Lithium Batteries are SOOO yesterday

[gjorgensen]

To bring this thread back to the original topic.... A quick read of their website shows that these batteries are, in fact, lithium-ion batteries. Their own animation indicates positive and negative lithium-ions as the active material in the electrolyte. The only real difference between these and current Li-ion batteries is that they're using carbon for the anode and cathode vs. copper and aluminum as used in current batteries. That lowers the ESR which is what allows such rapid charging without overheating. My guess is that it'll also make the battery quite a bit stronger and more crush resistant. And of course they should be cheaper if/when they go to mass volume because of the cheaper metals. But unless I'm misreading this, the Li-ion electrolyte is the same, meaning the bulk of the cost will be the same as current Li-ion batteries unless the volume of electrolyte is significantly different.

[matureee]

These new batteries do not use positive and negative (no such thing) Li ions. They use Li+ and an unspecified negative ion these are pulled from an electrolyte onto the carbon cathode and anode. This is more capacitor behaviour than battery and this is what gives the battery its characteristics.

The anode and cathode in a LiFePO4 cell are graphite and FePO4 the copper and aluminium back plates are used as highly conductive substrates for the real electrode materials.

Originally Posted by gjorgensen

To bring this thread back to the original topic.... A quick read of their website shows that these batteries are, in fact, lithium-ion batteries. Their own animation indicates positive and negative lithium-ions as the active material in the electrolyte. The only real difference between these and current Li-ion batteries is that they're using carbon for the anode and cathode vs. copper and aluminum as used in current batteries. That lowers the ESR which is what allows such rapid charging without overheating. My guess is that it'll also make the battery quite a bit stronger and more crush resistant. And of course they should be cheaper if/when they go to mass volume because of the cheaper metals. But unless I'm misreading this, the Li-ion electrolyte is the same, meaning the bulk of the cost will be the same as current Li-ion batteries unless the volume of electrolyte is significantly different.