New Lithium-Oxygen Battery Could One Day Power Electric Cars
New Lithium-Oxygen Battery Could One Day Power Electric Cars
By Reuters Updated Oct. 29, 2015, 2:25 PM PDT
Scientists have
created a battery whose technology in principle could power electric cars and
other energy-hungry devices far better than current lithium-ion batteries, but
it remains years away from commercial use.
Researchers at
the University of Cambridge on Thursday announced the creation of a laboratory
demonstration model of a lithium-oxygen battery that overcomes many of the
barriers that have held back the development of this technology. They said the
battery boasts very high energy density, is about 93 percent efficient — better
than previous efforts — and can be recharged more than 2,000 times.
Clare Grey, a
Cambridge professor of materials chemistry who led the research, called it
"a step towards a practical battery, albeit with many hurdles ahead."
The researchers
said it could be more than a decade before a practical lithium-oxygen battery
is ready, in part because the battery's ability to charge and discharge is too
low.
In cars, the
range for a compact, fully charged battery has been unable to reach that of a
full tank of gasoline in a regular engine because current lithium-ion batteries
do not pack that kind of power punch. The lithium-ion rechargeable battery,
first introduced in 1991, helped power the portable electronics revolution
including laptops and smartphones as well as powering some vehicles.
Lithium-oxygen
batteries, also called lithium-air batteries, have the potential to deliver the
desired power thanks to a high energy density — a measure of energy stored for
a given weight — that could be 10 times that of lithium-ion batteries and
approach that of gasoline. They also could be a fifth the cost and a fifth the
weight of lithium-ion batteries. But problems have beset lithium-oxygen
batteries that affect their capacity and lifetime, including troublesome
efficiency, performance, chemical reaction and potential safety issues and the
limitation of needing pure oxygen rather than plain old air.
The Cambridge
demonstrator battery employs different chemistry than previous work on
lithium-air batteries, for example using lithium hydroxide rather than lithium
peroxide. It also uses an electrode made of graphene, a form of carbon. The
result was a more stable and efficient battery.
Grey said it is
too early to gauge lithium-oxygen battery range limits in vehicles.
Intellectual property from the research is owned by Cambridge Enterprises, the
university's commercialization arm, and has been patented, Grey said.
The research
was published in the journal Science.
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