Completed Clean Energy Materials & Manufacturing

Granite - Passenger Car Solid State Battery

In plain English

AI plain-English summary

Solid-state batteries could soon power electric cars that travel hundreds of miles on a single charge and recharge in minutes, if a new UK consortium can figure out how to manufacture them at scale. Current lithium-ion batteries in electric vehicles have limits: they degrade over time, can overheat, and take too long to charge. Solid-state batteries replace the liquid electrolyte with a solid material, which is safer, stores more energy per kilogram, and lasts longer. The problem is that nobody has yet built a cost-effective production line for them. Project Granite brings together battery developer Ilika, manufacturer AGM Batteries, carmaker Jaguar Land Rover, and the Warwick Manufacturing Group to solve that manufacturing puzzle. If the consortium succeeds, the impact is straightforward: electric cars with longer range, faster charging, and simpler battery packs that cost less to build. That could remove two of the biggest barriers to mass adoption—range anxiety and charging time—without requiring new charging infrastructure. The project is squarely applied research, aimed at a commercial product, not fundamental science. Government support through the Faraday Battery Challenge is intended to give the UK a lead in a technology that could reshape the automotive supply chain.

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"The Government's Faraday Battery Challenge program is supporting an exciting research project to bring solid-state batteries much closer to market in future electric vehicles. The main advantage of solid state batteries (SSBs) lies in their increased safety, power performance, enhanced cycle life and increased energy density as compared to current Lithium-ion cells. This should translate into electric vehicles which can travel much further between charges, simpler battery pack designs and faster re-charging when it is necessary. This would ease any remaining customer worries about long charging delays or running out of power on long trips and help more people make the switch to electric motoring. However, solid state battery technology is still in its infancy and no one has yet worked out how to deploy the science on an industrial scale and at reasonable cost. Project Granite will explore the cost-effective routes for scaling up the solid-state technology developed by Ilika, a pioneering leader in this technology, with the support of AGM Batteries, which has industrial experience in manufacturing Lithium-ion cells. The project is led by Jaguar Land Rover, which will develop the new battery pack designs to fit within their future electric vehicles. Warwick Manufacturing Group will supply academic excellence in abuse modelling and cell performance evaluation. The consortium's expertise, backed by Government financial support, will allow Britain's best talent to be brought to bear, so that the UK can take the lead in this transformative technology."

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Original classification

Collaborative R&D

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