The Influence of Batteries on the growth of the Electric Vehicle industry World Energy Congress 2010 Montreal Dr. Donald Pihsiang Wu - 1 -
Subjects: I. Charging speed and driving range II. The importance of the battery for Electric Vehicles III. Battery Durability IV. Extremely safe battery module design V. Electro-Mechanical combination know-how VI. Cost VII. Charging Infrastructure - 2 -
As you may already know, about half of the global CO 2 released into the atmosphere is generated by personal automobiles. In developing countries that number is about 2/3. The internal combustion engine automobile has been commercialized for over a century while the modern electric vehicle is starting again this century from ground zero after manufacturers dabbled in it for over 10 years. Why? Because of the need to reduce global warming gases such as CO 2, electrifying the personal automobile has become an urgent priority for many developed and developing nations. The heart of the electric vehicle is the battery. The battery is of paramount importance to the development of the electric vehicle. Now let us discuss the impact of the battery on the development of the electric vehicle. Besides cost concerns, the most important factors to the consumers are charging time and driving range. The typical consumer has already been trained to demand charging time as compared with refueling today's automobiles. Consumers begin losing interest in electric vehicles when charging times are too long; so the quicker the charging time the better. And while we are at it, consumers would be delighted to have driving range between charges just as far or even farther than gasoline powered vehicles. On top of that the faster the better. No one has considered the initial joy upon the successful invention of the automobile over a century ago!!!!!! The continual development of the automobile has already spanned over a century, however, commercialization of the electric vehicle has not been formally introduced. It will come soon enough. Because of the successful development of the C-LiFePO 4 /LTO battery, the electric vehicle commercialization will be soon. However, just like a newborn baby, we cannot ask too much of it in the beginning. The speed of charging is a definite factor in the quick adoption of EVs. Once the EV commercially enters the market it will soon become an important factor of our daily lives. The EV will only need a few years to reach the target transportation device as imagined by consumers today. So what we need today is an EV that charges fast under 10 minutes with simple accessories and without too many complicated capabilities. Like a baby that has to learn to crawl, walk then run, don t ask too much of the EV in the initial stages. Too many demands in the initial stages will cause the EV market to fail prematurely ignoring the importance of the EV market. An overly simplistic viewpoint is to remove the internal combustion engine and put in a battery, any type of battery, and call it an EV. Battery Next I would like to discuss the importance of the battery to the development of the EV market. The motive batteries available today are lead acid batteries, fuel cells and lithium batteries, etc. Lead acid batteries possess high toxicity, are environmentally damaging, have a short life cycle and are heavy. Fuel cells still require further refinements to become commercially viable. Hybrid vehicles still require fossil fuels that contribute to global warming. Today we are here to talk about - 3 -
Lithium Batteries. Within the lithium family of batteries there is the familiar lithium cobalt battery, the lithium manganese battery, and the 3-elements, etc. The success and failure of the electric vehicle hinges on the battery. With the electric vehicle being in development for over 10 years without commercial success, the problem lies in the battery. The battery alone determines the commercial survivability of the EV. The selection of battery material and the quality of the battery material determines the kind of life the battery will have. The selection of the cathode material determines the position of the battery in the order of batteries. So the type of lithium battery selected will determine the success or failure of the EV. Cobalt is prone to explosion. Manganese and the 3-elements start degrading once they have been exposed to extreme temperatures, is less stable and is dangerous to operate in an EV environment. The cycle life for both Manganese and 3-elements are not very long, so the correct selection is Carbon Coated Lithium Iron Phosphate. Battery Durability PHET and The Pihsiang Group in developing the EV has researched tested and analyzed all of the aforementioned batteries. After careful analysis of Lithium Cobalt, Manganese, 3-elements and etc. for durability, high and low temperature tolerance, all of them cannot meet the characteristics desirable for automotive needs without additional cumbersome gadgets. So the final choice is carbon-coated lithium iron phosphate (C-LiFePO 4 ). I will now emphasize the safety, non-toxic, long cycle life winning characteristics of C-LiFePO 4 /LTO battery. In 2005 PHET was the first global mass producer of C-LiFePO 4 battery company. While in the process of mass-producing C-LiFePO 4 cells, The Pihsiang Group has applied the same cells for EV development. In this process PHET has accumulated a wealth of experience in Lithium Iron Phosphate battery manufacturing and usage technology. There are over 30 vehicles being driven and tested world-wide today. Each vehicle has logged from 10,000 to over 60,000 kilometers in real-world actual driving conditions as well as in laboratory test conditions. So we are testing the EVs in real-world and lab equipment monitored conditions in parallel. This differentiates us in that most battery companies only test their batteries inside laboratories and limited road tests. For battery companies that announce their batteries are good for a couple of thousands of cycles or for many years of usage based only on laboratory tests or limited road tests are just irresponsible. PHET batteries usage on EVs is based on actual road tests at high temperature as well as low temperatures on the actual road. Only the C-LiFePO 4 batteries have survived these road tests. Although the current comparative capacity is slightly lower, the dimensional demands a little higher and having slightly heavier weight than other lithium batteries, but the C-LiFePO 4 battery is a MUST. It is because intrinsic safety is of the utmost importance, durability, high and low temperature tolerance, long cycle life and non-toxicity makes C-LiFePO 4 the undeniable clear choice for EVs. - 4 -
Extremely safe modular battery pack such as the fault-tolerant DOSBAS safety system is based on individually fused 18650 battery cells connected in parallel to form a basic module. From the basic module further parallel and/or serial connections are made between the basic modules to form the desired capacity and voltage. Using this philosophy to construct a battery pack the most challenging issues to battery packs are solved: internal shorts are self-container, external shorts whether electrical in nature or mechanical in nature are self-contained, impedance variations between cells are minimized, future brand new battery cell replacements are tolerated by the aged battery pack with different impedance cells. The DOSBAS safety system battery pack has been proven to be successfully applied to the EV and all other applications. The DOSBAS safety system was accepted by the scientific panel at the EVS 24 Symposium as an important contribution for EV safety. After testing a vehicle collision between a DOSBAS safety system protected EV and a gasoline powered vehicle or another EV, the DOSBAS safety system protected EV proves itself to be reliable and safe. So for a EV to be commercially successful, besides requiring battery durability and high-low temperature tolerance, the most important trait is safety. Without safety nothing else matters. Whole vehicle reliability EV relies on the harmonious balance of electro-mechanical technology. The typical car manufacturer doesn t possess battery know-how; the typical battery manufacturer doesn t possess car manufacturing know-how. Even those who know both don t have the know-how to put everything together. The Internal Combustion Engine (ICE) vehicle is based solely on mechanics. Consumers gauge the ICE vehicle on speed, fuel economy and the ease with which the vehicle can be easily diagnosed and repaired when there is fault. EVs on the other hand, will either drive or not drive when desired. There is no in-between when it comes to EVs. It s either on or off. If improperly designed, the EV will stop driving without apparent reason and without warning. The other consideration when designing and building EVs are: center of gravity, structural integrity and ease of repair. So the entire EV chassis must be reconsidered for EVs only and not just swap out ICE chassis for use in EVs. New designs, philosophies for EV chassis and outer shell to hold modular batteries must be considered. After all, EVs should have its own designs apart from ICE vehicles due to its different needs. Cost due the recent rise in demand for EVs, the production level of EV batteries has not reached a level where economies of scale can help to lower cost. With the growth of the EV market in the future, battery costs will be lowered dramatically. Another main reason for future EVs to have lower total cost of ownership is due to EV s inherent simplicity in having 75% fewer parts compared with ICE vehicles. This means future initial EV costs will be lower as well as the service costs will be lower. Charging infrastructure the EV market will need a lot of help from governments - 5 -
worldwide as well as the entrepreneurial initiatives of businesses to set up fast charging stations, based on the battery barcode to recognize different batteries, different charging C-rates and different charging modes to popularize the EV. Due to time constraints, I would like to thank everyone and at the same time we should all thank Dr. Goodenough of UT, Hydro-Quebec, CNRS and University of Montreal and all the scientists that have dedicated their time and effort to the research of the wonderful C-LiFePO 4 material. Thank you! Before leaving you all, please allow me a few more seconds to share what may or may not be a joke about the future: if we don t act quickly to live responsibly with sustainable renewable resources, dinosaurs will reappear on earth while humans will become the hunted species. - 6 -