According to the electrek website, nearly a year after working with Tesla on new research, battery researcher Jeff Dahn began a round-trip speech on the progress of his team. Last week, the media reported on his speech at the International Battery Seminar in March. This week, he introduced to the outside world MIT's breakthrough in battery life at MIT.
He announced that his team has developed a battery that will double the life of batteries used in Tesla products, which is four years ahead of schedule. In addition, he also detailed the reasons why Tesla decided to work with his team, and revealed that Tesla recruited one of his graduate students.
He announced that his team has developed a battery that will double the life of batteries used in Tesla products, which is four years ahead of schedule. In addition, he also detailed the reasons why Tesla decided to work with his team, and revealed that Tesla recruited one of his graduate students.
In the title "Why is Tesla working with a group of Canadians? In a speech, Darn explained how the team designed a method of testing battery cells to accurately monitor the battery during charging and discharging to determine the cause of battery aging.
As acknowledged at the International Battery Symposium in March, Dane claimed that he did not fully understand the chemicals that determine the degradation of battery performance. However, the devices they develop can help them test new chemicals more accurately and quickly, finding ways to extend battery life.
One of his students is currently working in a battery research group within Tesla. Another student founded a company to commercialize the battery test equipment developed by the team. Their customers include Tesla, Apple, General Motors, 24M, and many other large battery manufacturers and consumers.
In the second half of the presentation, he explained how the new test method allowed them to discover a process in which an aluminum coating is better than all other materials. These battery test results show that there is almost no degradation in battery performance at room temperature, and performance is rarely reduced even in harsh environments.
When it comes to how these findings will affect Tesla's products, Darn refuses to disclose more details.
After the speech, the Q&A session. The ** question raised by the audience is his team's ultimate goal for lithium-ion battery life. He began to hesitate and later replied: "We sent the project (Tesla) to the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) for a government fundraising. When I introduced the project, I wrote The goal is to double the battery life of Tesla products at the same upper cut-off voltage. We have exceeded this goal in the ** round of research. This is the goal of the project and has been surpassed. We will continue to work hard - obviously, we still have four years. We will do our best."
The results were impressive, especially considering that the research cooperation between the two parties was only launched in June 2016 and February 2017.
Just a month after Tesla and Panasonic began producing the new "2170" battery in Gigafactory 1, Nevada, Darn claimed that his team's research has been applied to Tesla's products. These two things are necessarily side by side, but the timing is really interesting.
It should also be noted that Darn's research focuses on nickel manganese cobalt oxide (NMC) batteries. Tesla applies the battery to its fixed storage products (Powerwall and Powerpack), and the first batteries produced in Gigafactory 1 are for these products.
Darn explained that by extending the life of these batteries, Tesla is reducing the cost per kilowatt of its residential and commercial battery projects. For example, he said that according to the technical level of Tesla's current battery project, the cost of residential solar cells is 0.23 US dollars per kWh, and the cost of commercial batteries is 0.139 US dollars per kWh.
Tesla will also use nickel-cobalt alumina (NCA) batteries for its automotive products. Dan said that they are studying this. It is reported that Tesla and Panasonic are planning to start production of automotive batteries in Gigafactory 1 before June 2017, and first produce batteries that need to be equipped with Model 3.
He added that given Tesla's use of aluminum on the chassis, there is no reason to say that the life of the car and battery cannot last for 20 years.