Batteries

Since the conception of flexible battery technologies, suppliers have searched for strong application markets for their products. In the last five years, niches have finally begun to materialize, though the specific use case depends on battery technology.

Thursday 18 July 2024 - EV thermal system architecture and fluids used; Battery thermal management and trends; Motor thermal management and trends; Future refrigerants; Outlook for fluid content and forecasts

With the rapid growth of the electric vehicle market and a focus on the importance of safety, EV fire protection brings a large opportunity for material suppliers. In this article by Dr James Edmondson, Research Director here at IDTechEx, we share some of these opportunities including those outside of the automotive market, along with some challenges for material suppliers in this space and findings from recent industry events.

There is undoubtedly a huge push to build global DC fast-charging networks. The US government is providing more than $5 billion in funding and incentives as part of the NEVI program to build a coast-to-coast fast charging network, and many countries in Europe are rolling out similar programs following the AFIR regulations to spur EV charging infrastructure growth. 2024 will be a big year for EV charging, but, as IDTechEx discuss in this article, there's more to the story.

It is impossible to avoid headlines about the "graphene battery"; the concept of this Nobel Prize winning nanomaterial revolutionizing the energy storage market is naturally very enticing, but it is graphene's older sibling carbon nanotubes that have progressed beyond the hype and disillusionment phases of their commercial journey by finding a value-add high volume energy storage adoption.

Announcements of developments to alternative, next-generation, non-lithium battery chemistries, including redox flow, metal-air, or sodium-ion batteries, are now a regular occurrence. Despite interest in these alternatives, Li-ion batteries remain the dominant choice for consumer devices, electric vehicles, and stationary storage. However, the importance of non-lithium battery chemistries is expected to grow considerably over the next 10 years, especially in the stationary energy storage sector. By 2025, IDTechEx forecast that >10% of the stationary market will be accounted for by non-lithium chemistries, up from <5% in 2021.

The US Department of Energy's paper, "Grid Operational Impacts of Widespread Storage Deployment" analyzes requirements to 2050. It variously calculates 1.3 TWh required to just over 6.0 TWh in its 94% renewable electricity, Zero Carbon scenario. Earlier, other researchers calculated 80% wind and solar will require 5.4 TWh of energy storage so it is obvious that huge amounts of storage are needed. Even that is with massive over-production and therefore curtailment - electricity only being generated 10% to 20% of the time on average. Polluting peaker plants only have 11% capacity factor so, on that model, bad replaces bad in that respect.

In our surreal world, we continue to subsidize fossil fuels. We rarely subsidize the huge missing link on the way to 100% renewables, which is providing massive amounts of delayed electricity. People misunderstand. They think we do. Uniquely, the IDTechEx report "Future Stationary Energy Storage: Hydrogen, Batteries, Gravity, Gas, Other 2022-2042" looks at all the proliferating needs and technologies on the essential 20-year timescale ahead. It finds that the problems are largely solved of very brief fluctuations previously avoided by the momentum of rotating machines used in fossil fuel plants.

Li-ion batteries are beginning to hit their performance ceiling, especially with regards to energy density. However, a shift in the anode materials used, namely to silicon or lithium-metal anodes, could provide a stepwise improvement to energy density. Their promise can be highlighted by looking at the high number of early-stage companies primarily developing anode materials, most being focussed on silicon, compared to other areas of Li-ion development.

Fires in electric vehicles (EVs) certainly gain a lot of media attention in comparison to their internal combustion engine (ICE) counterparts. But a crucial question for the future of mobility is whether EVs are actually any more likely to catch fire than an ICE vehicle. There is always a non-zero risk of Lithium-ion batteries entering thermal runaway but the key points are how likely is a fire, how problematic is an EV fire and what is being done to prevent or limit them in the future?