Monday, March 7th 2022
Game-Changing Material Lets Lithium-ion Batteries Keep Almost Full Charge-Capacity for up to 5 years
A game-changing new material promises to keep your "battery health" meter stuck at a 100% for up to 5 years. Lihium-ion rechargeable batteries that power most of today's digital civilization, come with two limitations—one that they can only be recharged a finite number of times; and two, that their capacity reduces over time. On some smartphones, such as the iPhone, this is reported to end-users as "battery health."
Japan Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (JAIST) discovered a new material called [wait for it] bis-imino-acenaphthenequinone-paraphenylene (BP) co-polymer. This serves as a binder material on the anode (positive electrode). A binder is a substance used to coat an electrode to prevent the material of the electrode from falling apart or getting destroyed by the electrolyte. Li-ion cells use graphite anodes that are delicate, and were being coated by poly-vinylidene fluoride (PVDF), but this material had a durability of 500 recharge cycles at full (rated) capacity, and yielding only 65% of capacity the battery is "capable" of (with bare electrodes). Beyond 500 cycles, the PVDF binder wears, taking the electrode with it, which the capacity. JAIST's research has found its material to be capable of sustaining 1,700 recharge cycles while maintaining the battery's recharge capacity at 95 percent. For a smartphone that gets recharged once a day, that's nearly 5 years of full "battery health." The JAIST paper can be accessed here.
Sources:
EurekaAlert, PC Magazine
Japan Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (JAIST) discovered a new material called [wait for it] bis-imino-acenaphthenequinone-paraphenylene (BP) co-polymer. This serves as a binder material on the anode (positive electrode). A binder is a substance used to coat an electrode to prevent the material of the electrode from falling apart or getting destroyed by the electrolyte. Li-ion cells use graphite anodes that are delicate, and were being coated by poly-vinylidene fluoride (PVDF), but this material had a durability of 500 recharge cycles at full (rated) capacity, and yielding only 65% of capacity the battery is "capable" of (with bare electrodes). Beyond 500 cycles, the PVDF binder wears, taking the electrode with it, which the capacity. JAIST's research has found its material to be capable of sustaining 1,700 recharge cycles while maintaining the battery's recharge capacity at 95 percent. For a smartphone that gets recharged once a day, that's nearly 5 years of full "battery health." The JAIST paper can be accessed here.
32 Comments on Game-Changing Material Lets Lithium-ion Batteries Keep Almost Full Charge-Capacity for up to 5 years
I'm elderly and have lived a very full life to this point. It's heartbreaking to be sitting in the waiting room of the cancer lab at the hospital and see young children in far worse condition than I am. They haven't even begun to live their lives and many likely won't get to. Cures for cancer aren't akin to making electrical devices last longer, they're about eradicating a highly debilitating and often fatal disease. This is very personal to me. My birthday is in three days and potentially could be my last one ever. Never equate human life with man-made devices that are trivial in the giant scope of things. I apologize for the rant to those that are also going through what I am because you already know. I'm not in a very good mood at the moment because my biggest cheerleader in this struggle died suddenly Saturday morning at 73.
Keep well Bobby
There's clearly *A LOT* more to getting battery tech to market than just R&Ding a better battery that's easy and cheap to manufacture.
Precisely because this isn't revolutionary and appears compatible with existing manufacturing, I'm hoping we'll actually see this come to market.
Battery tech is the future of renewable energy and sustainable transport without fossil fuels, but like fusion power, major advances like this are announced frequently and rarely are they in commercially-viable state. I'm still yet to see the magical graphene battery advancements everyone was frothing over in 2018.