12 ms·

Electric vehicle battery capable of 98% charge in less than ten minutes

131 points by clouddrover 4y ago

malchow 4y ago
Worth noting that this battery is commercialized at their fab in Fremont.
- Animats 4y ago
  Well, just barely. They claim to have made some samples.[1] Read their SEC filing for Q1 2022. They already went public via an SPAC reverse merger, with a nominal value around $1 billion. The biggest concern is in the "Risks" section: "Our roadmap to improve our energy density requires us to implement higher energy density materials for both cathodes and anodes." That's a fundamental problem, and the story of too many wannabe battery makers. It would be much better if the SEC filing said they had a working prototype which met the announced specs, and the big risk was scaling up the manufacturing of the prototype. The stock symbol is ENVX. [1] https://www.sec.gov/ix?doc=/Archives/edgar/data/1828318/000095017022010240/envx-20220403.htm https://www.sec.gov/ix?doc=/Archives/edgar/data/1828318/0000...
  - malchow 4y ago
    Happily, you are misunderstanding their filing. They do have working prototypes which meet the announced specs. They also have a plan to push beyond the current (and very impressive) 900 Wh/L energy density.[1] It is those future-looking plans which may (or may not) require higher energy density materials on the anode and cathode. [1] https://www.enovix.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/Ashok-Lahiri_Enovix-AABC-Europe-Final-Stand-Alone.pdf https://www.enovix.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/Ashok-Lahi...
    - Animats 4y ago
      From PDF, page 10, note "Assumed 100% packing efficiency for pouch or prismatic vs 90.7% packing efficiency for cylindrical form factor". Some of the improved energy density seems to come from rectangular cells packed with no space for coolant flow. The one picture of an actual battery shows it sitting on a huge heat sink.
xwowsersx 4y ago
I don't know the EV battery space well. What is the capacity of the battery they are referring to and how does it compare to, say, the capacity of a Tesla Model S? Just trying to put this 5 minutes to 80% charge in context. As a headline, it sounds incredible. If I could charge my car to 80% in 5 minutes, I would buy an EV tomorrow, seriously.
- speedgoose 4y ago
  You may buy an EV before such a battery is widely available in production.
  - xwowsersx 4y ago
    Haha touché. I meant to say that the speed of charging is one aspect of switching to a FEV that might make me think twice about buying one, but if I could charge my car in five minutes, it'd be a much, much easier decision.
    - speedgoose 4y ago
      Having easy access to a charger helps a lot too. It takes only a few seconds (with practice) to plug at home or work, and you always have a charged battery. During longer trips you may have to pee or buy a coffee, and you are likely going to stop a bit more than 5 minutes. But I agree that a 5 minutes fast charging session would be nice and help people transition to EV a lot.
    - Maxion 4y ago
      Fast charging is really only relevant in two scenarios: 1) You want to travel further in one go than the cars range 2) You do not have access to at home charging For those who can charge at home, fast charging is really only needed for longer road trips. Current new cars like the Kia EV6 can fast charge at around 200 kW reliably, that means 20%-80% in around 15 minutes. For the vast majority of people this will be fast enough to be comfortable. This generation of EVs are already very mature technology. Couple one with a 22kW home charger and you'll have very comfortable and stress free traveling.
AtlasBarfed 4y ago
That's good news, pending actual pricing when commercially available. But the real meat of the EV revolution will probably be high density LFP (300-400 range cars) and next-gen sodium ion (200-300 mile cars) which require no nickel or cobalt, or for sodium ion, not even lithium. This is based on production densities that are supposed to be available in production late this year (LFP) or next year (sodium ion) Improvements in any sector or aspect is a good thing though. There will be cells needed in dozens of applications, from container ship to bicycle. Edit: I reached the posting limit, so here is more on the higher density LFP/sodium ion: 230 wh/kg LFP: https://pushevs.com/2022/03/29/guoxuan-closer-to-mass-produce-230-wh-kg-lfp-battery-cells/ https://pushevs.com/2022/03/29/guoxuan-closer-to-mass-produc... 160 wh/kg Sodium ion: https://www.electronicdesign.com/markets/automotive/article/21171384/electronic-design-sodiumion-batteries-achieve-160whkg-energy-density-fast-charging https://www.electronicdesign.com/markets/automotive/article/... So my napkin math says that the densities listed should enable a 400 mile Tesla model S type car (especially since LFP doesn't need as much cooling and has higher density cell-to-pack), and sodium ion should do about 70% of that, or a 275 mile model S large car. Napkin math is derived from looking at current pack densities in Tesla cars and comparing that with 90% of the cell densities in the above articles (which these should be able to achieve in pack density with cell-to-pack and that these chemistries don't need as much active cooling systems). The current model S from googling seems to be at 186 wh/kg at pack level. 90% CTP 230wh/kg LFP should be 205+ wh/kg!!! That may also enable large scale 50-70 mile range PHEVs, and even cheaper EV bikes/scooters/lawnmowers/etc. LFP also has better capacity retention,cycle endurance, and temperature endurance typically. But the Sodium Ion might be the real revolution from a city car perspective for places like China/India where you'd need a billion or more clean city cars. A cheap 100-150 mile sodium ion car is just what these markets need.
- krasin 4y ago
  High-density LFP sounds amazing. Where can I read more about it?
  - BobLaw 4y ago
    Not so much high-density as much as highER density. https://www.autoevolution.com/news/lfp-cells-are-getting-more-energy-density-200-wh-kg-with-svolt-230-wh-kg-with-gotion-185117.html https://www.autoevolution.com/news/lfp-cells-are-getting-mor...
rootusrootus 4y ago
Guessing it’ll need a megawatt charger to pull that off on an EV size battery.
- chris_va 4y ago
  Fun fact, the effective charging power of a gas pump is ~6MW (20MW thermal). Good luck getting a 1MW utility feed.
  - BobLaw 4y ago
    That would be a silly way to approach it. You would be paying $40k+ per month in just demand charges some places. A much better idea is to have battery packs you can charge at constant slower rates and feed the charging station at higher burst rates. Tesla and Electrify America already do this. https://electrek.co/2021/12/02/electrify-america-deployed-tesla-powerpacks-over-140-charging-stations/ https://electrek.co/2021/12/02/electrify-america-deployed-te... https://driveteslacanada.ca/semi/tesla-megacharger-installation-giga-nevada-wraps-up-construction/ https://driveteslacanada.ca/semi/tesla-megacharger-installat...
    - krab 4y ago
      Or swappable batteries if we standardize on a few sizes. You can then charge those slowly. However that brings problems with quality control - a worn battery costs less than the new one. Maybe a model where the customer doesn't own the battery?
      - ccozan 4y ago
        Renault does that with Zoe, if I am not mistaken
        gambiting 4y ago
        They did for a while but at least here UK there is no battery leasing anymore with Zoe. You just buy the whole car outright.
senectus1 4y ago
>The cells also surpassed 1,000 cycles while retaining 93% of their capacity 1000 is a short count i wonder if the capacity drops off suddenly after about 1000...
- BobLaw 4y ago
  Not really for cars at least. That's right up there with NCA and NMC chemistries and those seem to do just fine for 200k miles. LFP can do 3000+ cycles with the trade offs being lower energy and power density. Which is why it's usually relegated to models with lower range and power, or vehicles that have the capacity for larger packs like buses.
- Gigachad 4y ago
  1000 cycles is a pretty standard milestone for battery specs. Over 80% capacity at 1000 cycles is the quality standard Apple sets for example.
- Johnny555 4y ago
  I charge my ~100 mile range EV about twice a week, so 1000 cycles would last me 10 years, and then I'd still have 93% of the original range - that 7% drop could be hidden by the battery management system so I wouldn't see any drop in range.
arriu 4y ago
Wouldn’t this generate a ton of heat?
- WheatM 4y ago
- jillesvangurp 4y ago
  Only if it is very inefficient.
  - kataklasm 4y ago
    Right, but that's the thing about efficiency, it's relative. Another poster made some napkin calculations, even with a 99% effective process, meaning 1% energy lost to the environment, he calculated several kW of heat you need get out of your system. Even if you have 99% efficiency, which in reality is mostly unachievable, that's still a huge loss of energy if the energy you're handling is high enough.
    - nomel 4y ago
      > which in reality is mostly unachievable By what metric? Here's a company that sells dry and wet closed loop water cooling systems that are > 500kW.
  - gambiting 4y ago
    Even if it's 99% efficient(which would be incredible), if you're recharging 100kWh of capacity in a minute, that's using 6MW. So your 1% of inefficiency is still 60kW of heat that you need to do something with. And 60kW of heat is a crazy amount.
diebeforei485 4y ago
How heavy is this? The article doesn't say.
Andrew_nenakhov 4y ago
This is a marketing fail, again. Call 98% to be 100% and you can claim 100% charge in 10 minutes (plus an optional 2% overcharge!).
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
noja 4y ago
How thick is that cable?
- Johnny555 4y ago
  How thick is that cable? Not very thick to carry around 2.5 amps (80% of 0.27Ah in 5 minutes), 20 gauge would be more than enough: The company demonstrated the fast-charge ability in its 0.27 Ah EV cells in its silicon lithium-ion batteries
cbmuser 4y ago
So, either that battery is very small or it needs a very powerful charging station to get a full charge of 100 kWh completed in such a short time. This means, if this was supposed to be commercialized, the country would need to install thousands of charging stations with half a megawatt power. I don’t think this is ever going to happen. Especially, with western countries being slow in building new nuclear power plants.
- gambiting 4y ago
  That's the other thing that people forget when talking about this. To put 100kWh of capacity into a battery within one minute, you'd need to have a charger capable of delivering 6 megawatts. That's the output of a small hydroelectric power plant. I also would love to see the cables and cooling solution used for such a charger.
  - pengaru 4y ago
    If you have a battery on hand ready to suck down that power in EVs, all you have to do is contact whoever managed such a feat to provide your charging facility with the battery cache. And you don't have to recharge your cache off the grid/solar/wind/whatever at the same rate you charge the cars of waiting customers. You just need space for a big enough pile of batteries. Last I checked gas stations were rather bursty around rush-hours. Worst case the charge rate degrades after exhausting the cache. There will always be lulls between the thundering herds to allow filling it all back up. Is it really all that impossible to imagine? Maybe the gas stations of the future are battery towers.
  - mschuster91 4y ago
    6 megawatts is 60 amps on a 100 kV line or 300 amps on a 20 kV local distribution line. Don't need a thick wire to do that, train overhead lines carry more power than that.
    - gambiting 4y ago
      Yeah but the car isn't taking 100kV - the battery packs nowadays use 400 or 800V. Even at 800V that's 7500 amps. Also the power needs to be converted from AC to DC too, and that's not a 100% efficient process either.
s1mon 4y ago
This company seems like the real deal, and it seems like they have managed to actually start manufacturing cells. What they haven't done, is create batteries which are likely to be used in electric vehicles which carry people yet. The web site [0] has data sheets for 4 sizes of cells, from "eyewear" to "smartphone/laptop". While they claim energy densities that are much higher than conventional cells, none of these are as big as 18650, 2170, or 4680. There's reference to higher capacity cells in this presentation [1], but they are sited as design targets, which I take to mean: they only exist on paper. They also try to sell 100% packing density since they are prismatic instead of the conventional cylindrical cells. In one of their videos they say that they get less than 2% swelling after 500 charge cycles. So how does one get 100% packing density if the cells even only swell to 2%? After many years of experience, I do not trust any battery vendor's mechanical specs. Inevitably "<2%" will be a lot higher than that. Battery companies can't even get the static cell size correct with proper tolerances, let alone truthfully report the swelling. The 3 cofounders spent ~20 years at IBM San Jose before going on to other things. There are also a lot of very senior people from the auto industry and other top tier tech companies like Cypress. Enovix has 94 patents (+63 pending), 14 years of R&D and $254M in funding to get to this point. Their videos have much more detail. [2] According to their CEO, the first shipping product is in wearables (watches). From what they are saying about volumes and ramp plan, I wonder if they might be working with Apple. They're also working with AR companies, developing products specifically for them. [0] https://www.enovix.com https://www.enovix.com [1] https://www.enovix.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/Ashok-Lahiri_Enovix-AABC-Europe-Final-Stand-Alone.pdf https://www.enovix.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/Ashok-Lahi... [2] https://vimeo.com/enovix https://vimeo.com/enovix
- lta 4y ago
  I wish they also talked about the recycling strategy, because right now, afak, recycling is almost impossible for all of those batteries.
  - s1mon 4y ago
    In the long video, this question gets asked. They kinda punt and say it's the same as for other li-ion batteries. To me that means barely anything is happening yet.
1-6 4y ago
Stealing energy hasn’t been any easier! Next product, circuit breakers!
Guthur 4y ago
And it won't matter because no matter how fancy the tech you need an industrial base to actually manufacture the damn things. Myopic energy policies and economically destructive actions taken over the past 2 years will ensure that we're going to have severe de-industrialisation for the foreseeable future which will make much of this high level tech unattainable. They wanted us to have 21st century energy but forgot that we actually need to bootstrap it upon 20th century energy. We need energy now.
- hinkley 4y ago
  It’s worse than that, he’s dead, Jim. These infrastructure problems are shaping up to be another way for the divide between upper and lower class to widen, and another crucible to cook the middle class in. As the price of having your own backup power comes down, the willingness of people in power to spend political capital on fixing infrastructure starts to slide. Never mind the “fuck you, I’ve got mine” crowd. With solar panels, a big enough battery pack, and grid power that’s available at least 95% of the time, you can fast charge your vehicle even as the power grid slowly rots around you.
- someweirdperson 4y ago
  Also, we need to finish the transformation before running out of coveniently/cheaply available non-renewable resources. Given how slow such large long-term changes take, starting early isn't such a bad idea.
nine_k 4y ago
OK! Here comes a car with, say, 80 kWh battery. It's not entirely empty, so to reach 98%, it can take 60 kWh. It does so in 5 minutes. This means that it gulps 60 kWh in 5 minutes; since 1 hour = 12 * 5 minutes, the power transmitted is 60 * 12 = 720 kW. This is a scale of a neighborhood; a typical detached house is allocated 20 kW. And this is just one car. Now let's imagine optimistically that the efficiency of the process is 99%, and a mere 1% is dissipated as heat. 7.2 kW take a serious cooling system to dissipate. So no, I don't think it's fit for cars. For phones and drones, maybe, using a special actively cooled charging station.
- 01100011 4y ago
  Upon further reflection, I think the answer to this problem is to simply coordinate charging 'slots' on a sub-grid(not sure what you call a local delivery circuit with a certain capacity). It should be possible to request charging time slots from a local power company server and negotiate when your vehicle can charge with millisecond accuracy. Doing so also might help the power company supply that power more effectively/efficiently. Sure, this means in peak times you may not get the charging rate you want, because you have to wait for the network to be available, but in off-peak times you get the fast charging rate you're capable of.
- 01100011 4y ago
  Are there any other reasons to use this battery tech beyond rapid charging time? Does it have more charge cycles than other Li batteries when charged at a more reasonable rate? Is it denser or does it have better discharge characteristics(i.e. lower internal resistance)?
  - cogman10 4y ago
    Looks like they used a pretty standard lithium ion chemistry with high silicon anodes. This is where the industry is currently going with state of the art lithium batteries. They've just been slower about increasing the silicon due to fears of what other tradeoffs will arise.
  - clouddrover 4y ago
mungoman2 4y ago
To use this without overloading the grid one could pair this with a station with properties: high capacity, high discharge, slow charge, low density. Is there such tech? Capacitors would work I guess, but are probably too expensive at the needed scale.
atbpaca 4y ago
The question is: how much of rare earth elements are needed to build such a battery? While enhancing charging time for some, what about the countries extracting those elements and the impact on their environment?
- vardump 4y ago
  Do any lithium batteries contain any rare earth elements? At least I'm not aware of any usage whatsoever. NiMH batteries require Cerium, Lanthanum and Neodymium, but those batteries are not used in BEVs at all anymore. So I think the answer is: zero.
oliwarner 4y ago
Going on nine_k's answer, at 600V you'd also need a charging cable to handle 1200A. That's so thick (~50mm) a 3m cable's going to weigh 52KG. I'm sure somebody will jump in and suggest an alternative. Let's just put 10kV through the car. Then it's only 72A. Nothing bad happens at 10kV. Burst-chargers are silly. They might work, they might not, but either way they present such immediate problems for mass deployment that they should be considered a distraction. What we need today is "little" 10-15KWh replaceable battery pods. We're still talking up to 80KG, but something to get you 50 miles. These could be cycled out, cool-charged and essentially offer unlimited range to anyone without adding significant delay. You could also lower the onboard cost of new cars by reducing the standard battery size. I want a Tesla, but I need about 20 miles range for 99% of the time. Buying a 15KW battery and hiring the extra would be a better solution for me.
- rcxdude 4y ago
  Existing fast chargers can do 600A, the main trick is they water-cool the cable, which substantially reduces the amount of copper you need. They're about as difficult to handle as a gas pump nozzle. Somehow shifting 80kg batteries in and out of your car seems a lot harder to manage.
  - oliwarner 4y ago
    > shifting 80kg batteries The cool thing about these batteries is they're made up of small cells. 8×10Kg units could be swapped out with relative ease. Or we belt-feed 18650s and eject spent ones like a minigin. Cooler but harder to handle the electrics.
- jimmcslim 4y ago
  Better Place tried the whole replaceable battery pack idea... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Better_Place_(company) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Better_Place_(company) Switching batteries sounds like a good idea to me, but it doesn't seem to scale to this level .
  - clouddrover 4y ago
Gys 4y ago
> Lahiri will speak at the 12th International Advanced Automotive Battery Conference (AABC) Europe in Mainz, Germany. His presentation at 11:20 a.m. CEST (5:00 a.m. EST) titled “Silicon-Anode Lithium-Ion Batteries for EV Applications,” will provide an update on the company’s EV program. OT: Funny how they mention an exact time for the presentation at the conference without adding a date. The conference https://www.advancedautobat.com/europe https://www.advancedautobat.com/europe is 13 - 15 June. Small PR failure.
kuon 4y ago
I was talking with my car dealer as I wanted to buy an electric car. He was using the car for his own usage to get a good idea. The main thing that came out is that most available charging stations are 22kW max and very often they are shared using "smart charge", which basically means a lower duty cycle (/N). In practice it means it requires about 7 hours to charge the 50kW/h battery. After this discussion, I asked my utility company, and it would cost around $20k to install a 22kW charging station in my home. And what the person told me over the phone was basically "the grid is not ready, we would need to upgrade hundred of meters of cable". This is in Europe (Switzerland), but it shows how impractical super fast charging is with the current state of the grid and infrastructure (we can't start a turbine when you plug your car). I don't know if trying to make it work is possible. The current grid was built over decades. To me it seems way easier to use other form of energy transfer (hydrogen refill or battery swap). Edit: I'm at the limit of the current I can draw from the utility line (40A for my house) as I have a geothermal pump that can use up to 25A when running. Even if I put a smaller charging station, the utility will have to change my introduction box, and in all cases it is quite expensive. I asked for 22kW because we live in a remote location, and while not strictly necessary, it might become so in the future, for example if we have visitors with 3 cars, they might need recharge.
- Schroedingersat 4y ago
  You don't need a fast charger at home though. 2kW on off-peak hours is fine. That's >100kWh per week. Save the fast charger for the road trip or for the people with the 1hr commute to use on the way home when they top up once a fortnight. Or better yet start building infrastructure for a less insane and stupid transport method and transition away from cars altogether.
- alkonaut 4y ago
  I have 3x25A fuses at 230V (which is normal here, you either have 3x20 or 3x25 typically) so I could probably run a 22kW charger. But I couldn't run it and run much other stuff at the same time! I guess the solution is to have something store the capacity, i.e. a second battery. If one really needs to charge at home very quickly (e.g. you are a taxi driver or have some other specific reason) and you can't overload the grid, then the solution must be to slowly charge a battery at home when the car is used, just like most EV owners slowly charge the car over night. Then the home battery can be quickly emptied into the car for a fast charge. In the end, it's just like having 2EVs where one is charging while the other isn't. And of course, buying a 100kWh wall battery is going to also set you back a large part of the cost of a second car too, just like your $20k for a better electricity connection. BUT - the dual battery solution doesn't have the tragedy of the commons issue where not everyone can do it. I doubt more than a single digit % would ever consider needing fast charge at home though.
medion 4y ago
In the 90's and early 2000's everyone wanted T1 lines - the next generation of utility 'wants' will be massive fast chargers in the home...
- Rygian 4y ago
  As owner of an EV since 2019, I have never wanted that sort of thing. Maybe a 32 amp charger instead of a flimsy extension cord (that I cap to 5 amps). But in any case, my car starts charging in the evening, and I have enough charge for my next day by early morning.
seydor 4y ago
I understand the reservations about how to find a suitable source of charging, but consider that these vehicles may be charged by lightnings
cassepipe 4y ago
I personnally don't care for charging time, efficiency is the single most important thing for me. Plus if you get an Aptera, it's always charging a little. Charging become less of a problem if you are producing electricity.
eimrine 4y ago
> The cells also surpassed 1,000 cycles while retaining 93% of their capacity. Doesn't anybody think that best ever possible equivalent of 1000 cycles achivable only in lab condition (for example charging and discharging 5000 times from 40% to 60% only in ideal temperature) is a huge waste of non-recyclable cells? 93% will be totally impossible for any human use.

131 points by clouddrover 4y ago

malchow 4y ago

Worth noting that this battery is commercialized at their fab in Fremont.

Animats 4y ago
Well, just barely. They claim to have made some samples.[1] Read their SEC filing for Q1 2022. They already went public via an SPAC reverse merger, with a nominal value around $1 billion. The biggest concern is in the "Risks" section: "Our roadmap to improve our energy density requires us to implement higher energy density materials for both cathodes and anodes." That's a fundamental problem, and the story of too many wannabe battery makers. It would be much better if the SEC filing said they had a working prototype which met the announced specs, and the big risk was scaling up the manufacturing of the prototype. The stock symbol is ENVX. [1] https://www.sec.gov/ix?doc=/Archives/edgar/data/1828318/000095017022010240/envx-20220403.htm https://www.sec.gov/ix?doc=/Archives/edgar/data/1828318/0000...
- malchow 4y ago
  Happily, you are misunderstanding their filing. They do have working prototypes which meet the announced specs. They also have a plan to push beyond the current (and very impressive) 900 Wh/L energy density.[1] It is those future-looking plans which may (or may not) require higher energy density materials on the anode and cathode. [1] https://www.enovix.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/Ashok-Lahiri_Enovix-AABC-Europe-Final-Stand-Alone.pdf https://www.enovix.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/Ashok-Lahi...
  - Animats 4y ago
    From PDF, page 10, note "Assumed 100% packing efficiency for pouch or prismatic vs 90.7% packing efficiency for cylindrical form factor". Some of the improved energy density seems to come from rectangular cells packed with no space for coolant flow. The one picture of an actual battery shows it sitting on a huge heat sink.

xwowsersx 4y ago

I don't know the EV battery space well. What is the capacity of the battery they are referring to and how does it compare to, say, the capacity of a Tesla Model S? Just trying to put this 5 minutes to 80% charge in context. As a headline, it sounds incredible. If I could charge my car to 80% in 5 minutes, I would buy an EV tomorrow, seriously.

speedgoose 4y ago
You may buy an EV before such a battery is widely available in production.
- xwowsersx 4y ago
  Haha touché. I meant to say that the speed of charging is one aspect of switching to a FEV that might make me think twice about buying one, but if I could charge my car in five minutes, it'd be a much, much easier decision.
  - speedgoose 4y ago
    Having easy access to a charger helps a lot too. It takes only a few seconds (with practice) to plug at home or work, and you always have a charged battery. During longer trips you may have to pee or buy a coffee, and you are likely going to stop a bit more than 5 minutes. But I agree that a 5 minutes fast charging session would be nice and help people transition to EV a lot.
  - Maxion 4y ago
    Fast charging is really only relevant in two scenarios: 1) You want to travel further in one go than the cars range 2) You do not have access to at home charging For those who can charge at home, fast charging is really only needed for longer road trips. Current new cars like the Kia EV6 can fast charge at around 200 kW reliably, that means 20%-80% in around 15 minutes. For the vast majority of people this will be fast enough to be comfortable. This generation of EVs are already very mature technology. Couple one with a 22kW home charger and you'll have very comfortable and stress free traveling.

AtlasBarfed 4y ago

That's good news, pending actual pricing when commercially available. But the real meat of the EV revolution will probably be high density LFP (300-400 range cars) and next-gen sodium ion (200-300 mile cars) which require no nickel or cobalt, or for sodium ion, not even lithium. This is based on production densities that are supposed to be available in production late this year (LFP) or next year (sodium ion) Improvements in any sector or aspect is a good thing though. There will be cells needed in dozens of applications, from container ship to bicycle. Edit: I reached the posting limit, so here is more on the higher density LFP/sodium ion: 230 wh/kg LFP: https://pushevs.com/2022/03/29/guoxuan-closer-to-mass-produce-230-wh-kg-lfp-battery-cells/ https://pushevs.com/2022/03/29/guoxuan-closer-to-mass-produc... 160 wh/kg Sodium ion: https://www.electronicdesign.com/markets/automotive/article/21171384/electronic-design-sodiumion-batteries-achieve-160whkg-energy-density-fast-charging https://www.electronicdesign.com/markets/automotive/article/... So my napkin math says that the densities listed should enable a 400 mile Tesla model S type car (especially since LFP doesn't need as much cooling and has higher density cell-to-pack), and sodium ion should do about 70% of that, or a 275 mile model S large car. Napkin math is derived from looking at current pack densities in Tesla cars and comparing that with 90% of the cell densities in the above articles (which these should be able to achieve in pack density with cell-to-pack and that these chemistries don't need as much active cooling systems). The current model S from googling seems to be at 186 wh/kg at pack level. 90% CTP 230wh/kg LFP should be 205+ wh/kg!!! That may also enable large scale 50-70 mile range PHEVs, and even cheaper EV bikes/scooters/lawnmowers/etc. LFP also has better capacity retention,cycle endurance, and temperature endurance typically. But the Sodium Ion might be the real revolution from a city car perspective for places like China/India where you'd need a billion or more clean city cars. A cheap 100-150 mile sodium ion car is just what these markets need.

krasin 4y ago
High-density LFP sounds amazing. Where can I read more about it?
- BobLaw 4y ago
  Not so much high-density as much as highER density. https://www.autoevolution.com/news/lfp-cells-are-getting-more-energy-density-200-wh-kg-with-svolt-230-wh-kg-with-gotion-185117.html https://www.autoevolution.com/news/lfp-cells-are-getting-mor...

rootusrootus 4y ago

Guessing it’ll need a megawatt charger to pull that off on an EV size battery.

chris_va 4y ago
Fun fact, the effective charging power of a gas pump is ~6MW (20MW thermal). Good luck getting a 1MW utility feed.
- BobLaw 4y ago
  That would be a silly way to approach it. You would be paying $40k+ per month in just demand charges some places. A much better idea is to have battery packs you can charge at constant slower rates and feed the charging station at higher burst rates. Tesla and Electrify America already do this. https://electrek.co/2021/12/02/electrify-america-deployed-tesla-powerpacks-over-140-charging-stations/ https://electrek.co/2021/12/02/electrify-america-deployed-te... https://driveteslacanada.ca/semi/tesla-megacharger-installation-giga-nevada-wraps-up-construction/ https://driveteslacanada.ca/semi/tesla-megacharger-installat...
  - krab 4y ago
    Or swappable batteries if we standardize on a few sizes. You can then charge those slowly. However that brings problems with quality control - a worn battery costs less than the new one. Maybe a model where the customer doesn't own the battery?
    - ccozan 4y ago
      Renault does that with Zoe, if I am not mistaken
      - gambiting 4y ago
        They did for a while but at least here UK there is no battery leasing anymore with Zoe. You just buy the whole car outright.

senectus1 4y ago

>The cells also surpassed 1,000 cycles while retaining 93% of their capacity 1000 is a short count i wonder if the capacity drops off suddenly after about 1000...

BobLaw 4y ago
Not really for cars at least. That's right up there with NCA and NMC chemistries and those seem to do just fine for 200k miles. LFP can do 3000+ cycles with the trade offs being lower energy and power density. Which is why it's usually relegated to models with lower range and power, or vehicles that have the capacity for larger packs like buses.
Gigachad 4y ago
1000 cycles is a pretty standard milestone for battery specs. Over 80% capacity at 1000 cycles is the quality standard Apple sets for example.
Johnny555 4y ago
I charge my ~100 mile range EV about twice a week, so 1000 cycles would last me 10 years, and then I'd still have 93% of the original range - that 7% drop could be hidden by the battery management system so I wouldn't see any drop in range.

arriu 4y ago

Wouldn’t this generate a ton of heat?

WheatM 4y ago
jillesvangurp 4y ago
Only if it is very inefficient.
- kataklasm 4y ago
  Right, but that's the thing about efficiency, it's relative. Another poster made some napkin calculations, even with a 99% effective process, meaning 1% energy lost to the environment, he calculated several kW of heat you need get out of your system. Even if you have 99% efficiency, which in reality is mostly unachievable, that's still a huge loss of energy if the energy you're handling is high enough.
  - nomel 4y ago
    > which in reality is mostly unachievable By what metric? Here's a company that sells dry and wet closed loop water cooling systems that are > 500kW.
- gambiting 4y ago
  Even if it's 99% efficient(which would be incredible), if you're recharging 100kWh of capacity in a minute, that's using 6MW. So your 1% of inefficiency is still 60kW of heat that you need to do something with. And 60kW of heat is a crazy amount.

diebeforei485 4y ago

How heavy is this? The article doesn't say.

Andrew_nenakhov 4y ago

This is a marketing fail, again. Call 98% to be 100% and you can claim 100% charge in 10 minutes (plus an optional 2% overcharge!).

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]

noja 4y ago

How thick is that cable?

Johnny555 4y ago
How thick is that cable? Not very thick to carry around 2.5 amps (80% of 0.27Ah in 5 minutes), 20 gauge would be more than enough: The company demonstrated the fast-charge ability in its 0.27 Ah EV cells in its silicon lithium-ion batteries

cbmuser 4y ago

So, either that battery is very small or it needs a very powerful charging station to get a full charge of 100 kWh completed in such a short time. This means, if this was supposed to be commercialized, the country would need to install thousands of charging stations with half a megawatt power. I don’t think this is ever going to happen. Especially, with western countries being slow in building new nuclear power plants.

gambiting 4y ago
That's the other thing that people forget when talking about this. To put 100kWh of capacity into a battery within one minute, you'd need to have a charger capable of delivering 6 megawatts. That's the output of a small hydroelectric power plant. I also would love to see the cables and cooling solution used for such a charger.
- pengaru 4y ago
  If you have a battery on hand ready to suck down that power in EVs, all you have to do is contact whoever managed such a feat to provide your charging facility with the battery cache. And you don't have to recharge your cache off the grid/solar/wind/whatever at the same rate you charge the cars of waiting customers. You just need space for a big enough pile of batteries. Last I checked gas stations were rather bursty around rush-hours. Worst case the charge rate degrades after exhausting the cache. There will always be lulls between the thundering herds to allow filling it all back up. Is it really all that impossible to imagine? Maybe the gas stations of the future are battery towers.
- mschuster91 4y ago
  6 megawatts is 60 amps on a 100 kV line or 300 amps on a 20 kV local distribution line. Don't need a thick wire to do that, train overhead lines carry more power than that.
  - gambiting 4y ago
    Yeah but the car isn't taking 100kV - the battery packs nowadays use 400 or 800V. Even at 800V that's 7500 amps. Also the power needs to be converted from AC to DC too, and that's not a 100% efficient process either.

s1mon 4y ago

This company seems like the real deal, and it seems like they have managed to actually start manufacturing cells. What they haven't done, is create batteries which are likely to be used in electric vehicles which carry people yet. The web site [0] has data sheets for 4 sizes of cells, from "eyewear" to "smartphone/laptop". While they claim energy densities that are much higher than conventional cells, none of these are as big as 18650, 2170, or 4680. There's reference to higher capacity cells in this presentation [1], but they are sited as design targets, which I take to mean: they only exist on paper. They also try to sell 100% packing density since they are prismatic instead of the conventional cylindrical cells. In one of their videos they say that they get less than 2% swelling after 500 charge cycles. So how does one get 100% packing density if the cells even only swell to 2%? After many years of experience, I do not trust any battery vendor's mechanical specs. Inevitably "<2%" will be a lot higher than that. Battery companies can't even get the static cell size correct with proper tolerances, let alone truthfully report the swelling. The 3 cofounders spent ~20 years at IBM San Jose before going on to other things. There are also a lot of very senior people from the auto industry and other top tier tech companies like Cypress. Enovix has 94 patents (+63 pending), 14 years of R&D and $254M in funding to get to this point. Their videos have much more detail. [2] According to their CEO, the first shipping product is in wearables (watches). From what they are saying about volumes and ramp plan, I wonder if they might be working with Apple. They're also working with AR companies, developing products specifically for them. [0] https://www.enovix.com https://www.enovix.com [1] https://www.enovix.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/Ashok-Lahiri_Enovix-AABC-Europe-Final-Stand-Alone.pdf https://www.enovix.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/Ashok-Lahi... [2] https://vimeo.com/enovix https://vimeo.com/enovix

lta 4y ago
I wish they also talked about the recycling strategy, because right now, afak, recycling is almost impossible for all of those batteries.
- s1mon 4y ago
  In the long video, this question gets asked. They kinda punt and say it's the same as for other li-ion batteries. To me that means barely anything is happening yet.

1-6 4y ago

Stealing energy hasn’t been any easier! Next product, circuit breakers!

Guthur 4y ago

And it won't matter because no matter how fancy the tech you need an industrial base to actually manufacture the damn things. Myopic energy policies and economically destructive actions taken over the past 2 years will ensure that we're going to have severe de-industrialisation for the foreseeable future which will make much of this high level tech unattainable. They wanted us to have 21st century energy but forgot that we actually need to bootstrap it upon 20th century energy. We need energy now.

hinkley 4y ago
It’s worse than that, he’s dead, Jim. These infrastructure problems are shaping up to be another way for the divide between upper and lower class to widen, and another crucible to cook the middle class in. As the price of having your own backup power comes down, the willingness of people in power to spend political capital on fixing infrastructure starts to slide. Never mind the “fuck you, I’ve got mine” crowd. With solar panels, a big enough battery pack, and grid power that’s available at least 95% of the time, you can fast charge your vehicle even as the power grid slowly rots around you.
someweirdperson 4y ago
Also, we need to finish the transformation before running out of coveniently/cheaply available non-renewable resources. Given how slow such large long-term changes take, starting early isn't such a bad idea.

nine_k 4y ago

OK! Here comes a car with, say, 80 kWh battery. It's not entirely empty, so to reach 98%, it can take 60 kWh. It does so in 5 minutes. This means that it gulps 60 kWh in 5 minutes; since 1 hour = 12 * 5 minutes, the power transmitted is 60 * 12 = 720 kW. This is a scale of a neighborhood; a typical detached house is allocated 20 kW. And this is just one car. Now let's imagine optimistically that the efficiency of the process is 99%, and a mere 1% is dissipated as heat. 7.2 kW take a serious cooling system to dissipate. So no, I don't think it's fit for cars. For phones and drones, maybe, using a special actively cooled charging station.

01100011 4y ago
Upon further reflection, I think the answer to this problem is to simply coordinate charging 'slots' on a sub-grid(not sure what you call a local delivery circuit with a certain capacity). It should be possible to request charging time slots from a local power company server and negotiate when your vehicle can charge with millisecond accuracy. Doing so also might help the power company supply that power more effectively/efficiently. Sure, this means in peak times you may not get the charging rate you want, because you have to wait for the network to be available, but in off-peak times you get the fast charging rate you're capable of.
01100011 4y ago
Are there any other reasons to use this battery tech beyond rapid charging time? Does it have more charge cycles than other Li batteries when charged at a more reasonable rate? Is it denser or does it have better discharge characteristics(i.e. lower internal resistance)?
- cogman10 4y ago
  Looks like they used a pretty standard lithium ion chemistry with high silicon anodes. This is where the industry is currently going with state of the art lithium batteries. They've just been slower about increasing the silicon due to fears of what other tradeoffs will arise.
- clouddrover 4y ago

mungoman2 4y ago

To use this without overloading the grid one could pair this with a station with properties: high capacity, high discharge, slow charge, low density. Is there such tech? Capacitors would work I guess, but are probably too expensive at the needed scale.

atbpaca 4y ago

The question is: how much of rare earth elements are needed to build such a battery? While enhancing charging time for some, what about the countries extracting those elements and the impact on their environment?

vardump 4y ago
Do any lithium batteries contain any rare earth elements? At least I'm not aware of any usage whatsoever. NiMH batteries require Cerium, Lanthanum and Neodymium, but those batteries are not used in BEVs at all anymore. So I think the answer is: zero.

oliwarner 4y ago

Going on nine_k's answer, at 600V you'd also need a charging cable to handle 1200A. That's so thick (~50mm) a 3m cable's going to weigh 52KG. I'm sure somebody will jump in and suggest an alternative. Let's just put 10kV through the car. Then it's only 72A. Nothing bad happens at 10kV. Burst-chargers are silly. They might work, they might not, but either way they present such immediate problems for mass deployment that they should be considered a distraction. What we need today is "little" 10-15KWh replaceable battery pods. We're still talking up to 80KG, but something to get you 50 miles. These could be cycled out, cool-charged and essentially offer unlimited range to anyone without adding significant delay. You could also lower the onboard cost of new cars by reducing the standard battery size. I want a Tesla, but I need about 20 miles range for 99% of the time. Buying a 15KW battery and hiring the extra would be a better solution for me.

rcxdude 4y ago
Existing fast chargers can do 600A, the main trick is they water-cool the cable, which substantially reduces the amount of copper you need. They're about as difficult to handle as a gas pump nozzle. Somehow shifting 80kg batteries in and out of your car seems a lot harder to manage.
- oliwarner 4y ago
  > shifting 80kg batteries The cool thing about these batteries is they're made up of small cells. 8×10Kg units could be swapped out with relative ease. Or we belt-feed 18650s and eject spent ones like a minigin. Cooler but harder to handle the electrics.
jimmcslim 4y ago
Better Place tried the whole replaceable battery pack idea... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Better_Place_(company) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Better_Place_(company) Switching batteries sounds like a good idea to me, but it doesn't seem to scale to this level .
- clouddrover 4y ago

Gys 4y ago

> Lahiri will speak at the 12th International Advanced Automotive Battery Conference (AABC) Europe in Mainz, Germany. His presentation at 11:20 a.m. CEST (5:00 a.m. EST) titled “Silicon-Anode Lithium-Ion Batteries for EV Applications,” will provide an update on the company’s EV program. OT: Funny how they mention an exact time for the presentation at the conference without adding a date. The conference https://www.advancedautobat.com/europe https://www.advancedautobat.com/europe is 13 - 15 June. Small PR failure.

kuon 4y ago

I was talking with my car dealer as I wanted to buy an electric car. He was using the car for his own usage to get a good idea. The main thing that came out is that most available charging stations are 22kW max and very often they are shared using "smart charge", which basically means a lower duty cycle (/N). In practice it means it requires about 7 hours to charge the 50kW/h battery. After this discussion, I asked my utility company, and it would cost around $20k to install a 22kW charging station in my home. And what the person told me over the phone was basically "the grid is not ready, we would need to upgrade hundred of meters of cable". This is in Europe (Switzerland), but it shows how impractical super fast charging is with the current state of the grid and infrastructure (we can't start a turbine when you plug your car). I don't know if trying to make it work is possible. The current grid was built over decades. To me it seems way easier to use other form of energy transfer (hydrogen refill or battery swap). Edit: I'm at the limit of the current I can draw from the utility line (40A for my house) as I have a geothermal pump that can use up to 25A when running. Even if I put a smaller charging station, the utility will have to change my introduction box, and in all cases it is quite expensive. I asked for 22kW because we live in a remote location, and while not strictly necessary, it might become so in the future, for example if we have visitors with 3 cars, they might need recharge.

Schroedingersat 4y ago
You don't need a fast charger at home though. 2kW on off-peak hours is fine. That's >100kWh per week. Save the fast charger for the road trip or for the people with the 1hr commute to use on the way home when they top up once a fortnight. Or better yet start building infrastructure for a less insane and stupid transport method and transition away from cars altogether.
alkonaut 4y ago
I have 3x25A fuses at 230V (which is normal here, you either have 3x20 or 3x25 typically) so I could probably run a 22kW charger. But I couldn't run it and run much other stuff at the same time! I guess the solution is to have something store the capacity, i.e. a second battery. If one really needs to charge at home very quickly (e.g. you are a taxi driver or have some other specific reason) and you can't overload the grid, then the solution must be to slowly charge a battery at home when the car is used, just like most EV owners slowly charge the car over night. Then the home battery can be quickly emptied into the car for a fast charge. In the end, it's just like having 2EVs where one is charging while the other isn't. And of course, buying a 100kWh wall battery is going to also set you back a large part of the cost of a second car too, just like your $20k for a better electricity connection. BUT - the dual battery solution doesn't have the tragedy of the commons issue where not everyone can do it. I doubt more than a single digit % would ever consider needing fast charge at home though.

medion 4y ago

In the 90's and early 2000's everyone wanted T1 lines - the next generation of utility 'wants' will be massive fast chargers in the home...

Rygian 4y ago
As owner of an EV since 2019, I have never wanted that sort of thing. Maybe a 32 amp charger instead of a flimsy extension cord (that I cap to 5 amps). But in any case, my car starts charging in the evening, and I have enough charge for my next day by early morning.

seydor 4y ago

I understand the reservations about how to find a suitable source of charging, but consider that these vehicles may be charged by lightnings

cassepipe 4y ago

I personnally don't care for charging time, efficiency is the single most important thing for me. Plus if you get an Aptera, it's always charging a little. Charging become less of a problem if you are producing electricity.

eimrine 4y ago

> The cells also surpassed 1,000 cycles while retaining 93% of their capacity. Doesn't anybody think that best ever possible equivalent of 1000 cycles achivable only in lab condition (for example charging and discharging 5000 times from 40% to 60% only in ideal temperature) is a huge waste of non-recyclable cells? 93% will be totally impossible for any human use.