Category Archives: Thin Film Batteries

October 10, 2011 — BUSINESS WIRE — CCID Consulting released a white paper on China’s lithium-ion (Li-ion) battery industry, as the country seeks to promote new energy technologies for automobiles (electric vehicles) and other needs.

In 2010, China’s lithium ion battery market hit RMB 27.61 billion, an increase of 37.9% compared with 2009. China produced 3.67 billion lithium ion batteries in 2010, an increase of 33.9% compared with 2009. China determined in October 2010 to cultivate new energy technologies to lead the national economy. China’s lithium-ion battery industry will grow rapidly in the country’s Twelfth Five-Year Plan, CCID Consulting reports.

The country will spend RMB100 billion on new-energy vehicles between 2011 and 2020, with lithium-ion batteries at the heart of the sector. Shanghai’s strong automotive industry will capitalize on this focus.

Regional competition will push local governments to develop high-end technologies. The industry is concentrated on the Pearl River Delta, with a production base for raw materials and low-cost labor for assembly of lithium ion batteries. In 2010, the output value of lithium ion battery in this region is RMB 7.48 billion, accounting for about 27% of the nation. However, as the inland increasingly lowers the labor costs, the labor-intensive links such as battery core assembly and PACK will gradually move from coastal areas to inland areas.


Map of China’s Li-ion battery industry.

The Bohai Bay is the material and production base of lithium-ion batteries in China. In 2010, the output values of lithium ion battery for these areas reached RMB 4.56 billion. Beijing has achieved remarkable growth in anode materials for lithium ion batteries. Tianjin will become an essential base for the lithium-ion battery industry in the future.

Main upstream ores of lithium ion battery include lithium carbonate, iron, manganese, cobalt, and nickel. China is rich in lithium, next only to Chile and Argentina. The central and western regions offer rich ore fields producing lithium-ion battery raw materials. Regions with rich lithium ore reserves (Yichun Jiangxi, Ngawa Sichuan, Qinghai, Tibet) have "unrivaled conditions" for Li-ion battery development. CCID Consulting believes that with the rapid development of lithium ion battery industry and the expanding of downstream productivity, resource companies will face increasing pressure of supplying. As demand exceeds supply, upstream mineral resources will be of high investment value. Battery material is the bottleneck of lithium ion batteries industrialization.

With high barrier in threshold of market access, technology and other intelligence factors are the major drivers for the rapid development of high-end material of lithium ion battery such as membrane and lithium hexafluorophosphate. Intelligence-intensive eastern regions represented by Beijing, Jiangsu, and Shanghai, therefore, will maintain their monopoly position in high-end battery material based on their leading technologies. Eastern regions will hold even more power as new-energy automobiles gain prominence.

The output of lithium ion batteries from Japan, China, and South Korea accounts for over 90% of the global output. Before 2000, more than 80% of lithium ion batteries were produced in Japan, but China’s good investment environment and cheaper labor is driving an industry shift. Many Japanese, South Korean and Taiwanese enterprises go to China to build their lithium factories. In 2010, China produced over 30% of the global output, and growing.

The development of battery core assembly depends on capital and scale. With mature production technique and technology, most lithium ion battery manufacturers in China can produce cores of lithium ion batteries, on the condition that the raw material supply is guaranteed. However, the production of motive-power battery involves combination of cores, which requests core consistency, more advanced battery production equipment and more investment as a result. Compared with other upstream battery material industries, this industry is labor-intensive, and many domestic and foreign enterprises have stepped into this field.

And what about recycling? As Li-ion production and consumption increase, scrapped lithium ion batteries will create environment pollution. Cobalt in lithium ion batteries offers huge economic value if recovered. With the development of battery recycling and recovery technology, especially the maturity of microorganism metallurgy in handling lithium ion batteries, cobalt, graphite, electrolyte and other metals contained in lithium ion batteries can be recovered.

CCID Consulting summarizes the distributing characteristics of world Li-ion battery industry and its successful development mode; and analyzed the features of domestic distributing and resources. CCID Consulting examines the trends for future development of China’s lithium ion battery industry and the assorted investment values of lithium ion battery in every links of the chain. This provided important guidance for the layout design of the national and local lithium ion battery industry as well as decision making of enterprises. Obtain the white paper at http://en.ccidconsulting.com.

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October 5, 2011 — Stanford researchers, led by Yi Cui, an associate professor of materials science and engineering, fabricated electrode materials that significantly increase lithium-ion battery energy storage capacity. Sulfer-coated hollow carbon nanofibers, and an electrolyte additive, improved the battery cathode. In previous research (2007), Cui’s group fabricated battery anodes with silicon nanowires. Cui envisions silicon nanowire anodes and sulfur-coated carbon cathodes combined in next-generation batteries.

Sulfur offers "10x higher charge storage capacity," Cui explains, "with about half the voltage of the existing battery. Higher charge capacity and lower voltage results in a lithium-ion battery with 4-5x the energy storage capability of today’s Li-ion products.

Read our Energy Storage Trends blog here.

Prior attempts at incorporating sulfur — which is low cost and nontoxic — have failed to produce commercially viable products. Lithium-sulfur batteries fail quickly when cycling through charging. Sulfer has conventionally coated open carbon structures, exposed to the battery’s electrolyte. Intermediate reaction products, lithium polysulfides, dissolve into the electrolyte solution and reduce energy density.

Cui’s team developed a cathode fabrication that they expect will avoid these issues. "On the one side we don’t want a large surface area contacting the sulfur and the electrolyte," said graduate student Wesley Guangyuan Zheng, "on the other hand we want a large surface area for electrical and ionic conductivities." In this work, sulfur coats the inside of a hollow carbon nanofiber, protected from the outside. This was achieved with a commercially available filer technology.

The nearly closed cathode design prevents polysulfides from significantly leaking out into the electrolyte solution. The length of a hollow nanofiber is about 300x its diameter, containing polysulfides thanks to the long, skinny shape.

Graduate student Yuan Yang then included an electrolyte additive that enhances the battery’s charge and energy efficiency, known as the coulombic efficiency. "Without the additive you put 100 electrons into the battery and you get 85 out. With the additive, you get 99 out," Cui said.

Judy J. Cha of the Stanford Department of Materials Science and Engineering and Seung Sae Hong of the Stanford Department of Applied Physics also contributed to this research.

The results were published online Sept. 14 in the journal Nano Letters: Access "Hollow Carbon Nanofiber-Encapsulated Sulfur Cathodes for High Specific Capacity Rechargeable Lithium Batteries," Nano Letters, Sept. 14, 2011, at http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/nl2027684.

Courtesy of Sarah Jane Keller, science-writing intern at Stanford News Service. Learn more at www.stanford.edu.

September 26, 2011 — Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory scientists designed a tailored polymer that enables increased energy storage in lithium-ion (Li-ion) batteries with silicon anodes, maintaining the increased energy capacity in tests over a year later with many hundreds of charge-discharge cycles.

The tailored polymer conducts electricity and binds closely to lithium-storing silicon particles, which expand to more than 3x their volume during charging and shrink during discharge. The anodes are made from low-cost materials, compatible with standard lithium-battery manufacturing technologies.

Figure 1. At left, the traditional approach to composite anodes using silicon (blue spheres) for higher energy capacity has a polymer binder such as PVDF (light brown) plus added particles of carbon to conduct electricity (dark brown spheres). Silicon swells and shrinks while acquiring and releasing lithium ions, and repeated swelling and shrinking eventually break contacts among the conducting carbon particles. At right, the new Berkeley Lab polymer (purple) is itself conductive and continues to bind tightly to the silicon particles despite repeated swelling and shrinking.

Lithium-ion batteries typically have graphite anodes, expanding modestly when housing the ions between its graphene layers. Silicon can store 10X more, but it swells to more than three times its volume when fully charged, said Gao Liu of Berkeley Lab’s Environmental Energy Technologies Division (EETD), a member of the BATT program (Batteries for Advanced Transportation Technologies) managed by the Lab and supported by DOE’s Office of Vehicle Technologies. This swelling breaks the anode’s electrical contacts. Some companies mix silicon particles into a flexible polymer binder with carbon black for conductivity. The Berkeley Lab researchers decided to use this concept without the carbon materials, which suffer from pump out after repeated charges. 

Figure 2. At top, spectra of a series of polymers obtained with soft x-ray absorption spectroscopy at ALS beamline 8.0.1 show a lower “lowest unoccupied molecular orbital” for the new Berkeley Lab polymer, PFFOMB (red), than other polymers (purple), indicating better potential conductivity. Here the peak on the absorption curve reveals the lower key electronic state. At bottom, simulations disclose the virtually complete, two-stage electron charge transfer when lithium ions bind to the new polymer.

PAN (polyaniline) polymer has positive charges; it starts out as a conductor but quickly loses conductivity. An ideal conducting polymer should readily acquire electrons, rendering it conducting in the anode’s reducing environment.

A polymer with a low value of the “lowest unoccupied molecular orbital,” where electrons can easily reside and move freely best suits the Li-ion battery. Ideally, electrons would be acquired from the lithium atoms during the initial charging process. Liu and his postdoctoral fellow Shidi Xun in EETD designed a series of such polyfluorene-based conducting polymers (PFs).

Wanli Yang of Berkeley Lab’s Advanced Light Source (ALS) used conducting soft x-ray absorption spectroscopy on Liu and Xun’s candidate polymers using ALS beamline 8.0.1 to determine their key electronic properties. Soft x-ray spectroscopy has the power to track where the ions and electrons are and where they move, Yang said.

Compared with the electronic structure of PAN, the absorption spectra Yang obtained for the PFs differed, most notably in PFs incorporating a carbon-oxygen functional group (carbonyl).

Lin-Wang Wang of Berkeley Lab’s Materials Sciences Division (MSD) joined the research collaboration with his postdoctoral fellow, Nenad Vukmirovic, to conduct ab initio calculations of the polymers at the Lab’s National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center (NERSC). They determined precisely how the lithium ions attach to the polymer, and why the added carbonyl functional group improves the process.

The lithium ions interact with the polymer first, and afterward bind to the silicon particles. When a lithium atom binds to the polymer through the carbonyl group, it gives its electron to the polymer — a doping process that significantly improves the polymer’s electrical conductivity, facilitating electron and ion transport to the silicon particles.

Figure 3. Transmission electron microscopy reveals the new conducting polymer’s improved binding properties. At left, silicon particles embedded in the binder are shown before cycling through charges and discharges (closer view at bottom). At right, after 32 charge-discharge cycles, the polymer is still tightly bound to the silicon particles, showing why the energy capacity of the new anodes remains much higher than graphite anodes after more than 650 charge-discharge cycles during testing.

To tune the polymer’s physical properties, Liu added another functional group, producing a polymer that can adhere tightly to the silicon particles as they acquire or lose lithium ions and undergo repeated changes in volume.

Scanning electron microscopy and transmission electron microscopy at the National Center for Electron Microscopy (NCEM), showing the anodes after 32 charge-discharge cycles, confirmed that the modified polymer adhered strongly throughout the battery operation even as the silicon particles repeatedly expanded and contracted. Tests at the ALS and simulations confirmed that the added mechanical properties did not affect the polymer’s superior electrical properties.

"Using commercial silicon particles and without any conductive additive, our composite anode exhibits the best performance so far," says Liu. "The whole manufacturing process is low cost and compatible with established manufacturing technologies. The commercial value of the polymer has already been recognized by major companies, and its possible applications extend beyond silicon anodes."

The research collaboration is now studying other battery components, including cathodes.

The research team reports its findings in Advanced Materials: "Polymers with Tailored Electronic Structure for High Capacity Lithium Battery Electrodes," by Gao Liu, Shidi Xun, Nenad Vukmirovic, Xiangyun Song, Paul Olalde-Velasco, Honghe Zheng, Vince S. Battaglia, Lin-Wang Wang, and Wanli Yang. Access it at http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/adma.201102421/abstract.

Materials research for this work in the BATT program was supported by the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy. The ALS, NCEM, and NERSC are national scientific user facilities supported by DOE’s Office of Science. Visit http://batt.lbl.gov/, http://www-als.lbl.gov/, http://ncem.lbl.gov/, or http://www.nersc.gov/.www.lbl.gov.

Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory addresses the world’s most urgent scientific challenges by advancing sustainable energy, protecting human health, creating new materials, and revealing the origin and fate of the universe. The Office of Science is the single largest supporter of basic research in the physical sciences in the United States, and is working to address some of the most pressing challenges of our time. For more information, please visit http://science.energy.gov.

September 22, 2011 — Carbon nanotubes (CNT) company SouthWest NanoTechnologies Inc. (SWeNT) received an Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) consent order permitting SWeNT to manufacture and distribute multi-wall carbon nanotubes (MWCNT) for commercial applications.

SWeNT’s Multi-Wall products are sold under the SWeNT SMW, Specialty Multi-Wall, trademark.

SWeNT reports that it is now the only US manufacturer permitted to commercially distribute both single and multi-wall carbon nanotubes. Commercial-scale sales allow more product developers to integrate CNTs for cost and performance improvements, from a domestic source, said SWeNT CEO Dave Arthur.

Prior to the EPA decision, SWeNT distributed its SMW products via a low release, low exposure (LOREX) PMN exemption from the EPA.

The EPA granted this consent order under the Toxic Control Substances Act (TSCA), which requires defining each company’s carbon nanotubes as a new chemical substance. The EPA requires manufacturers who intend to distribute commercial quantities to obtain a consent order prior to CNT commercial production or distribution, although small quantities are permitted for research and development from suppliers with a LOREX exemption.  

The consent order states that SWeNT’s SMW CNTs can be used as additives in resins, thermoplastics and elastomers for mechanical reinforcement and enhanced electrical properties. The SWeNT products can also be used commercially for coatings on metallic foils for batteries and for fabric composites manufacturing.

SouthWest NanoTechnologies (SWeNT) is a specialty chemical company that manufactures high-quality single-wall and specialty multi-wall carbon nanotubes, printable inks and CNT-coated fabrics. For more information, please visit www.swentnano.com.

September 14, 2011 – PRWEB — Using a microreactor and control software, Quantum Materials Corporation (QMC) and the Access2Flow Consortium of the Netherlands achieved a continuous flow process to mass produce quantum dots.

With mass production, Quantum Materials Tetrapod Quantum Dots will be available in materials quantities needed for high-volume electronics products, such as solid-state lighting, quantum-dot light emitting diode (QLED) displays, nano-bio apps, etc. This process will also be used for QMC’s subsidiary, Solterra Renewable Technologies, for quantum dot solar cells and solar panels.

The continuous flow process claims yield and conversion improvements over batch quantum dot synthesis. QMC’s goal is 100kg/day production “with a 95% or greater yield,” explained Stephen Squires, founder and CEO of Quantum Materials Corporation. The inherent design of the microreactor allows for commercial-scale parallel modules to achieve large production rates at low cost in a regulated, optimized system. Materials choice for QD production is flexible, enabling work on heavy-metal (cadmium) free quantum dots and other biologically inert materials. Adaptability to other inorganic metals and elements is as important as the scaleability achieved in the process flow, said QMC CTO Dr. Bob Glass.

Also read: E beam litho, etch make identical quantum dots

While quantum dots offer performance improvements for products from LED displays to energy storage systems, lacking high-volume manufacturing methods have limited quantum dot integration into commercial products, say the Quantum Materials representatives. The continuous flow manufacturing process is meant to eliminate the difficulty in manufacturing quantum dots, the lack of quality and uniformity of quantum dots, and the corresponding high cost (average $2500-$6000/gram).

Quantum Materials Corporation uses volume manufacturing methods to establish a growing line of quantum dots. Learn more at http://www.qdotss.com.

Solterra Renewable Technologies Inc develops sustainable and cost-effective solar technology by replacing silicon wafer-based solar cells with Quantum Dot-based solar cells. Solterra is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Quantum Materials, Inc. Go to http://www.solterrasolarcells.com.

Access2Flow is a consortium of FutureChemistry, Flowid and Micronit Microfluidics based in the Netherlands. Access2Flow produces technology for converting small laboratory processes or “beaker batches” to full scale optimized "continuous flow chemistry."

September 13, 2011 – PRNewswire — Energy storage system supplier Ener1 Inc. (NASDAQ:HEV) will restructure its 8.25% Senior Amortizing Notes with Goldman Sachs Asset Management L.P. and other Note holders. Ener1’s primary shareholder, BzinFin S.A., has extended the maturity of its $15-million line of credit from November 2011 to July 2013.

In the Note restructuring, the $58.5 million outstanding principal amount will be divided into two $29.25 million tranches (A and B below). Each will be convertible at the investor’s option into shares of Ener1’s common stock. 

The conversion price for the Tranche A Notes will be fixed at approximately $0.66, or 175% of the 5-day volume-weighted average price (VWAP) of Ener1’s common stock, for the period ending August 30, 2011.

The conversion price for the Tranche B Notes will be fixed at $2.00, subject to a downward adjustment if such Notes are not redeemed by January 31, 2012 to the lower of the conversion price for the Tranche A Notes or the 5-day VWAP of Ener1’s common stock for the period ending January 31, 2012.

Additional terms of the restructuring include:

The amortization payment due on October 1, 2011 will be made in 50% cash and 50% stock. The requirement to maintain a minimum cash balance has been reduced from the $12 million to the lower of $6 million or 15% of the principal amount of Notes outstanding. Note holders will receive an additional 1.4 million in warrants to purchase Ener1 stock at a strike price of $0.3752 per share. The existing warrants held by the note holders will also be reset to this strike price.

The restructured Notes lend Ener1 more “flexibility” in pursuit of business goals, said Charles Gassenheimer, chairman and CEO. More details will be available once the company completes its restatement of financial statements.

Ener1 Inc. is a publicly traded (NASDAQ:HEV) energy storage technology company that develops compact, lithium-ion-powered battery solutions for the utility grid, transportation and industrial electronics markets. For more information, visit Ener1’s website at www.ener1.com.

September 9, 2011 — Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) researchers, led by Hansan Liu, Parans Paranthaman, and Gilbert Brown of the ORNL Chemical Sciences Division, created a titanium dioxide compound material that increases surface area and features a fast charge-discharge capability for lithium ion batteries.

Titanium dioxide’s architecture, mesoporous TiO2-B microspheres, features channels and pores that allow for unimpeded ion flow with a capacitor-like mechanism. This "pseudocapacitive behavior" is triggered by "unique sites and energetics of lithium absorption and diffusion in TiO2-B structure," according to the researchers. The microsphere shape allows for traditional electrode fabrication, creating compact electrode layers.

Also read: Carbon Fiber Electrodes Boost Lithium Ion Batteries

In 6 minutes of charging, the titanium-dioxide fabbed battery reaches 50% capacity. A traditional graphite-based lithium ion battery would be just 10% charged at the same current, according to Liu.

The titanium dioxide boasts 256 milliampere hour per gram capacity, beating commercial lithium titanate material’s 165. Its sloping discharge voltage can control state of charge. The researchers also note that oxide materials are safer than alternatives, with long operating lifecycles.

The titanium dioxide with a bronze polymorph could prove inexpensive as well, according to Liu.

The compound could be used to improve batteries for hybrid electric vehicles (HEVs) and other high-power applications. Stationary energy storage systems, for solar and wind power and smart grids, could also benefit.  

Further research is needed on the complex, multi-step production process for this material. Production would need to be scalable to serve commercial use.

Results were published in Advanced Materials. Access the paper, "Mesoporous TiO2-B Microspheres with Superior Rate Performance for Lithium Ion Batteries," here: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/adma.201100599/abstract. Other authors of the paper are Zhonghe Bi, Xiao-Guang Sun, Raymond Unocic and Sheng Dai.

The research was supported by DOE’s Office of Science, ORNL’s Laboratory Directed Research and Development program, and ORNL’s SHaRE User Facility, which is sponsored by Basic Energy Sciences.

UT-Battelle manages ORNL for The Department of Energy (DOE) Office of Science. Learn more at http://www.ornl.gov/

August 23, 2011 — Rice University researchers created a solid-state, nanotube-based supercapacitors for energy storage, combining aspects of high-energy batteries and fast-charging capacitors with harsh-environment ruggedness.

SEM images. CNT bundles coated with alumina and aluminum-doped zinc oxide in Rice U’s solid-state supercapacitor for energy storage. Credit: Hauge Lab/Rice University.

The supercapacitor uses a solid nanocoating of oxide dielectric material rather than liquid or gel electrolytes. The solid material better withstands extreme heat and cold while performing discharge/recharge functions.

Nanocapacitors. CNT bundles at the center of Rice’s supercapacitors. The electron microscope images at right show the three-layer construction of one of the supercapacitors, which are about 100nm wide. Credit: Hauge Lab/Rice University.

Rice used 15-20nm bundles of single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWCNT) up to 50µm long. Carbon nanotubes were used to give the electrons high surface area, increasing capacitance. Each bundle of nanotubes is a self-contained super capacitor that is 500 times longer than it is wide. A chip could contain hundreds of thousands of bundles.

Transfer scheme. Bundles of vertically aligned SWCNTs to be transferred intact to a conductive substrate. Metallic layers added via atomic layer deposition create a solid-state supercapacitor that can withstand extreme environments. Credit: Hauge Lab/Rice University.

The array was transferred to a copper electrode with thin layers of gold and titanium for adhesion and electrical stability. The nanotube bundles (the primary electrodes) were doped with sulfuric acid to enhance their conductive properties; then they were covered with thin coats of aluminum oxide (the dielectric layer) and aluminum-doped zinc oxide (the counterelectrode) via atomic layer deposition (ALD). A top electrode of silver paint completed the circuit. It creates a metal/insulator/metal structure. Rice asserts that the project is the first of its kind with such a high-aspect-ratio material and ALD fabrication.

Chemist and team leader Robert Hauge devised the energy storage system with an eye on integration into devices from on-chip nanocircuitry to power plant equipment, flexible displays, electric cars, bio-implants, sensors, and other applications, including medical injections.

Results are published in the journal Carbon. Access the article at http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0008622311005549

Team members included former Rice graduate students Cary Pint, first author of the paper and now a researcher at Intel, and Nolan Nicholas, now a researcher at Matric. Co-authors of the Carbon paper include graduate student Zhengzong Sun; James Tour, the T.T. and W.F. Chao Chair in Chemistry as well as a professor of mechanical engineering and materials science and of computer science, and Howard Schmidt, adjunct assistant professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering, all of Rice; Sheng Xu, a former graduate student at Harvard; and Roy Gordon, the Thomas Dudley Cabot Professor of Chemistry at Harvard University, who developed ALD.

The research was supported by T.J. Wainerdi and Quantum Wired, in coordination with the Houston Area Research Council; the Office of Naval Research MURI program; the Wright Patterson Air Force Laboratory and the National Science Foundation.

More Rice U research:

August 10, 2011 – BUSINESS WIRE — Carl Zeiss Nano Technology Systems, CEOS GmbH, and the University of Ulm have completed 2 years of evaluation and are starting the second phase of the Sub Angstrom Low Voltage Electron Microscope (SALVE) project.

SALVE aims to create a transmission electron microscope (TEM) capable of imaging samples with atomic resolution at very low acceleration voltages. Medium-voltage TEMs with accelerating voltages of 200-300kV destroy radiation-sensitive samples prior to image capture and material analysis. Sample preparation methods are also being researched.

The SALVE project’s goal is to overcome the hurdle that lower accelerating voltages lead to significant optical aberrations. Phase 1, 2009-2011, showed that atomic-resolution images could be generated at accelerating voltages below 80kV.

The German Research Foundation (DFG) and the Ministry for Science, Research and Art from the Federal State of Baden-Wuerttemberg (MWK/BW) support the SALVE project Phase 2 with €3.2 million (DFG) and €2.1 million (MWK/BW).

The SALVE TEM technology could be used to study superconductors and semiconductors, as well as lithium-ion batteries (Li-ion), plastics, and biological materials.

Carl Zeiss will work on developing the microscope system; the University of Ulm will develop applications and research sample preparation methods; CEOS will work on an optimized corrector to compensate for the chromatic and the spherical aberration at low voltages.

The Carl Zeiss Group develops optical and opto-electronic products. Carl Zeiss NTS GmbH is the Nano Technology Systems Division of Carl Zeiss, focused on electron microscopy. Learn more at www.smt.zeiss.com/nts.

July 21, 2011 – Marketwire — SolRayo, Enable IPC Corporation (PINKSHEETS:EIPC) subsidiary,  developed an inexpensive and simple nano-based technology to improve lithium batteries, using its Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF) SBIR/STTR Program. The $150k grant, awarded in 2010, enabled SolRayo to create a nanoparticle-based technology to address performance degradation of certain lithium batteries, particularly in high-temperature applications.

The nanoparticle coating approach is "simple and inexpensive," according to SolRayo CEO Dr. Mark Daugherty, benefiting lithium battery cycle life (number of charges and discharges) by a factor of three. The nanoparticle coating inhibits the degradation of battery cathode materials, especially at higher operating temperatures, explained Kevin Leonard, SolRayo CTO.

The NSF approved SolRayo’s final report, clearing the company to submit a Phase II proposal for an additional $500,000 in funding over two years beginning in early 2012. Phase II objective will be commercialization of the technology in military, remote power and transportation applications, said Daugherty, fulfilling the STTR program goal of transfering technologies from lab to marketplace.

Battery makers and battery materials suppliers have checked out the nano coating, and SolRayo has seen "some strong interest in the technology," said David Walker, Enable IPC CEO and SolRayo COO.

STTR is a US government-funded, highly competitive small business program that expands funding opportunities in the federal innovation research and development arena.

Enable IPC provides efficient, streamlined strategies for turning technologies into products and bringing them to market. Learn more at http://www.enableipc.com

Also read: Nanotechnology improves Li-ion battery capacity

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