- donarb 8y agoNOVA did a show about batteries, including a researcher at Tufts University who created lithium batteries that you could impale with a sharp object or cut with scissors that would not catch fire even while continuously providing power. https://www.pbs.org/video/nova-battery-wont-explode/ https://www.pbs.org/video/nova-battery-wont-explode/
- tankerdude 8y agoSo many battery breakthroughs have been announced. Not one of the "breakthroughs" for cars have been released to the public. Most are "5 years away" or more. Ionic with the polymer batteries looks promising, but again, as others have stated, it's the manufacturing process that is rough. Works great in the lab, but scaling what was done in the lab to the public is really, really hard.
- philipkglass 8y agoI agree that scaling is hard and progress is slow. I think that a major breakthrough has made it into cars, though: lithium ion batteries. The 1990s-vintage GM EV1 used lead-acid or NiMH batteries. The earlier generations of Prius used NiMH batteries too. The Tesla Roadster was the first highway-legal serial production EV to use lithium ion batteries. It took 17 years after lithium ion batteries saw first commercial use in small electronic devices (commercial batteries out in 1991, Roadster in 2008). Because, as you say, scaling is hard. Of course the first Roadsters now seem like old hat and every auto maker is using lithium ion batteries. We're eager for the next, better kind of lithium battery. But just getting autos to use any kind of lithium battery was a big enough change that it deserved the "breakthrough" moniker, IMO.
- tankerdude 8y agoAgreed that that was definitely the big initial breakthrough. We need this next one sooner or later for mass adoption. As Musk says, show me him a battery with the breakthrough and the manufacturing process for it. If it's good, he'd switch it out to that battery. No one has succeeded yet at that challenge.
- flyinghamster 8y agoA major driving factor in the advancement of lithium-ion batteries for automotive use was the patent issues surrounding large-format NiMH batteries.* Once Chevron got its grubby hands on the NiMH patents, the technology was effectively dead in the water. * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patent_encumbrance_of_large_automotive_NiMH_batteries https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patent_encumbrance_of_large_au... Interesting that Patent #6969567 expires a week from today. I doubt that will lead to a revival of NiMH technology, though.
- gsich 8y agoIt's a breakhrough when it's shipped in devices. Only then, not before.
- Obi_Juan_Kenobi 8y agoThere's good skepticism in this thread, but at the end of the day, I think there's reason to be optimistic about better batteries. * So many different technologies are showing some promise, and only one needs to be commercialized for a breakthrough. Put another way, this is an engineering an manufacturing issue, not a physics problem. * The battery market is getting bigger and bigger, with ever more money at stake. * Some real big investments into various battery startups and R&D programs have been made, at least several hundred million from various automakers. Either they're taking desperate risks, or else they see real progress on solid-state lithium batteries. So often with technology, you don't see much progress until it arrives, and then things seem to change overnight.
- exabrial 8y agoI have nieces and nephews that can prove the fireproof claim invalid.
- 8bitsrule 8y agoBah! in about 25 years BIC will be selling lighter-size fusion reactors. I'll just wait.
- sytelus 8y agoWhen you get the news articles with "breakthrough", just do Ctrl+F and type "could". If you get hit in title or first paragraph, close your tab and move on. You just came across another PR article on immature tech.
- swedish_mafia 8y agoFunding secured.