Townsville battery plant moving forward after council meetings, page-33

Hi Names, although I have been following the development of Lithium Ion batteries for a while I doubt if I would know any more than anyone else with an interest in them so if anyone is bored senseless with the following just skip over it.

In addition to the standard cylindrical packages mentioned above they are also made in pouch and prismatic formats but they are not suitable for bigger batteries and require more liaising with manufacturers as to dimensions and capacities so are probably best left until the plant is up and running.

There are also many different chemistries that can be used for the Cathode but the 2 most popular for EVs are Lithium Nickel Cobalt Aluminium Oxide (NCA) used by Tesla and Lithium Nickel Manganese Cobalt Oxide (NMC) used by most others. Manufacturers are trying to reduce Cobalt and chemistries such as Lithium Iron Phosphate (LFP) don't need it but they don't seem to be popular for EVs yet. The press release from Imperium 3 indicated that no Nickel or Cobalt is being used for their batteries so LFP is their likely chemistry.

Current electrolytes are either liquid or a polymer with large amounts of research being put towards solid electrolytes which are potentially safer because they can't leak. The Anode is usually some form of carbon but other materials can be used.

Lithium Ion batteries are very susceptible to heat degradation (and in extreme cases thermal runaway) so EV packs are made from thousands of 18650 cells (and more recently 2170 cells for the Tesla Model 3) so cooling lines can run between them. In cold climates the same system can warm the battery pack to operational temperature.

I know nothing about the various complexities of actually making the batteries but one would have to assume that Imperium 3 would have all that covered since they are already producing them. It would be important to have equipment that is mainly automated but adaptable for different sizes and chemistries.