Nano power: An electron-microscope image of 40-nanometer-wide rod-shaped particles that make up a promising battery material.
Arumugam Manthiram, University of Texas at Austin
Researchers show a low-cost route to making materials for advanced batteries in electric cars and hybrids.
A new way to make advanced lithium-ion battery materials addresses one of their chief remaining problems: cost. Arumugam Manthiram, a professor of materials engineering at the University of Texas at Austin, has demonstrated that a microwave-based method for making lithium iron phosphate takes less time and uses lower temperatures than conventional methods, which could translate into lower costs.
Lithium iron phosphate is an alternative to the lithium cobalt oxide used in most lithium-ion batteries in laptop computers. It promises to be much cheaper because it uses iron rather than the much more expensive metal cobalt. Although it stores less energy than some other lithium-ion materials, lithium iron phosphate is safer and can be made in ways that allow the material to deliver large bursts of power, properties that make it particularly useful in hybrid vehicles.
Indeed, lithium iron phosphate has become one of the hottest new battery materials. For example, A123 Systems, a startup based in Watertown, MA, that has developed one form of the material, has raised more than $148 million and commercialized batteries for rechargeable power tools that can outperform conventional plug-in tools. The material is also one of the types being tested for a new electric car from General Motors.
But it has proved difficult and expensive to manufacture lithium iron phosphate batteries, which cuts into potential cost savings over more conventional lithium-ion batteries. Typically, the materials are made in a process that takes hours and requires temperatures as high as 700 °C.
Manthiram's method involves mixing commercially available chemicals--lithium hydroxide, iron acetate, and phosphoric acid--in a solvent, and then subjecting this mixture to microwaves for five minutes, which heats the chemicals to about 300 °C. The process forms rod-shaped particles of lithium iron phosphate. The highest-performing particles are about 100 nanometers long and 25 nanometers wide. The small size is needed to allow lithium ions to move quickly in and out of the particles during charging and discharging of the battery.
New materials from MIT could power laser weapons or give hybrid cars jackrabbit acceleration.
Donald Sadoway conceived of a novel battery that could allow cities to run on solar power at night.
A new lithium-ion battery from A123 Systems could help electric cars and hybrids come to dominate the roads.
Theoretical capacity of lithium iron phosphate
Quote from article:
"the materials came close to the theoretical capacity of lithium iron phosphate, which is 170 milliamp hours per gram."
What causes this theoretical limit?
Re: Theoretical capacity of lithium iron phosphate
The theoretical capacity limit is based upon the number of Li-ions that can be transported from the cathode to the anode during discharging of the battery. The LiFePO4 (Lithium-iron phosphate) structure can only theoretically allow a certain number of Li-ions to vacate its structure while remaining stable and not collapsing. It is a physically allowable amount of Li-ions that can move from the cathode to the anode. For the actual equation that is used to calculate this just search on Google.
The worldwide supply of Lithium is severely constrained by the amount available as recoverable Lithium Carbonate & Lithium Chloride on surface of the Earth. Google will turn up the sources easily.
Over 80% of all Lithium salt deposits are in S. America, & thus S. America will be the OLEC "Organization of Lithium Exporting Countries" cartel. Great.
6.2 million tons of Lithium is the estimated world supply of Lithium and we used about 20,000 tons/yr in 2005.
Lithium is relatively expensive, difficult or economically undesirable to recycle and of limited supply and so I conclude, just from what I read, that Lion batteries are only an interim battery solution.
Altairnano's battery technology
Altairnano seems to be making some recent noise about their quick charge battery technology and using them in a Phoenix Motors product. How does that compare with the technology in this article?
Manufacturing in the United States is in trouble. That's bad news not just for the country's economy but for the future of innovation.
This document is part of the “How-To Guide for Most Common Measurements” centralized resource portal. This tutorial provides a detailed guide for measurement and device considerations to take temperature measurements using thermocouples. Get an introduction to thermocouples, which are inexpensive sensing devices widely used with PC-based data acquisition systems. Also review some specific thermocouple examples and learn how thermocouples work and ways to integrate them into a data acquisition measurement system.
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mkogrady
425 Comments
Residential Application
Assuming we're actually heading towards an Electric Car based society (world?) - how viable are these batteries as a means to store non-peak electricity to charge up your car. In essence, use the battery (in an array or large single unit) to capture cheap electricity at night, then charge your car batteries in the morning?
Are these units forecasted to be competative with Electrolyte Flow Cell battery solutions for smaller residential applications (ie 5Kva to 10Kva) - can the battery materials be reused to keep costs low as possible?
Final question - will development of these include using large industrial sized Microwave Ovens (ie room sized) to make larger crystals or more materials in a single pass??
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muraliganth
1 Comment
Re: Residential Application
Using Lithium battery to store the grid-power during off-peak hours to use it again for car batteries to minimize the cost is certainly a gud option, but may not be practical because of the need to use batteries twice (cost issue which is already an important criteria for making PHEV commercial).
Lithium technology can sure replace other batteries because of its high energy and volumetric density (light and small). It will keep on improving resulting in more energy and mileage replacing IC engine altogether within 2025..
reg Microwave for large scale production is still debatable..but will sure one day replace the conventional heating methods..(like how domestic microwave replaced conventional ovens from our kitchens)..
Reply
cobraphx
14 Comments
Re: Residential Application
If your car has a battery, why not just charge your car's battery at night when the rates are lowest? Why would you charge a separate battery in order to charge the car's battery? If you work at night, I guess it makes some sense... But I'm not sure the cost differential between daytime and nightime electricity rates is enough to offset the cost of a $2000-$5000 battery system, to store the cheaper of the 2 charges, especially when you take the efficiency losses in account. You'd be adding 5-10% losses for charging the storage battery and then discharging it to charge the car's battery.
If you are completely off the grid, and using the battery to buffer your daytime solar power, it makes a lot more sense.
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LDighera
13 Comments
Re: Residential Application
... "cheap electricity at night" ...
Actually the window for cheap electricity occurs between about midnight and 9am. Here's some historical information: Click to view
Here's the current demand for California: Click to view
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