The batteries of electric cars are the key to improve autonomy and that the average user ends up taking away that anxiety about being stranded. The brands are already working on the next step for batteries and Porsche has shared its progress and forecasts for its next generation.
The German brand points out the different areas in which it can be improved, which are above all the materials used both to create the anode and the cathode, but also the packaging of the cells.
Professor Maximilian Fichtner, Director of the Helmholtz Institute Ulm (HIU), notes that “in the medium term, we can expect that the combination of the new anode chemistry and the dense packing of the cells will enable a vehicle range of 1,300 kilometres”.
How is this possible? Preserving the good base of current batteries, which have lithium as the main element, but innovating with other materials that can get better performance.
Stefanie Edelberg, Battery Cell Specialist Engineer at Porsche Engineering, explains: “Pure lithium is the ideal active anode material in terms of energy density. However, for safety reasons, graphites are currently mainly used as active anode materials that can absorb lithium ions.”
Falko Schappacher, Commercial and Technical Director of the MEET Battery Research Center of the University of Münster (WWU), adds that their long useful life is another key factor, with a duration of up to 1 million kilometers, since they have “between 1,500 and 3,000 full charge cycles to reach a residual capacity of 80% are not a problem.”
Among the options that exist to improve them is the use of graphite as an active material in the anode, since it has 10 times greater storage capacity and is compatible with very fast charges, enough to go from 5 to 80% of the capacity. from batteries in 15 minutes.
However, there are still problems to deal with, such as the fact that, when absorbing lithium, the silicon particles expand by 300%, something that damages the material and shortens its useful life significantly, a con to consider even though the energy density is much higher.
There is also room for improvement in the materials used in the cathode, since lithium-nickel-cobalt-manganese (NCM) oxide is currently used in a ratio of 6:2:2, but a greater number is expected in the future. presence of nickel and a lesser presence of both cobalt and manganese.
All this will result in “increases of between 30% and 50% in the autonomy of premium vehicles”, points out Schappacher, who also points out that “more important than the simple increase in autonomy is the fast charging capacity”, which it will also improve.
