On January 11, Sichuan-based Tianqi Lithium (002466) announced that SES, a high-performance lithium metal battery manufacturing company in which it has a stake, will soon be listed on the New York Stock Exchange. Lithium-ion giants will also gain a foothold in the field of new batteries.
Combing SES investors will find that in addition to Tianqi Lithium, it also includes a long list of automotive giants such as GM, Hyundai, Kia, Geely and SAIC.
A number of leading companies at the same time to participate in the equity, it can be seen that the industry attaches importance to lithium metal battery.
Both lithium-metal and lithium-ion batteries belong to the Lithium Battery category, and the main difference between the two brothers is the anode material.
The former, with graphite and silicon as the negative electrode, has been widely used after more than 20 years of development. However, due to its low specific capacity, it is difficult to further break through the bottleneck of energy density. Therefore, lithium metal with high specific capacity is regarded as the "potential stock" of the next generation battery system.
However, the application of lithium metal also has some old difficulties: first, lithium dendrite generation caused by security risks.
After the battery charge and discharge for many times, the surface of lithium metal will continue to grow dendritic lithium crystal, a large number of sharp dendrites will produce stress on the diaphragm and Pierce it, causing short circuit explosion and other thermal control, as if an untimely bomb.
Moli Energy, a Canadian company that made waves in the 1980s with the first lithium-metal battery to test the waters, went from glory to ruin after a series of fires, and the industry turned to the graphite cathode.
Secondly, the infinite volume expansion of lithium metal will lead to the pulverization of lithium electrode, electrolyte consumption and massive gas production bulge.
Despite lithium's naughtiness, battery makers have not given up taming the perky anode because of its excellent base.
Xiang Yanhuo, president of Ningde Times China Passenger Vehicle Solutions Department, revealed at the global New Energy Vehicle Conference in 2021, "After nearly 10 years of critical research, we believe that all-solid-state metal battery with lithium metal as anode material is the optimal development direction of solid-state battery." He pointed out that the technology can essentially improve battery safety and energy density, ningde times will continue to invest, but the key technologies and processes still need to be solved by the industry.
Ganfeng Lithium (002460) mentioned in the 2020 performance presentation that the second generation of solid state battery developed by ganfeng Lithium is based on high nickel ternary positive electrode and lithium metal negative electrode material, with energy density of more than 350Wh/kg and cycle life of nearly 400 times. Last year, its subsidiary, Yichun Ganfeng, also planned to invest 2.2 billion yuan in jiangxi province for the construction of "high specific energy solid state battery ultra-thin lithium anode material project".
Overseas, Japan's National Institute of Industrial Science and Technology, South Korea's Samsung Research and Development Institute and Tesla's Australian Research Institute are also pushing ahead with lithium-metal battery research and development.
Zheng Juncong, managing partner of Xiangfeng Investment, explained to Huxun why lithium metal batteries are valued by capital: First, compared with other power solutions, they can realize twice the Energy Storage under the same volume; Second, the advance realization of fast charging technology is favorable for commercialization; Third, compared with lithium ion battery price increase is not much, is a cost-effective choice.
In November 2021, SES launched a 107Ah Apollo™ lithium-metal battery, which weighs only 0.982Kg and has an energy density of 417Wh/ Kg and 935Wh/L, making it the largest single lithium-metal battery in the world.
In order to understand this technical route in more detail, Hu Smell to SES company founder Hu Qichao Doctor to explore.
Hu qichao told Huxun that in recent years, we have been developing lithium metal batteries, but no company has yet made the battery cell into a car standard, so Apollo™ has caused a certain shock in the industry.
There are many ways to name the battery on the market, some are based on the cathode material, such as ternary lithium, quaternary lithium, lithium iron phosphate; Some are based on electrolyte, such as solid, mixed; Some are based on anode materials, such as lithium metal and lithium ion.
Across the battery, lithium-metal batteries are 60 percent similar to lithium-ion batteries. The compatibility between the production line and the process is very high. The positive material and diaphragm can be used almost all, and the remaining 40% difference is reflected in the electrolyte, negative material and software monitoring.
The improvement of high concentration lithium electrolyte can make lithium dendrite become smooth and dense, avoid piercing the diaphragm, and also make the positive electrode have good oxidation stability under high voltage, not flammable.
Lithium metal has a completely different chemical system from conventional graphite and silicon, so it needs to be redeveloped because it cannot use conventional lithium-ion battery electrodes.
Monitoring battery life and failure mechanisms also requires new software concepts. For lithium metal batteries, the influence of the external environment on stealth performance is sometimes greater than the influence of the material in the cell on the system, so it is necessary to strictly control the environment, temperature, pressure, humidity and charge and discharge speed of the cell.
The main significance of lithium metal anode material for battery companies is that it can greatly improve the car's range and reduce the cost per unit of energy density. Volkswagen, Ford, Honda, BMW, Geely and other well-known car companies are almost all in the layout.
Car companies generally have many different brands of different lines. For high-end models, such as Porsche and Cadillac, high-nickel three-yuan lithium with relatively high cost will be used as the positive pole. For middle and low-end mass brands, such as Chevrolet, SAIC and Mazda, relatively cheap lithium iron phosphate will be used as the positive pole.
Referring to the application progress, Hu Qichao said that generally new batteries need to go through engineering sample, A sample, B sample, C sample and mass production before getting on the car. The engineering sample has A development cycle of about five years, A sample has two years, B and C sample each year, and finally mass production. SES has already signed an agreement with GM and Hyundai to develop A prototype lithium-metal battery, which is expected to be ready in 2025.
As the first company in the world to jointly develop lithium metal A samples with large car companies, Hu Qichao believes that SES can cooperate and run in with downstream manufacturers in advance, which is not only A first-mover advantage in terms of time, but also another moat besides core technology.
Raw materials besides lithium, nickel also shortage
Power battery is in a comprehensive upgrade of the tide, the scientific research team launched an attack to the subdivision plate without dead Angle. But after finishing the technology, will eventually return to the cost, than or raw materials.
Lithium, as the leading role, is naturally the focus of the stage tracking lamp. Not only the local tycoons in the primary market have made bets, heavy gold mining, secondary market related stocks also rose in unison, the rise is gratified.
Sky LiYe is SES company holding 9.34% of the raw material suppliers, early in the lithium industry layout, also take time to snake swallow like, acquired the world's best lithium fai quarries taliesin lithium, pricked the cloth in the nation's largest salt lake lithium salt lake, scored yajiang county in sichuan cuo lithium fai stone mining, is undoubtedly the battery company solid home front.
There is, of course, a price to pay. Due to its aggressive expansion, especially after it acquired 23.77% equity of Chile'S SQM company at a high premium in 2018, Tianqi Lithium was once plagued by serious debt crisis, and its first profit in seven consecutive single quarters was in Q2 2021. Even if the current crisis is basically over, the liquidity pressure is still there.
"Lithium shortage" consensus, Hu Qichao added to the tiger smell of "nickel shortage" judgment. There are already hundreds of GWh of ev batteries in the world, and by 2030 there could be several. If the total cost of power batteries drops below $60 /KWh, there will be little profit left for upstream and downstream.
But in addition to lithium, nickel, manganese and cobalt are also scarce in the battery system, especially nickel.
At the moment, increasing nickel content is the trend. For example, the nickel proportion in ternary and quaternary Lithium Batteries has increased from 50% to 80% or even higher. However, the nickel content in the earth's crust is less than 1% of lithium. Therefore, the possibility of nickel shortage should be considered in the future.
Competition puts pressure on individual firms and creates efficiencies in industries. It has to be said that the emerging start-up scene is making the next generation of power battery field exciting and exciting.
With the acceleration of industrial development, the evaluation standards of technology companies will be improved accordingly.
In addition to high and low parameters, the completion of production lines, upstream linkage, customer expansion, team management and other dimensions will force the founders of science and technology from science and engineering to step out of the comfort zone of digital logic, deal with the more complex market environment head-on, and feel the emotional challenges facing them. And that may be the hardest thing to do before a new technology is commercialized.
