Solid state battery enterprises only see the concept and do not know the performance

Li hong, a researcher at the institute of physics of the Chinese academy of sciences, described the current commercialization of solid-state batteries as "the so-called all-solid state only sees the concept, but does not know the performance; I only heard about security, but there were no reports of security tests." He said that from the public data, the solid state battery system has not yet published data, fuel cells have the size of the reactor, power and life of the system data. If the data becomes public, the technology is mature.

At present, in addition to yichengxineng, which has recently been involved in solid-state battery, a-share company also has jiawei, which claims to have created the first all-solid-state battery, and ganfeng lithium, which has built the research and development pilot production line of solid-state battery with 250 million yuan. The three companies are involved in solid-state batteries, which are hard to tell apart by their varying degrees of advance.

The reporter found that the solid state battery has attracted the attention of scientific research institutions and companies due to its high safety performance and high energy density potential, but technical problems such as excessive interface impedance make it difficult to commercialize. The long time of research and development and huge capital investment put many battery companies off. Solid state lithium battery authority r & d institutions personnel admitted to reporters, "the so-called all solid state only see the concept, but do not know the performance; I only heard about security, but there were no reports of security tests."

Listed companies "haoyan" unmeasurable

Yi cheng xin neng, gan feng lithium and jia wei share 3 companies to manufacture solid-state batteries, the progress of the 3 companies are different.

Compared with ganfeng lithium, yichengxin can be more practical in view of the published patent application, r&d team and equity award. In terms of technology, ganfeng lithium has bought the technology from ningbo institute of Chinese academy of sciences in real money and last September, the two sides also launched the industrialization cooperation of scientific and technological achievements. According to the 2016 annual report of ganfeng lithium, the company has obtained 5 authorized invention patents of ningbo institute of materials, Chinese academy of sciences. At the same time, the company all solid state battery patent technology development expenditure 2 million yuan. In the first half of this year, ganfeng lithium used 27,673,500 yuan to buy semi-solid battery as a pilot test to develop technology.

On December 6, ganfeng lithium intends to invest no more than 250 million yuan to set up a wholly-owned subsidiary to build the first-generation solid-state lithium battery research and development pilot production line. According to the published performance evaluation indexes, the purpose of yichengxineng lithium is more clear than that of ganfeng lithium. For example, the goal of the solid-state battery technology index in June next year is to reach the battery energy density of no less than 240Wh/kg. In 2018, trial-produce the first generation solid state lithium battery series cells; By the end of 2019, the sales volume of the first-generation solid-state lithium battery exceeded 300 million yuan, and the technical energy density of the second-generation solid-state lithium battery was no less than 300Wh/kg.

However, there is still some gap between the purpose of ganfeng lithium and the energy density of the solid-state batteries expected in the industry. According to the national medium and long term development plan of automobile industry, the energy density of single power battery will reach over 300Wh by 2020, and strive to achieve 350Wh.

Unlike ganfeng lithium, jiawei reported the world's first solid-state lithium battery and quick-rechargeable lithium battery in November last year, and it can produce solid-state batteries in volume at the end of this year. In November, when investors asked panorama what electrolyte it used for its all-solid-state batteries, the company responded with a gel mix. And this kind of material actually belongs to the category of liquid lithium ion battery, which is also questioned by the industry as "quasi-solid state" not all-solid state battery.

Toyota: no commercialization date has been set

Companies in the industry are also mostly cautious about commercializing solid-state batteries.

In the case of tesla, which still runs on batteries supplied by panasonic with liquid electrolytes, there are no plans to use solid-state batteries. In China, ningde times, a leading lithium battery manufacturer, said in its prospectus that next-generation batteries, including all-solid lithium batteries and lithium metal air batteries, cannot be commercialized.

Just after jiawei announced the world's first solid-state lithium battery in November, an investor asked hengdian DMC, a listed company in the lithium battery industry, what it thought of the technology and its prospects. "This technology is cutting-edge, and the company will organize research and development, but this technology is also the future. At this stage, due to immature technology and high cost, it needs to be investigated and market observation," he said.

Mr Hengdian cites Toyota as an example: "in 2010, Toyota launched an electric car with a solid-state battery and a range of 1,000km, and it wants to commercialise the technology by 2020. Toyota has also said publicly that all-solid-state batteries could be commercialized by 2025, five years earlier than lithium-air batteries, 'provided technical hurdles are overcome.' But soon Toyota itself was pouring money into hydrogen fuel cell technology, building a huge patent portfolio around hydrogen preparation and storage.

Toyota China related staff told reporters that Toyota solid state battery in the laboratory stage, but has made a breakthrough. In addition, the commercialization date for Toyota's solid-state batteries is in the early 2020s.

Industry: see concept but not performance

For this year's capital market in the solid-state battery hot, the industry is surprised at the same time, most people say that the commercialization of solid-state batteries is premature.

With the rise of all-solid-state lithium batteries, a variety of all-solid-state or solid-state lithium batteries have emerged, dazzling investors for a while. On December 26, the Chinese academy of sciences researcher at the institute of Li Hong writing in academic journals to define, solid-state batteries "solid-state lithium battery, it is a kind of using solid electrode material and solid electrolyte materials, does not contain any liquid lithium battery, mainly includes all solid state lithium ion battery and solid-state lithium batteries, the difference is that the former negative do not contain metallic lithium, which is negative extremely metal lithium."

Li hong said in the paper that the all-solid-state lithium battery has attracted the attention of international giants because it is expected to solve the two major challenges currently plaguing the power battery industry -- safety risks and low energy density. Li told reporters that solid state batteries to commercialization, must have enough technical reserves and research and development team. A lithium-ion battery technology typically takes 15 to 18 years to develop, he said.

"Overnight, so many companies are developing solid-state batteries, and they all seem to be moving very fast. It's a bit of a technological leap forward." True lithium research chief analyst mo ke told reporters.

Wang rongjin, a partner at jin bang capital, which invests in lithium batteries, told reporters that most of the developers he has met are pessimistic about solid-state batteries and see them as difficult to commercialize in the short term.

Li hong described the current commercialization of solid-state batteries as "the so-called all-solid-state battery only sees the concept, but does not know the performance; I only heard about security, but there were no reports of security tests." He said that from the public data, the solid state battery system has not yet published data, fuel cells have the size of the reactor, power and life of the system data. If the data becomes public, the technology is mature.

As for when solid-state batteries can be commercialized, moko is optimistic that it will be three to five years, while li and wang believe it will be about seven years. However, li hong said that the hot investment and financing of solid state battery has objectively promoted the research and development of solid state battery, stimulated the industry and the field, and promoted the industry's attention to solid state battery.

The page contains the contents of the machine translation.