One Simple Trick To Cut The Cost Of An EV Battery – CleanTechnica

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The cost of an EV battery has been sailing rapidly along a downward path, and energy storage innovators are determined to keep up the good work. In the latest development, the UK firm Zircotec is introducing a high-tech coating that can free up the EV battery supply chain from expensive, heavyweight materials in favor of less expensive alternatives.

The EV Battery Coating Solution

Zircotec is taking aim at the heavy (and expensive) steel casing commonly deployed to enclose EV battery packs. In addition to cutting costs, the company anticipates that its new approach will also improve the efficiency of the cooling plates that help prevent thermal runaway — aka fires and explosions — in lithium-ion batteries. “Significant improvements in cooling plate efficiency can be achieved through thin, high-performance electrical insulation with enhanced thermal conductivity,” the company explains.

By high-performance electrical insulation they mean a ceramic-based coating, designed to enable automakers to use relatively inexpensive and lightweight alternative battery casing and cooling plate materials, such as aluminum and polymer composites.

Also, by ceramic they don’t mean your local pottery class. High tech ceramic materials are front and center in the emerging solid-state battery trend as well as other areas of decarbonization-centered technology.

Zircotec already has a wide headstart on ceramic-based technology through its suite of ElectroHold® products, which it currently deploys in the rarified world of F1 auto racing, among other motorsports that rely on sophisticated thermal management systems. In addition to cooling, Zircotec notes that its coatings improve the accuracy of electrical systems, reducing the chances of a malfunction.

“These existing products are lightweight, can be easily packaged into existing automotive design infrastructures, protect against water ingress, corrosion and chemical attack, and provide the highest performance and adherence levels during normal operating conditions,” Zircotec enthuses.

So, What’s Holding Up The Low Cost EV Battery Pack Of The Future?

Regardless of its long experience with ceramic thermal coatings in demanding environments, Zircotec had to go back to the drawing board to come up with a new, market-ready iteration of ElectroHold coatings to address the street-legal electric vehicle market. The company has just launched a new twelve-month R&D cycle under the newly launched UK Ceramics for BEVs project, aimed at deploying ceramic technology to reduce the cost of an EV battery.

CeraBEV is a new program under the umbrella of the UK Advanced Propulsion Centre. With Zircotec as lead partner for product development, Cranfield University has also been enlisted for the testing and evaluation end of things.

As described by Zircotec Engineering Director Dominic Graham, the aim is to produce “world-first, all-in-one” coatings that enable automotive stakeholders to produce lighter, more efficient vehicles with lighter materials.

Lighter Materials For Electric Vehicles

Reducing the weight and cost of EV battery packs is just one step along the pathway to the next generation of higher-performing but not necessarily higher-costing electric vehicles. “By using lightweight structural materials, cars can carry additional advanced emission control systems, safety devices, and integrated electronic systems without increasing the overall weight of the vehicle,” explains the US Department of Energy.

“While any vehicle can use lightweight materials, they are especially important for hybrid electric, plug-in hybrid electric, and electric vehicles,” the Energy Department adds. “Using lightweight materials in these vehicles can offset the weight of power systems such as batteries and electric motors, improving the efficiency and increasing their all-electric range.”

“Alternatively, the use of lightweight materials could result in needing a smaller and lower cost battery while keeping the all-electric range of plug-in vehicles constant,” they throw in for good measure.

That’s not quite as simple as it sounds. Lightweight materials suitable for the auto industry also tend to be expensive, and pushing up the cost of electric vehicles is not a particularly sensible way to attract more auto buyers.

Still, the Energy Department’s Office Vehicle Technologies Office has set a short term goal of deploying new high-strength steel, aluminum, or glass fiber-reinforced polymer composites to reduce average vehicle weight at by least 10%, and more ambitiously up to 60%.

“In the longer term, advanced materials such as magnesium and carbon fiber reinforced composites could reduce the weight of some components by 50-75 percent,” the Vehicle Technologies Office adds, while emphasizing that cutting the cost of lightweight materials is a concurrent goal.

Next Steps For The Lightweight EV Battery Of The Future

Aside from the potential for using lightweight materials in EV battery pack casing, the EV battery itself is overdue for a lightweight makeover.

With that in mind, let’s take a look at a newly published study from a research team at Chalmers University. Under the title, “Unveiling the Multifunctional Carbon Fibre Structural Battery“ in the journal Advanced Materials, the team describes a new lightweight carbon fiber battery that could increase EV driving range by up to 70%.

The new study builds on a breakthrough back in 2018, in which the team demonstrated its new approach to battery design. “The news that carbon fibre can function as electrodes in lithium-ion batteries was widely spread and the achievement was ranked as one of the year’s ten biggest breakthroughs by the prestigious Physics World,” Chalmers University notes.

If you’re wondering what all the excitement was about, that has to do with the field of structural EV batteries. The Chalmers research is part of a movement aimed at developing an EV battery that can perform structural or load-bearing duties as well as storing a charge, with the potential for exercising downward pressure on the overall weight and cost of a vehicle.

The carbon fiber electrode material also performs multiple functions within the EV battery, further pushing the lightweight envelope. “In the anode it acts as a reinforcement, as well as an electrical collector and active material,” Chalmers University notes.

“In the cathode it acts as a reinforcement, current collector, and as a scaffolding for the lithium to build on,” the school adds.

As an extra sustainability bonus, the carbon fiber replaces current collectors that would otherwise be made of heavier materials like copper or aluminum. Carbon fiber also replaces cobalt and manganese, two commonly used EV battery materials that auto makers would rather avoid due to some sticky supply chain issues.

Since the big breakthrough in 2018, the Chalmers research team has been working on a number of performance tweaks leading to commercialization, so stay tuned for more on that.

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Image (cropped): The UK firm Zircotec is adapting a high tech ceramic coating to reduce the weight and cost of an EV battery pack, leveraging its experience in Formula One racing and other motorsports (courtesy of Zircotec).