Discover how a revolutionary battery design could increase electric vehicle efficiency and ensure greater safety and longevity.
A team of researchers has developed a new kind of gel electrolyte that could increase electric vehicle battery ranges by 2.8 times. Developed by researchers from the Ulsan National Institute of Science and Technology , this development could also dramatically improve EV battery safety and longevity.
At present, to get more range, EV makers are pushing lithium-ion batteries to higher voltages . In theory, the higher the voltage, the more energy that can be stored.But there’s a catch: at high voltage, the nickel-rich cathode becomes unstable. It starts releasing surface oxygen, which then turns into reactive oxygen species . This is a highly reactive molecule that can break down the electrolyte.They can also damage the cathode structure. dissolve nickel, and result in gas formation, which can swell the battery, resulting in increased risk of battery failure. ROS can also rapidly shorten battery life.To this end, you can think of ROS as “battery rust on overdrive.” To overcome this, the UNIST team developed a gel-like electrolyte based on anthracene and nitrile-containing polymer chains. Gel electrolyte could revolutionize EV batteriesThe material, called An-PVA-CN gel polymer electrolyte , can attack the oxygen problem at the source, rather than dealing with the damage afterward. But how does it work?Well, the anthracene acts like an oxygen “bodyguard” and performs two defensive jobs. The first is that it binds to unstable surface oxygen on the cathode, preventing it from escaping and turning into ROS.This stops ROS formation before it begins. The second sees it scavenge any ROS that already exist, neutralizing them before they can attack the electrolyte. This is the “dual protection” mechanism mentioned.Nickel in high-Ni cathodes tends to dissolve and deform under high voltage. To combat this, the nitrile groups bind to nickel, preventing dissolution and helping maintain structural integrity.This reduces cracking, degradation, and capacity fade. According to the team, this breakthrough has been shown to extend battery life by almost 3 times. The new electrolyte has also been shown to maintain 81% capacity after 500 cycles at 4.55. They also found that generated gases dropped sharply, with only ~13 µm swelling observed with the gel electrolyte. That compares to around ~85 µm swelling for regular electrolyte EV batteries. Many improvements over conventional batteriesThat’s a 6 times reduction in gas generation. This new electrolyte proves that controlling oxygen chemistry via electrolyte design can support higher-voltage EV packs while also producing safer long-range batteries.It could also result in longer cycle life, lighter battery systems , and large-scale grid storage systems that avoid frequent replacements.In short, it’s a shift from modifying the cathode to engineering the electrolyte as the gatekeeper of oxygen stability.“This study demonstrates that oxygen reactions in high-voltage batteries can be controlled at the electrolyte design stage. This principle could be applied to develop lightweight LIBs for aerospace applications and large-scale energy storage systems,” Professor Hyun-Kon Song from UNIST explained.The study is available in the journal Advanced Energy Materials.
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