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Panasonic’s new US$4 billion battery factory in De Soto, Kansas, is designed to be a model of sustainability – it’s an all-electric factory with no need for a smokestack. When finished, it will cover the size of 48 football fields, employ 4,000 people and produce enough advanced batteries to supply half a million electric cars per year. But there’s a catch, and it’s a big one. While the factory will run on wind and solar power much of the time, renewables supplied only 34% of the local utility Evergy’s electricity in 2023. In much of the U.S., fossil fuels still play a key role in meeting power demand. In fact, Evergy has asked permi...... Read Full article on HadNews

This article is part of our exclusive IEEE Journal Watch series in partnership with IEEE Xplore.As more electric vehicles hit the roads, the environmental impact of their battery production will also increase. This raises a major question: What type of EV battery will be the most environmentally friendly on a large scale?A study published 1 February in IEEE Access suggests that, after considering five different types of EV battery cells, lithium-sulphur cells will be the most environmentally friendly. The results also suggest that cells that don’t rely on precious and critical metals are fundamental for ensuring sustainable production.The m...... Read Full article on HadNews

In a newly published study, we describe our design for a self-extinguishing rechargeable battery. It replaces the most commonly used electrolyte, which is highly combustible – a medium composed of a lithium salt and an organic solvent – with materials found in a commercial fire extinguisher. An electrolyte allows lithium ions that carry an electric charge to move across a separator between the positive and negative terminals of a lithium-ion battery. By modifying affordable commercial coolants to function as battery electrolytes, we were able to produce a battery that puts out its own fire. Our electrolyte worked well across a wide ...... Read Full article on HadNews