New electrode could unleash faster battery charge times

New electrode could unleash faster battery charge times

University of Texas researchers say they have fabricated a new type of electrode for lithium-ion batteries that could unleash greater power and faster charging. The battery’s positively and negatively charged parts use magnets to create a unique alignment that sidesteps common problems associated with sizing up these critical components.

According to the researchers, the electrode could potentially facilitate twice the range on a single charge compared to batteries using an existing commercial electrode.

“Two-dimensional materials are commonly believed as a promising candidate for high-rate energy storage applications because it only needs to be several nanometers thick for rapid charge transport,” says Guihua Yu, a professor in UT Austin’s Walker Department of Mechanical Engineering and Texas Materials Institute. “However, for thick-electrode-design-based next-generation, high-energy batteries, the restacking of nanosheets as building blocks can cause significant bottlenecks in charge transport, leading to difficulty in achieving both high energy and fast charging.”

The researchers say the key is to use thin two-dimensional materials as the building blocks of the electrode, stacking them to create thickness and then using a magnetic field to manipulate their orientations. The research team uses commercially available magnets during the fabrication process to arrange the two-dimensional materials in a vertical alignment, creating a fast lane for ions to travel through the electrode.

“Our electrode shows superior electrochemical performance partially due to the high mechanical strength, high electrical conductivity, and facilitated lithium-ion transport thanks to the unique architecture we designed,” said Zhengyu Ju, a graduate student in Yu’s research group who is leading this project.

In addition to comparing their electrode with a commercial electrode, the researchers also fabricated a horizontally arranged electrode using the same materials for experimental control purposes. The researchers say they were able to recharge the vertical electrode to 50% energy level in 30 minutes, compared with 2 hours and 30 minutes with the horizontal electrode.

The researchers emphasize that they are early in their work, looking at just a single type of battery electrode in this research.

They aim to generalize their methodology of vertically organized electrode layers to apply it to different types of electrodes using other materials. They say this could enable future fast charging with electric vehicles.

The research team includes from The University of Texas at Austin: Yu, Ju, Xiao Xu, Xiao Zhang and Kasun U. Raigama; and from Stony Brook/Brookhaven National Laboratory: Steven T. King, Kenneth J. Takeuchi, Amy C. Marschilok, Lei Wang and Esther S. Takeuchi. The U.S. Department of Energy funded the research through the multi-institutional Energy Frontier Research Center, the Center for Mesoscale Transport Properties.

You May Also Like

The Electric Circuit rolls out power-sharing fast chargers

A total of 500 kW of power is distributed among up to three connected vehicles based on their respective charging capacities.

The_Electric_Circuit

The Electric Circuit is introducing new fast-charging stations with power sharing, making them available for the first time in Canada in the city of Rivière-du-Loup. The new satellite-based charging stations are manufactured by Kempower of Finland and distributed in Québec by Bornes Québec. Three dual-charging outlets share a total of 500 kW of power that is distributed among connected vehicles based on their respective charging capacities. Each charging cable can deliver up to 300 kW of power.

NaaS collaborates with Hyundai to expand EV charging in China

The partnership enables charging services, allowing owners to check charging status via a mobile app or center console.

NaaS-Hyundai
Fisker to provide owners access to Tesla Supercharger Network

Fisker said the move will allow drivers to take advantage of Tesla’s 12,000 Supercharger stations in the U.S. and Canada.

Fisker tesla EV charging
EVgo expands Autocharge+ compatibility to Rivian models

With the addition of Rivian, there are now 30 eligible vehicle models that can be enrolled in Autocharge+.

Rivian-EVgo
Electrify America unveils 75MW Solar Glow 1 project

At peak capacity, the power drawn from the project is equivalent to charging 500 EVs simultaneously.

Electrify_America_Solar_Glow

Other Posts

Identifying and charging BMW’s 12V lithium-ion batteries

A modern luxury vehicle may have 100+ actuator motors and control units, all of which need to be supplied with power.

BMW-M4-M3-Battery-Lithium
Volta launches EV battery copper foil factory in Canada

Volta’s Granby factory will produce eco-friendly copper foil for EV batteries, contributing to sustainable production.

Copper-foil-stock
Cummins, Daimler Trucks, PACCAR plan $2-3B battery JV

The group said LFP battery cells will offer advantages over other battery chemistries, including lower cost and longer life.

Daimler_Truck_Joint_Venture
World record driver shows off what’s possible in an EV

Multiple-time Guinness World Record holder Rainer Zietlow delves into the challenges of long-distance and extreme-temperature EV driving.

Amped-hankook-1400