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Would-be electric vehicle (EV) owners waiting for battery-powered cars and trucks that run longer on a single charge won’t have to wait much longer.
California-based Amprius has sold and shipped its first batch of lithium-ion batteries that, it says, stores 73 percent more energy per unit of weight than the batteries in Tesla’s Model 3 EV and take up 37 percent less space.
The secret: Amprius has embedded silicon nanowires into the substrate of the batteries’ lattice-like graphite anode, or negative terminal.
Silicon stores ten times more lithium than graphite, the conventional anode material in lithium-ion cells. However, silicon tends to swell and crack.
Amprius found that silicon in the form of interspersed long and short nanowires solves that problem, giving its batteries a useful life about as long as conventional lithium-ion cells—while weighing less and storing more energy, both factors that improve vehicles’ range.
Amprius isn’t the only one claiming bragging rights on battery breakthroughs extending EV range.
Mercedes says its Vision EQXX all-electric concept car uses a battery pack half the size and 30 percent lighter than in its EQS production car. As a result, the car will travel more than 600 miles, or about 1,000 km, on a charge.
A battery two-pack created by Michigan-based Our Next Energy drove a Tesla S 752 miles on one charge, Reuters reported. The test ran continuously for 14 hours in mid-December at an average speed of 55 miles an hour.
In addition to a conventional lithium-iron-phosphate battery, ONE adds a back-up “range extender” cell that can be called on when a vehicle needs extra power. That leaves more energy in the regular battery that runs the car under normal conditions.
TREND FORECAST: Battery technologies are improving to the extent that, before this decade is over, EVs will be able to travel almost twice as far on a charge as the typical gasoline car can go on a full tank.
Automakers, electric utilities, and independent companies already are at work building out a growing national network of charging stations, also ensuring that by the end of this decade no driver paying attention to a fuel gauge needs to fear being stranded between chargers.
It is not range anxiety or a lack of demand that will hamper the widespread adoption of EVs. The key drawback in the near to medium term will remain a lack of key minerals at affordable prices needed to make batteries and electric motors.