Australia-based Brighsun says ‘the revolution is underway.‘
This is not the first time we’ve heard about Lithium-Sulphur battery technology as a promising way to increase the range of EVs, but this time the claims are being made by a company that specializes EVs and EV-related tech, with a good track record – the claims are believable.
Brighsun Group is based in Australia and it recently announced it’s working on Lithium-Sulphur batteries that would give an EV a theoretical range of close to 2,000 km (1,200 miles) on a single charge. The company the announcement was made after almost eight years of research and it claims these batteries have 5 – 8 times the storage capacity of conventional rechargeable batteries (although it’s not clear what these conventional batteries that they’re referring to are).
Another claim about these new Li-S batteries is that they can retain 91 percent of their capacity after 1,700 cycles of fast charging at a rate of 2C (being fully charged and discharged in 30 minutes). It adds that these batteries can still hold 74 percent of their initial capacity even after 1,000 cycles at 5C (fully charged to fully empty in 12.5 minutes0.
How Brighsun achieved these remarkable numbers? Well, it says it
‘ Has patented Li-S battery technology that prevents the generation of polysulfide on the sulfur cathode and effectively suppresses dendritic growth of Li on the anode Li-S, paving the way for Li-S battery use in EVs. ’
It also adds that raw materials supply is not an issue because they
‘ Are widely available in Australia, with a supply sufficient for hundreds of years. Indeed, at under AUD100 for 1kWh, the expected production cost of Brighsun-branded 2U Li-S batteries is lower than conventional lithium ion batteries. ‘
Don’t expect to see this type of battery in a production EV in a showroom near you any time soon, though. Brighsun is looking for investors in order to commence large scale production and testing of these Li-S batteries. And they’re not just destined for automotive use; the company points out that with their tech, a modern smartphone could hold enough charge for an entire week, a far cry from the current batteries that are depleted after two days.
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