The lithium-ion battery invasion is in full swing; they’re seemingly everywhere.

These batteries power all our modern devices from cameras, smartphones, and tablets to pacemakers, satellites, and electronic vehicles (EVs).

And recently, they have gained notoriety for being unstable, volatile, and even combustible.

As evidenced with the lithium-ion batteries used in Samsung’s Note 7 smartphone, which the company recalled last year, our favorite efficient battery is in need of some reconfiguration.

The UPS even requires its customers to sign a dangerous goods service agreement before it will ship lithium-ion and lithium-metal batteries.

Most lithium-ion batteries use a liquid-state electrolyte solution that helps in carrying charges from one battery electrode to the another, making them extremely unstable. 

Electrolytes are essential to a battery. They are composed of salts that contain positive and negative ions.

A lithium-ion battery works by creating a flow of positive lithium ions between two electrodes via the electrolyte solution. 

However, there are researchers who are hard at work looking to establish a finer balance between safety and conductivity in order to improve the function and reliability of lithium-ion batteries.

Basically, it’s time to retire the liquid-state electrolyte lithium-ion battery and instead give a warm welcome and a round of applause to the solid-state battery.

Although solid-state batteries are not nearly as conductive as their liquid counterparts, they make up for this with stability.

Researchers at Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU) are working to improve the conductivity and safety of the lithium-ion battery, basically making it so rechargeable battery users can have their cake and eat it, too. 

The researchers show how it’s possible to design solid-state electrolytes that are not only as conductive as their liquid counterparts but are also able to maintain their desired stability.

The findings, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences this month, could lead to a safer and more powerful future for lithium-ion batteries.

To improve the conductivity in solid-state electrolytes, the researchers produced a computational model in which a single negative ion is removed. Negative cluster ions — groups of atoms with more electrons than protons — replace the absent ion:

The scientists conceptualized a twist on a specific solid-state electrolyte that had previously been tested by other researchers. Originally, the electrolyte, which belongs to a family of crystals called antiperovskites, contained positive ions that were made of three lithium ions and one oxygen atom. The positive ions were joined with a single chlorine atom that worked as the negative ion.

In the computational model, the chlorine atom is replaced by a negative cluster ion that’s created by one boron atom and four fluorine atoms joined to the existing positive ions.

Other combinations of negative cluster ions were identified for potentially enhancing future conductivity.

The research still needs to be tested, but it shows great potential for overthrowing the highly unstable liquid electrolyte for good.

There are more studies taking place about improving the overall function of the solid-state battery at the University of Maryland (UMD), College Park and the Nanostructures for Electrical Energy Storage; a Department of Energy (DOE)-sponsored Energy Frontier Research Center (EFRC); the DOE’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory; and also many others. But none have ventured much beyond the laboratory…

Automakers and innovative companies are working to improve the lithium-ion battery in order to gain the leading edge in the ever-growing EV market, taking the new, experimental batteries beyond computerization and the laboratory. 

Sir James Dyson, the British inventor who revolutionized vacuum cleaners, hair dryers, and stationary fans, is endeavoring to revolutionize the electronic car and its battery all at the same time. His endeavor could very well be the breakthrough that the modern rechargeable world has been waiting for.

And this is because something has to change, considering how the liquid structure of the electrolyte within most lithium-ion batteries (where the ions flow back and forth between electrodes when the battery is charged or discharged), manufacturing faults, damage, and even general wear and tear may lead to short-circuiting — potentially causing the battery to overheat or even burst into flames.

And in a vehicle, this could be deadly.

Solid-state batteries would be the safer option. And with recent advances in science, they could also be more powerful, too.

Dyson recently purchased small American startup Sakti3 for $90 million back in October of 2015 that was then tasked with improving the solid-state battery for the highly anticipated Dyson EV.

Sakti3 has been making experimental batteries through using a thin-film deposition process, a method widely used to produce things like solar panels and display screens. The goal is to produce low-cost batteries with long and safe service lives and also the energy density for greatly increasing — perhaps even doubling — the range of a typical electric car.

We should expect to see Dyson’s solid-state-powered cars on the road by 2020.

Toyota has a similar time frame in mind for the launch of its new electric cars, which will also be powered by the company’s own version of solid-state batteries. 

The Japanese auto giant currently has more than 200 engineers working on solid-state batteries, which are still based on the popular lithium-ion technology but are also able to work at higher temperatures and are therefore smaller since they don’t require cooling. 

The executive vice president of Toyota, Didier Leroy, believes that his company is the leader in terms of intellectual property when it comes to solid-state battery technology, 

He’s also convinced that his company’s technology is a “game changer” as far as drastically improving the driving range of EV is concerned. And this is inevitably a major factor in consumers accepting these cars as practical alternatives to conventional gasoline and diesel vehicles. 

All of this reinvention and revolutionizing means that the solid-state lithium battery should be able to overtake its more established rival by some margin — not only in terms of cost but also in performance and reliability.

If the new solid-state lithium battery manages to do that, it would be a real breakthrough.

That’s all for now.

Until next time,

John Peterson
Pro Trader Today