Monday, February 03, 2020

IEEE Spectrum: To Make Solid Electrolytes, Start With a Liquid

To Make Solid Electrolytes, Start With a Liquid
03 Feb 2020 | 20:05 GMT. By Sandy Ong

A solutions-based synthesis can make thin yet strong electrolytes for solid-state batteries

New batteries are often described with comparatives: they’re safer, lighter, or longer-lived than today’s versions. Solid-state batteries—those which contain no liquid—can make two such claims. With inorganic electrolytes, they’re much less likely to catch fire than traditional lithium-ion batteries, which have organic electrolytes. And by swapping out graphite for lithium as the anode, you can get a massive increase (up to 10-fold) in energy density, making solid-state batteries look especially promising for electric vehicles.
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While Liu’s project officially ended on 31 January, the team is now in talks with a different federal funding agency and an industry player to continue their work. The goal is to create a working prototype for a solid-state battery with a two ampere hour (Ah) capacity—similar to the capacity of most smartphone batteries today—at a target cost of below US $100 per kilowatt hour (kWh) within the next two to three years.

Cool new tech. Maybe we'll see these in our phones, tablets and laptop computers in a few years.

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