Next generation battery technology for Electric vehicles to replace Lithium-ion batteries

Next generation battery technology for Electric vehicles to replace Lithium-ion batteries

Context: India will work out a policy to institutionalise research and development on the next generation of battery technologies for electric vehicles, like metal-ion, metal air, hydrogen fuel cell, etc, to replace lithium-ion batteries and reduce India’s dependence on other countries for its import within this decade.

Concept:

Metal-ion batteries:

• Batteries based on multivalent metals have the potential to meet the future needs of large-scale energy storage, due to the relatively high abundance of elements such as magnesium, calcium, aluminium and zinc in the Earth’s crust.
• These are rechargeable battery in which metal ions provide energy by flowing from the negative electrode of the battery, the anode, to the positive electrode, the cathode.
• These offer the possibilities of low cost and low flammability, together with three-electron-redox properties leading to high capacity

Metal-air technology:

• A metal-air battery uses some type of metal (like aluminum) for the anode, air as the cathode, along with a liquid electrolyte.
• In the case of aluminum, oxygen from the air then combines with the metal to create aluminum hydroxide, which activates the electrolysis process and creates a current.
• Metal-air batteries are light, compact power sources with a high energy density, but they have had a major limitation i.e., they corrode.
• Once this is turned them on, you can’t turn them off. The only way to stop the reaction is to drain the electrolyte out of the system.

Hydrogen fuel cell:

• It is an electrochemical cell that converts the chemical energy of a fuel (often hydrogen in the case of Hydrogen Fuel Cell) and an oxidizing agent (often oxygen) into electricity through a pair of redox reactions.
• A Fuel Cell consists of an anode, a cathode, and an electrolyte that allows ions, often positively charged hydrogen ions (protons), to move between the two sides of the fuel cell.
• A fuel cell converts chemical potential energy (energy stored in molecular bonds) into electrical energy.