Scientific Frontline looks at a new way to create rechargeable lithium-ion batteries – the power behind electric cars, iPhones, and most of the rest of the 21st century – without using cobalt, a mineral that comes with a heavy environmental and ethical price. Instead, University of California, Irvine, researchers say, we’re a step closer to replacing it all with cleaner, kinder (and hopefully cheaper) nickel:
“Nickel doesn’t have child labor issues,” said Huolin Xin, the UCI professor of physics & astronomy whose team devised the method, which could usher in a new, less controversial generation of lithium-ion batteries. Until now, nickel wasn’t a practical substitute because large amounts of it were required to create lithium batteries, he said. And the metal’s cost keeps climbing.
To become an economically viable alternative to cobalt, nickel-based batteries needed to use as little nickel as possible.
“We’re the first group to start going in a low-nickel direction,” said Xin, whose team published its findings in the journal Nature Energy. “In a previous study by my group, we came up with a novel solution to fully eliminate cobalt. But that formulation still relied on a lot of nickel.”
To solve that problem, Xin’s team spent three years devising a process called “complex concentrated doping” that enabled the scientists to alter the key chemical formula in lithium-ion batteries as easily as one might adjust seasonings in a recipe.
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Xin said he thinks the new nickel chemistry will quickly start transforming the lithium-ion battery industry. Already, he said, electric vehicle companies are planning to take his team’s published results and replicate them.