For electronic devices such as cell phones and laptops, energy storage is key. The more power stored, the better, and the longer the operating time, the better. And for some larger applications, such as batteries in electric vehicles, in addition to the energy density required for the battery, power is equally important. The material must be able to provide power quickly to drive the car and be able to recharge quickly when the power is depleted.
The current problem with electric cars is that they have a limited range! While a fuel car has a range of about 500 km on a full tank of gas, the range of an electric car depends on its "fuel tank" - the battery. See here may be asked, why not to the car installed a large battery?
Does this idea make sense? The answer is that there is some truth, but not all right. It's not that the bigger the battery, the higher the range!
There are two ways to increase the range of an electric car: one is to increase the overall capacity by increasing the number of battery packs, which is the aforementioned "big battery". The disadvantage of this method is that the overall weight of the car will also increase, and the increased battery reduces the internal space of the car, increasing the cost of the car, and also increasing the power consumption. Therefore, we need to consider the relationship between the weight of the battery and the range to find the optimal solution. Taking the fuel car around us as an example, a full tank of fuel can travel about 500-600 km, if the fuel tank is increased, the amount of stored fuel will be improved, but the fuel consumption will also increase accordingly. Another way to increase the range of electric vehicles is to improve the energy density of batteries and develop lighter, higher-capacity batteries. On the other hand, we can improve the range of electric cars by improving the charging speed of batteries, so that cars can be charged faster and more easily.
How to make the "five minutes of charging, 500 miles of range" electric car possible?
The "Made in China 2025" issued by the State Council proposes that the energy density of power battery should reach 300 Wh/Kg in 2020, 400 Wh/Kg in 2025 and 500 Wh/kg in 2030. According to the requirements of "Made in China 2025", combined with the current technology, our scientists have proposed the goal of using high nickel cathode + quasi-solid electrolyte + silicon carbon cathode to achieve 300 Wh/Kg; using lithium-rich cathode + all-solid electrolyte + silicon carbon / lithium metal cathode battery to achieve 400 Wh/Kg in 2025, and using lithium air battery and lithium sulfur battery to achieve 500 Wh/Kg in 2030.
"Five minutes of charging, a range of 500 miles", in the present can not be reached. If this idea is realized, it will undoubtedly shake the dominance of fuel cars. So, is "five minutes of charging, five hundred miles of range" really within reach?
Want to achieve this goal, the battery charge and discharge speed has a very high demand. The main reason for this is the speed of lithium removal and embedding of the positive and negative lithium storage materials and the stability of the structure in the rapid charging and discharging process. High-speed charging tends to heat up the battery, damage the structure, and reduce the life of the battery. This in turn puts demands on the stability and safety of the battery.
Although hydrogen fuel cell concept cars have been reported in recent years, hydrogen fuel cell cars need to solve a series of complex problems such as hydrogen production, hydrogen storage, fuel cell engine, vehicle structure, safety and so on, which make it difficult to be used commercially. In general, for a long time in the future, electric car batteries will still be dominated by lithium-ion batteries.
To turn "five minutes of charging, 500 miles of range" into reality, the following conditions need to be met: (1) high energy density of the material, that is, more stored electricity. (3) in the lithium ion insertion and removal, the material and lithium reaction to be very rapid. (3) The material is a good conductor of electrons. This will reduce the internal loss of the battery and further enhance the performance of the battery. (4) The material is stable. The material does not change its structure or otherwise decompose during charging and discharging, and the volume of the material does not expand or deform. (5) Low material cost. This determines the price of batteries and electric vehicles. (6) The material is environmentally friendly. No pollution or minimal pollution to the environment, controlled.
If you want to achieve the goal of "five minutes of charging, 500 miles of range", you need to conduct more in-depth research and excavation of the battery process technology and energy storage mechanism. I believe that in the near future, "charging five minutes, range of 500 miles" of electric vehicles will become possible!
