“New Cobalt-Free Lithium-Ion Battery Reduces Costs Without Sacrificing Performance”

July 20th, 2020

Awake Goy

“New Cobalt-Free Lithium-Ion Battery Reduces Costs Without Sacrificing Performance”

July 19th, 2020

Cobalt is the ugliest part of high performance lithium ion batteries, and the most difficult to eliminate. This research out of University of Texas might be good news.

Via: UT News:

For decades, researchers have looked for ways to eliminate cobalt from the high-energy batteries that power electronic devices, due to its high cost and the human rights ramifications of its mining. But past attempts havenâ€™t lived up to the performance standards of batteries with cobalt.

Researchers from the Cockrell School of Engineering at The University of Texas at Austin say theyâ€™ve cracked the code to a cobalt-free high-energy lithium-ion battery, eliminating the cobalt and opening the door to reducing the costs of producing batteries while boosting performance in some ways. The team reported a new class of cathodes â€” the electrode in a battery where all the cobalt typically resides â€” anchored by high nickel content. The cathode in their study is 89% nickel. Manganese and aluminum make up the other key elements.

More nickel in a battery means it can store more energy. That increased energy density can lead to longer battery life for a phone or greater range for an electric vehicle with each charge.

The findings appeared this month in the journal Advanced Materials. The paper was written by Arumugam Manthiram, a professor in the Walker Department of Mechanical Engineering and director of the Texas Materials Institute, Ph.D. student Steven Lee and Ph.D. graduate Wangda Li.

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