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Scientists Deliver a Longer-Lasting Lithium-Oxygen Battery (technologyreview.com)
Packing more energy into batteries is the key to delivering electric cars with longer range, smartphones that can last days -- and cheaper electronic products all around. Lithium-oxygen batteries represent one of the more promising paths toward that end. From a report: They could boost energy density by an order of magnitude above conventional lithium-ion batteries -- in theory, at least. In a paper published this week in Science journal, researchers at the University of Waterloo identified ways of addressing some of the major hurdles to converting that potential into commercial reality.
A critical problem has been that as a lithium-oxygen battery discharges, oxygen is converted into superoxide and then lithium peroxide, reactive compounds that corrode the battery's components over time. That, in turn, limits its recharging ability -- and any real-world utility. To get around the problem, researchers switched from a carbon cathode to one made of nickel oxide and supported by a stainless steel mesh. They also used molten salt for the electrolyte -- the part of the battery that allows positively charged ions to move between the electrodes -- and raised the battery's operating temperature to 150C. Those steps made it possible to achieve about three times the number of charging cycles as earlier lithium-oxygen efforts. The researchers also managed to increase the energy per unit of mass by more than 50 percent.
A critical problem has been that as a lithium-oxygen battery discharges, oxygen is converted into superoxide and then lithium peroxide, reactive compounds that corrode the battery's components over time. That, in turn, limits its recharging ability -- and any real-world utility. To get around the problem, researchers switched from a carbon cathode to one made of nickel oxide and supported by a stainless steel mesh. They also used molten salt for the electrolyte -- the part of the battery that allows positively charged ions to move between the electrodes -- and raised the battery's operating temperature to 150C. Those steps made it possible to achieve about three times the number of charging cycles as earlier lithium-oxygen efforts. The researchers also managed to increase the energy per unit of mass by more than 50 percent.
You can now also heat your house with it while discharging!
I have this sneaking suspicious that news about battery improvements is a circle of different press releases, such that they re-publish the same article every five years or so before moving further around the circle.
The whole stainless steel mesh thing sounds just familiar enough I'm pretty sure they gave the game away.
Oh battery scientists, you are so clever! They are probably all laughing at us from a tropical shore, drinks in hand and diesel generators happily powering a boombox.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Existing EV's can be fast charged to nearly completely charged in about a half hour.... would that mean that even overnight charging would have to be "fast"?
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
Because with a 150C battery in it, you don't dare pick it up to use it.
It's another basic science press release! A molten salt battery, Yet somehow it runs at 150C, so salt doesn't mean NaCl, which melts at 801 degrees centegrade. And it's corrosive and eats itself. OK, lead-acid batteries are too, but there's some significant technology to get past, and this is still just a research project. Also, I'm wondering what heating up the whole battery to 150 C to start your car will look like, and what sort of battery you will need to do that. Obviously not the same battery.
Wake me up when I can buy one off the shelf, OK?
Bruce Perens.
We've found that batteries made for the Chinese internal market frequently have a lower capacity than those made for the Korean and US markets. Has to do with how they're made. Be aware of this.
That said, also be aware of the operating ranges and any physical defects.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
I know science is hard, but it's astounding how many "new and improved battery" stories that we see, and how few of them end up being useful.
it would be really interesting to do some statistics and see how many of these things have actually resulted in improvements to batteries that you can actually buy.
my guess is that he number is really low, maybe even 0.
it's kind of a amazing.
Absolute statements are never true
... when you are not allowed to use asbestos for your glowing phone at 150C?
I don't need a signature to draw attention to myself.
Its always 10-15 years away...
Going by other lithium cells, batteries charging currents are generally a function of the capacity of the battery which means that fast charging time generally remains constant. So, if a battery has 10x the capacity of a base battery, the charging current will be on the order of 10x with the overall charging time being the same.
Of course, the circuitry for handling 10x the current is going to be significantly different than the base battery.
Mimetics Inc. Twitter
Who would want to drive around in a car with some 150C block under the hood?
Where all think alike, no one thinks very much.
No, I think he's actually right this time. Within the last few years I remember hearing separately about both the "lithium-oxygen" thing and the "[something unexpected] mesh cathode" thing. Long enough ago in both cases that it's suspicious this is being reported on again as though it's brand new now. Who knows though, maybe they did really have another breakthrough in feasibility? I didn't read the article.
I'm assuming that's sarcasm, but just in case it's not -- internal combustion engines run about equally hot.
How is the Riemann zeta function like Trump rallies? Both have an endless number of trivial zeros.
My favorite in-pants thing!
Right. Because hot-grits batteries are just not panning out the way we all hoped.
[Why do I suddenly think of "Natalie Portman" and "discharge"? :-/]
If it weren't for deadlines, nothing would be late.
Wake me when the title says:
delivers ...
Narcocide observed:
You can now also heat your house with it while discharging!
If your house is a materials lab, that is.
The headline is (surprise!) profoundly - and purposefully - misleading. These researchers delivered nothing more than a benchtop demonstration. In other words, a glorified science fair project.
Perhaps it's just me, but to use the word "deliver" accurately to describe what these folks have built, it would have to be, at a minimum, a working commercial prototype, designed for mass manufacture. The demo here is a long damned way from that ...
Check out my novel.
Can't read the paper and the abstract is ambiguous so it seems like the paper is about a 'way ahead' as opposed to an actual device prototype. It seemed like the paper + article were a way to profile the research in order to get funding to actually build something ... a long long way (as one of the researchers says herself) from actually having a product or even it seems an experimental prototype.
"Consensus" in science is _always_ a political construct.