In the decades before the Wright brothers historic 1903 flight at Kitty Hawk there were many claims of powered heavier-than-air flying machines. There were also many false sightings of “airships”, amounting to a form of mass delusion. But the false claims and false sightings do not change the fact that the technology for powered flight was right on the cusp, and that the Wright brothers crossed that threshold in 1903, leading ultimately to the massive industry we have today. This is not surprising. There is often a sense, in the industry and spreading to the public, that the technological pieces are in place for a significant application breakthrough. Today this is more true than ever, with a vibrant industry of tech news, showcases, conferences, blogs, podcasts, etc. I cover plenty of tech new here. It’s interesting to try to glimpse what technology is right around the corner. Any technology that is closely watched and much anticipated is likely to generate lots of premature hype and false claims.
This is definitely true for battery technology. We are arguably in the middle of a massive effort to electrify as much of our industry as possible, especially transportation. Also maximizing intermittent renewable sources of energy would be greatly facilitated by advances in energy storage. Meanwhile electronic devices are becoming increasingly integrated into our daily lives. Advances in battery technology can have a dramatic impact on all these sectors, and is likely to be a critical technology for the next century. So it’s no surprise that there is a lot of hype surrounding battery tech, some of it legitimate, some of it fake, and some just premature. But this hype does not change the fact that battery technology is rapidly improving and the hype will become reality soon enough (just like the Wright flyer).
When it comes to EV batteries we all have a wish-list of features we would like to see. I now own two EVs, and they are the best cars I have ever owned. At least for my personal situation (I live in an exurb and own my own parking spots), EVs are great, and current battery technology is more than adequate for EVs. But sure, I live everyday with the reality of how advances in battery tech will make EVs even more convenient and useful. I have detailed the wish-list before, but here it is again: increased capacity, both in terms of volume but especially weight (specific energy), to decrease the weight while increasing the potential range of EVs, faster charging (with the holy grail being the ability to fully recharge an EV as fast as you can fill a car with gas), long charge-discharge cycle lifespan (longer than the lifespan of the car), useful in a wide range of temperatures, stability (does not spontaneously catch fire), and cheap, which is tied to being made from cheap and abundant elements. This last feature also means that the battery is not dependent on rare elements whose supply line is largely controlled by hostile or conflict-ridden countries.
Making a significant breakthrough in any one of these features is big news. This is why Donut Lab’s claim to have simultaneously improved all of these wish-list features at once was met with so much skepticism. (I will give a quick update on Donut Labs at the end of this post.) Now we have another bold claim, this one from a US company based in Dallas. Their claim focuses on just one feature of EV batteries, the recharge time, however they also claim reduced need for cobalt, which is nice. The company is OMI, who claims to have innovated a new iron-based cathode that allows an EV to recharge from empty to full in 3 minutes. That would be huge – 3 minutes is the holy grail, about as long as it takes to fill a tank of gas. Technically they claim a 20C recharge rate. The “C” is based on a convention with 1C meaning that a battery can fully charge in 1 hour. So a 20C battery, by definition, would recharge fully in 3 minutes. For reference, most fast charging EV batteries today are rated at 8-12C, or a 7.5 to 5 minute recharge time. This is already pretty good, and as you can see there is a diminishing return with increased C rating when translated into recharge time. Of note, however, these ratings are under ideal conditions. In the real world we are still looking at 10-12 minute recharge times for the fastest recharging batteries.
To me this is not a big deal at all. Even when I use a charger that requires 20 minutes to go from 20-80% charge, it’s rare I am doing that on the road (only during long trips), and it’s relatively easy to plan that around a pit stop anyway. Go to the restroom, get a snack, and by the time you get back to your car you are done or almost done. Any improvement from there is icing on the cake. Ten to twelve minutes would be fantastic. Three minutes is insane. Keep in mind, 99% of the time I am slow charging my EVs at home. But sure, that occasional time you are driving home late at night and you need a top off to make it home, and you have nothing to do but wait there while your car recharges, faster is definitely better.
So how reliable is this claim from OMI. It looks pretty credible. They are calling the technology LnFP (lithium nano-ferrophosphate). This is a variation on the established LMFP technology which uses manganese in the cathode. Doping the cathode with manganese allows for faster charging. OMI is not revealing the exact chemistry of their new cathode (industry secrets and all), but will only say that it is nano-structured, hence the “nano”. Nothing there that breaks the laws of physics, and this all seems reasonably incremental. But again, prematurely hyping plausible incremental advances, but ones that will give a company dominance in an industry, is not uncommon. Claim unlimited free energy and you are just an obvious crank or a fraudster. Claim a plausible incremental advance, and you generate excitement in the industry. But that still leaves the question – did they really achieve this, or are they hyping a lab phenomenon, or are they pulling a “fake it till you make it” maneuver to goose funding?
The broader context here is that OMI is not one of the major players in battery technology, investing billions in a global race to push the industry forward and grab market share. They are a small startup, although they have been providing components to large companies like Harley Davidson. Are we seeing the democratization of battery tech, with spunky small startup leveraging creativity and innovation to challenge the major players? Or is this mostly small startups trying to make a quick score by making bold claims and either attracting big funding or getting snapped up by one of the big boys? OMI claims their battery claims are validated, but I cannot find any independent third-part validation. They also claim they will go into production in 2027. That is the ultimate test – can they mass produce these batteries at a competitive price and they actually work as advertised in products?
Speaking of which, two months ago Donut Labs announced to the world a dream solid-state battery with all the wish-list features. Now they are claiming independent testing and validation, but again it is not quite worthy of the hype they are putting out. Finland’s state-owned VTT Technical Research Centre has tested some of its features. It tested the rapid recharge time revealing a 0-80% charge in 4.5 minutes, with a 5C rating. Testing has also demonstrated their solid state battery is not a supercapacitor, which was one of the theories. But that, so far, is it. The 400 Wh/kg specific energy has not been validated, and that is really the main feature. So far we have more of a glimpse than total verification. So I am still withholding ultimate judgement until all the evidence is in, but it still seems sketchy to me. I hope that everyone is wrong, and Donut Labs has really achieved what they claim. But that hope, I think, is the point.
