Batteries Used in Electric Cars to Get Safe with the Addition of
Special Molecules in Electrolyte By August 26th, 2009Wednesday,
August 26, 2009 8:42 on The molecule, developed by researchers
Zonghai Chen and Khalil Amine at Argonne National Laboratory, is
being tested as an additive in the electrolyte of lithium
batteries to keep cell voltage from going too high. The
batteries used in electric and hybrid vehicles typically consist
of 200 to 400 small cells, strung together into one powerful
whole. Individual cells sometimes overcharge, emitting heat when
they reach too high a voltage and pushing neighboring cells past
the breaking point to set off a runaway thermal reaction.
Because electric and hybrid vehicles are constantly discharging
and recharging during normal driving, overcharging problems are
not confined to the garage but pose a real operational hazard.
In the lab, Amine and Chen discovered they could make a molecule
based on boron and fluorine and add a tiny amount of it to each
cell to control cha