{"id":62366,"date":"2020-12-31T03:00:02","date_gmt":"2020-12-31T08:00:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/?p=62366"},"modified":"2020-12-30T11:36:43","modified_gmt":"2020-12-30T16:36:43","slug":"the-limiting-factor-that-holds-back-the-green-dream-of-electric-cars-everywhere","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/2020\/12\/31\/the-limiting-factor-that-holds-back-the-green-dream-of-electric-cars-everywhere\/","title":{"rendered":"The limiting factor that holds back the green dream of electric cars everywhere"},"content":{"rendered":"

I’m not actually against the spread of electric vehicles — where appropriate — but we’re a long way technically speaking from an all-electric future on the roads. Alongside the vast increase in our electric generation and distribution infrastructure such a change would require, there’s also the practical limitation of what is currently possible in battery technology, and hoped-for improvements will require significant breakthroughs which seem more than just a step beyond our current capabilities<\/a>:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Nissan Leaf electric vehicle charging.
Photo by Nissan UK<\/p><\/div>\n

“There are liars, damned liars, and battery guys” \u2013 or some variation thereof \u2013 is an aphorism commonly attributed to US electro-whizz Thomas Edison.<\/p>\n

Edison’s anecdotal frustrations remain valid today because scarcely a month goes by without a promised battery revolution, and scarcely a month goes by without that revolution arriving.<\/p>\n

In October, for example, The Register<\/em> encountered Jagdeep Singh, CEO of QuantumScape, a battery startup that boasted a new type of battery that could double the range of electric vehicles, charge in 15 minutes, and is safer than the lithium-ion that dominates the rechargeable market.<\/p>\n

“Ten years ago, we embarked on an ambitious goal that most thought was impossible,” Singh said in a canned statement. “Through tireless work, we have developed a new battery technology that is unlike anything else in the world.”<\/p>\n

Singh might disprove Edison’s aphorism and deliver the better batteries the world will so clearly appreciate. But to do so he’ll have to buck a 30-year trend that has seen lithium-ion reign supreme.<\/p>\n

Why has the industry stalled? The short answer is that chemistry hasn’t found a way to build a better battery.<\/p>\n

“The basic concept of what a battery is hasn’t shifted since the 18th century,” says Professor Thomas Maschmeyer, a chemist at the University of Sydney and founding chairman of Gelion Technology, a battery developer. All batteries, Maschmeyer explains, consist of three main building blocks: a positive electrode, called a cathode; a negative electrode, called an anode; and an electrolyte that acts as a catalyst between the two sides. “These three elements cannot change. So, if you want a breakthrough, it must come from a fundamental change in the chemistry,” Maschmeyer says.<\/p>\n

Better living through chemistry<\/strong>
\nBattery boffins have proposed a periodic table’s worth of alternative compounds that could surpass lithium-ion batteries.<\/p>\n

These largely fall into two categories. First, batteries that are trying to surpass the energy densities that lithium offers, such as solid-state batteries, lithium-sulphur, and lithium-air. The other is batteries comprised of more abundant materials such as sodium-ion batteries, aluminium-ion, and magnesium-ion batteries.<\/p>\n

But changing the chemistry of batteries is easier said than done, says Professor Jacek Jasieniak, a professor of material sciences and engineering at Monash University. He compares changing one element in a battery to changing a chemical in a pharmaceutical. “Often solving one problem exacerbates another,” he says.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I’m not actually against the spread of electric vehicles — where appropriate — but we’re a long way technically speaking from an all-electric future on the roads. Alongside the vast increase in our electric generation and distribution infrastructure such a change would require, there’s also the practical limitation of what is currently possible in battery […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":35193,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[25,15],"tags":[111,872,497,513],"class_list":["post-62366","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-economics","category-technology","tag-cars","tag-chemistry","tag-electricity","tag-research"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/favicon.png","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2hpV6-gdU","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62366","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=62366"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62366\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":62368,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62366\/revisions\/62368"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/35193"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=62366"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=62366"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=62366"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}