Periodic Reporting for period 1 - SALAMANDER (SMART SENSORS AND SELF-HEALING FUNCTIONALITIES EMBEDDED FOR BATTERY LONGEVITY WITH MANUFACTURABILITY AND ECONOMICAL RECYCLABILITY)
Reporting period: 2023-05-01 to 2024-10-31
The salamander is well known for its ability to self-heal, regenerating lost or injured limbs and allowing the salamander’s to survive for longer. Inspired by this natural property, the SALAMANDER project aims to develop a rechargeable battery which can heal itself. Specifically, this ability is considered a “smart” functionality, meaning not only that it can self-heal, but that it can sense when it is injured and where to heal the damage. Using an internal sensor which measures some aspect of health or internal damage, the battery management system (BMS) receives information and makes a decision to trigger an external stimulus that activates the self-healing. With these “smart” self-healing and sensing aspects, SALAMANDER batteries can work for longer and more reliably. Lastly, the SALAMANDER project will examine how to add these “smart” components to batteries using manufacturing methods of today and how these components affect battery recycling. The ultimate goal is to provide an answer to the rapidly growing demand for sustainable, safe and reliable batteries, which have been identified as a key enabler for the transition to decarbonized and clean energy systems due to their broad application potential in renewable energy production/storage and electrified transport sectors.
As of October 2024, the SALAMANDER project has developed new computational tools for modeling and optimizing self-healing polymers with various configurations of functional groups and their interactions with silicon and lithium through molecular dynamic and ReaxFF systems, respectively. Both mechanical and electrochemical properties can be predicted based on different model polymers. New families of self-healing polymers with tunable properties have also been developed and optimized, with upscaling efforts beginning. Integration of multiple types of self-healing polymers and functionalities into anode and cathode composites have been achieved and are currently being optimized for electrochemical performance. Multiple sensors have been developed and tested for cell chemistry compatibility, with optimized inks and encapsulation technologies being applied to enhance the chemical stability of sensors printed on cell components and embedded inside of pouch cells. BMS software and hardware systems have also been developed to connect to sensors and process their signals into useful, readable data. A lifecycle inventory on a reference cell chemistry has identified global warming impact and its material or processing origins.
As of October 2024, there are two publications describing progress or a review of progress beyond the state of the art.