lithium-ion

The energy storage system will include two large-scale lithium-ion battery packs to store energy generated by wind power from an 800kW wind turbine.

The harnessed energy will be fed back to the electrical grid to be used during peak times of energy consumption, with the battery being recharged during off-peak periods.

Saft has demonstrated that this base system achieves a maximum ramp rate of 10% per minute of the rated power output of the 800kW wind turbine while also providing up to 400kWh of peak shaving capability. The flexibility and scalability of Saft's solution also allows the energy content to be increased in 124kWh increments up to 992kWh if additional peak shaving capability is desired.

This is the first project of its kind that Saft is involved in in North America.

A123 Systems has filed for bankruptcy following a turbulent year. The Massachusetts-based lithium-ion battery manufacturer that employs 2 500 has been struggling to keep its head above water following disappointing sales of electric vehicles and a costly recall back in March 2012.

Johnson Controls Incorporated will buy the automotive business assets from A123 in a deal worth US$125 million. This will provide the finance for the company during bankruptcy. The factory in Michigan is to remain open for the time being.

This latest news puts halt to the discussions for a rescue buy-out by Wanxiang Group Corporation in August. The US$465 million deal would have meant the Chinese corporation held an 80% share in A123 and four of the nine board seats. However certain conditions, including A123's liquidity falling below operational levels, were not met so only $22.5 million of the loan amount has been funded. These complications prompted the deal with Johnson Controls. The talks had sparked political debate because A123 had received a substantial amount of public funding from the Obama administration to boost the advanced battery industry in the USA and there was unrest about the company then falling to non-American ownership.  

A123 Systems has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection on 16 October 2012 due to its mounting financial problems. There will be a bankruptcy auction for assets. Johnson Controls has provided A123 with US$72.5 million in debtor-in-possession financing to fund the bankruptcy case.

The Michigan-based battery maker has suffered because the EV market has failed to take off as quickly as hoped, only accounting for 3% of US car sales last year. For the first half of 2012 it reported losses of US$ 208 million, this vulnerable position led to the talks with Wanxiang Corp.

The mounting financial problems came despite a cash injection of US$249 million in the form of federal grants from the Obama administration in 2009. 

The bankruptcy will add fuel to the US presidential debate as another example of an unsuccessful ‘green’ investment by the Obama administration. Following EnerDel, A123 is the second of the 30 battery and electric drive companies that received government funding to go bankrupt. Excess of US$1.2 billion has been provided for battery makers, including A123 and Johnson Controls, over the past three years to boost the hybrid and electric vehicle market. Of the money A123 received in federal grants, US$132 million has been spent on building a factory in Michigan.

A123 has suffered losses of US$857 million since the company began and was at risk of being delisted from the stock market because of consistently low stock value.

Battery manufacturers Accutronics, based in Birmingham UK, have been awarded a Knowledge Transfer Partnership award for a joint project with Birmingham’s Aston University Business School.

Accutronics, who design, develop and manufacturer nickel metal hydride and lithium-ion batteries, joined with Aston for the two-year project to demonstrate how academic advancements could be used as a practical business tool.

Prabhjit Singh Chugh of Aston University spent time at Accutronics on the team where he was able to develop a new approach to managing operational improvements in a very customer driven way.  Martin May of Aston University described Prabhjit’s role as to “present a project in partnership with the host business to attract government funding.  The university provides some supervision and mentorship, as, of course, does Accutronics.”

The KTP project aims to build and strengthen relationships between academic establishments, businesses and the community.

Gareth Hancox, KTP project supervisor said: “This project was aimed at developing and implementing an operational strategy, which, together with all necessary processes and facilities would assist to support and grow the increasingly complex product range within Accutronics.”  He hopes it will continue to improve Accutronics reputation and enable the company to meet the challenges of performance requirements.

Key achievements in the first year of the project have included the definition of operations performance targets for existing and new markets and the identification of over one hundred improvement actions in the business process.

Advances made in lithium-air battery technology by researchers at the University of St Andrews, Fife, Scotland, could provide ten times more energy density per mass unit than conventional lithium-ion batteries.

Battery chemist Peter Bruce believes the driving range of EV’s can be pushed beyond the 300 mile driving range with the lithium air technology which he believes has the potential to provide a transformational shift in transport.

If successful, lithium-air batteries could decrease the weight of the battery pack because they use oxygen to charge the electrodes. The design would be of a similar design to zinc-air batteries used in hearing aids.

A previous stumbling block to using lithium-air cells has been the unstable chemical reaction causing the battery to fail after a couple of cycles.  This may be overcome with the work done at St Andrews where they were able to run a lithium-air lab cell for 100 charge-discharge cycles.

Clearly there is a long way to go before this could be a commercially practical option, but this step is part of a giant leap in the future of battery technology.

The ‘second life’ potential of batteries is a hot topic at the moment with the rise in EVs meaning more lithium-ion batteries will be in circulation, including the Nissan Leaf being mass-produced in the UK from 2013.  ABB and Zero Carbon Futures are both researching the potential utilisation of ‘used’ batteries.  When the batteries come out of the cars they would still have around 80% capacity, this would reduce the range of the car but still be sufficient to be put to another application.  Zero Carbon Futures, working alongside Nissan, are researching the energy storage potential of the used batteries for home energy management systems.