Science Daily October 12, 2022
Using massive batteries to alleviate range anxiety is ineffective for mainstream EV adoption due to the limited raw resource supply and high cost. Fast charging enables downsizing of EV batteries for both affordability and sustainability, without causing range anxiety. However, fast charging of energy-dense batteries remains a challenge. A team of researchers in the US (Pennsylvania State College, State College (PA)) combined materials based on asymmetric temperature modulation with a thermally stable dual-salt electrolyte to achieve charging of a 265 Wh kg−1 battery to 75% (or 70%) state of charge in 12 (or 11) minutes for more than 900 (or 2,000) cycles. They built a digital twin of such a battery pack to assess its cooling and safety and demonstrated that thermally modulated 4C charging only requires air convection. This offered a compact and intrinsically safe route to cell-to-pack development. According to the researchers the rapid thermal modulation method to yield highly active electrochemical interfaces only during fast charging has important potential to realize both stability and fast charging of next-generation materials, including anodes like silicon and lithium metal...read more. TECHNICAL ARTICLE
Electrochemical–thermal coupled simulations of a 12S1P pack of 150 Ah prismatic cells. Credit: Nature (2022)Â