Development status of lithium titanate battery technology

On August 2, 2017, Gpro Titanium Industry Co., Ltd said on the investor interaction platform that the company's Titanium dioxide for lithium titanate battery has been scheduled to be ordered and tested on the production line. It is reported that the Jinpu titanium industry previously disclosed that the company participated in the first lithium titanate battery industry chain seminar held in Wuxi, Jiangsu province on July 6, 2017. After the meeting, executives of several battery manufacturers visited the company.

It is learned that currently in domestic titanium dioxide manufacturing enterprises, Jinpu titanium and Lomon rector Group Co., Ltd. Were recused in the market of titanium dioxide for lithium titanate batteries. Among them, jinpu titanium industry has conducted research on the lithium titanate battery industry since 2016 and has reached technical cooperation with the well-known lithium titanate battery manufacturer in China, north titanium nanotechnology co., LTD. In July 2016, the company signed a cooperation agreement with Zhiyang technology co., LTD., a well-known graphene manufacturer in China, to enter the market of titanium dioxide for lithium titanate batteries. At present, the company has formed capacity of 10,000/ year with a monthly sales volume of 600 tons.

In recent years, the booming development of China's new energy vehicle industry has brought fire to the emerging market of lithium titanate batteries. As an important raw material of lithium titanate batteries, titanium dioxide has gradually increased its market demand. At present, domestic titanium dioxide production enterprises have seized the opportunity to carry out the layout. However, it can also be seen that the current capacity of entering the market of battery specific titanium dioxide is relatively small, and manufacturers also adopt the strategy of on-demand production and are more cautious. It can be said that due to the current lithium titanate battery market has not yet opened, most of the domestic titanium dioxide producers for this emerging downstream market wait and see attitude. But what is certain is that the future with the new energy automotive industry further development and mature in the global scope, lithium titanate battery special titanium dioxide is expected to become a large chain, market application field, domestic titanium dioxide manufacturers are expected to use this new realization of industry transformation and upgrading, the downstream market into the field of high-grade titanium pigment production.

The advantages and disadvantages of lithium titanate materials as lithium battery cathode materials. Since the industrialization of lithium-ion battery in 1991, the anode materials of the battery are dominated by the graphite. In recent years, with the development of new lithium-ion batteries, researchers at home and abroad have carried out in-depth research on the characteristics of lithium titanate materials as lithium battery cathode materials. At present, it is generally believed in the industry as a negative material has the following advantages and disadvantages. In terms of advantages, lithium titanate materials have such advantages as ultra-high safety, ultra-long life, the wide operating range at high and low temperature, high power, low cost, and green environmental protection. In terms of disadvantages, lithium titanate has a low energy density and high environmental requirements for battery production due to its strong water absorption. In addition, at present, the application market of lithium titanate battery has not been fully opened, which has become one of the inferior materials of lithium titanate as the negative electrode of lithium battery.

Development status of lithium titanate materials at home and abroad. At present, the leading companies in the research and industrialization of lithium titanate materials in the world include American aotna nanotechnology co., LTD., Japan Ishihara industry co., LTD., and Johnson matthey in the UK. Among them, the lithium titanate produced by American aotec has excellent performance in terms of ratio, safety and service life, etc., but its production method is too long and delicate, which leads to the high cost and makes it difficult to promote commercially. As the largest titanium dioxide producer in Asia, Ishihara has successfully developed a number of lithium titanate products with low cost, high magnification, and different particle sizes by taking advantage of its raw material advantages. Products with similar performance have greater advantages compared with lithium titanate materials of aotec in the United States, but they are slightly inferior compared with domestic products.

Domestic outstanding lithium titanate material manufacturers include Sichuan Xingneng new materials co., LTD., Zhuhai Yinlong new energy co., LTD., Huzhou Weihong power co., LTD., Shenzhen Beitui new energy materials co., LTD., and Hunan Shanshan new materials co., LTD., etc. Among them, Zhuhai Yinlong completed the acquisition of 53.6% equity of American aotec in 2011, thus becoming one of the few enterprises in China that has multiple core technologies such as lithium titanate material preparation, battery production, lithium titanate electric vehicle and energy storage system. In addition, Zhuhai Yinlong has also carried out strategic cooperation with Shiyuan on the research and development of new lithium titanate materials. The cost of materials will decrease with the increase of production, and it is expected to approach the current cost price of anode materials in the next few years.

Lithium titanate batteries and their applications in electric vehicles and energy storage. Lithium titanate industry chain can be divided into lithium titanate material preparation, lithium titanate battery production, lithium titanate battery system integration and its application in electric vehicle and energy storage market. At present, the international production of lithium titanate battery manufacturers is not many, mainly the United States and Japan's Toshiba group as a representative. One of the United States in the large specification of lithium titanate battery manufacturing at the leading position. In terms of battery system applications, the company's hybrid bus for California has been in operation since 2008, with a fuel economy index of 106.4kg/L, much higher than the 23.8kg/L of ordinary diesel engines. In addition, the company's 1MW energy storage system for the Hawaii natural energy institute wind farm is the only high-capacity lithium titanate battery product currently in the U.S. power grid that has been commercially available in the field for more than two years. Toshiba's "SCiB" brand lithium titanate battery has the advantages of quick charging and long life and is currently used in batch production of ev-neo electric motorcycles. In terms of energy storage, Toshiba is applying lithium titanate batteries to large-scale energy storage power stations and home energy storage systems under Japan's new sunshine program.

Among the major domestic lithium titanate battery manufacturers, Huzhou Weihong has carried out vertical integration of lithium titanate materials, diaphragm, electrolyte, and anode materials required for the production of lithium titanate batteries, with the capacity of 80,000 10Ah lithium titanate batteries per day. In the electric vehicle market, the company's 10-minute rechargeable battery system has carried more than 3,000 hybrid buses, mainly to the UK, the Netherlands and Chongqing. In the energy storage market, the company has installed lithium titanate battery energy storage systems for grid frequency modulation and grid demand management in Vermont and Chongqing, China. Another well-known lithium titanate battery manufacturer in China, Zhuhai Yinlong, has reached the same level of product performance indicators as the United States aotec. In terms of application, the company's pure electric buses equipped with lithium titanate batteries have been put into public transport systems in Zhanjiang, Guangdong, Handan, Shijiazhuang, and other places. The company has also undertaken the 863 national projects in energy storage in cooperation with state grid corporation of China and China Southern power grid co., LTD.

4. Difficulties in the development of lithium titanate battery technology. At present, the manufacturing difficulties of lithium titanate battery and battery pack mainly come from the following aspects. First, while lithium titanate materials production in principle is not complicated, but will be used as the anode material of lithium-ion batteries, not only needs to have proper specific surface area, particle size, density, and the electrochemical properties, etc., must also be more enough to adapt to the mass production technology of lithium battery, due to the PH of lithium titanate materials for 11 or 12, hygroscopicity strong, so we can not in much traditional lithium battery production line for production. Secondly, since the humidity requirement of lithium titanate materials is much higher than that of conventional lithium-ion batteries, it is better to design a compact, compact and fully enclosed automatic production line for the production of lithium titanate batteries, which requires a large cost. In addition, lithium titanate battery pack after putting into use for a period of time will see the soft pack single battery has a trace of gas production, in the existing industrial conditions is difficult to avoid.

5. Development prospect of lithium titanate batteries in China. In the past, the main market for lithium batteries was portable electrical appliances and mobile phones, laptops and so on. Chinese lithium battery manufacturers are in the sales capacity of Japanese and Korean products. However, the current market for lithium titanate batteries is hybrid electric vehicles, special industrial applications, and energy storage markets, which are still in their infancy globally. Lithium titanate batteries are expected to play a significant role in these markets. China has a huge population, and its electric cars, energy storage, and industrial applications are a huge market that many multinational companies covet. In recent years, the Chinese government has paid more and more attention to the development of electric vehicles and energy storage industry and introduced various national encouragement policies. The domestic lithium titanate battery system has also accumulated several years of commercial data in many cities in Europe and the mainland. For the future development prospects, some industry analysts pointed out that the key to improving the energy density of lithium titanate batteries is to develop high-capacity, high-potential solutions, and antioxidant membranes and other research topics. China's lithium battery industry's efforts to develop lithium titanate battery technology will reap considerable rewards in the emerging market for electric vehicles, energy storage and industrial applications.

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