**The Game-Changing Potential of Graphene Batteries: A Deep Dive**
For decades, humanity has relied heavily on fossil fuels to meet its energy needs. From coal-powered plants to gasoline-fueled cars, our ancestors turned to these finite resources for warmth and transportation. However, as we stand at the brink of a new century, it’s clear that this reliance on non-renewable energy sources is no longer sustainable. The push toward cleaner, renewable energy has become paramount, but one significant hurdle remains: how do we store this energy effectively? Enter the battery—a crucial piece in the puzzle of transitioning to a greener future.
Over the years, advancements in battery technology have been sluggish, particularly when it comes to energy density and charging speed. Lithium-ion batteries, while revolutionary, are not without their limitations. They require rare materials like cobalt and lithium, which are not only expensive but also pose ethical and environmental concerns. Moreover, their charging times remain a significant inconvenience for electric vehicle (EV) users.
This is where graphene—a groundbreaking material—steps into the spotlight. Derived from graphite, graphene is a single layer of carbon atoms arranged in a hexagonal lattice. This structure gives it unparalleled electrical and thermal conductivity. If you were to unfold just one gram of graphene, its surface area would be nearly 2700 square meters, roughly the size of ten tennis courts combined. This vast surface area allows for an exceptional capacity to store and transfer energy.
### How Graphene Revolutionizes Battery Technology
Graphene’s impact on battery technology can be understood by examining its role in three key areas: energy density, charging speed, and thermal management.
1. **Energy Density**:
Traditional lithium-ion batteries use graphite as the anode material. Each carbon atom in graphite can hold one lithium ion, which limits the amount of charge a battery can store. Graphene, on the other hand, is only one atom thick and can hold lithium ions on both faces and even along its edges. This significantly increases its theoretical energy capacity to 744 mAh/g compared to graphite’s 372 mAh/g. Integrating graphene into batteries could reduce their overall weight while increasing their energy density by up to 18%. For instance, a Tesla Model 3 with a 300-mile range could potentially extend to 354 miles without any added weight.
2. **Charging Speed**:
The slow charging time of lithium-ion batteries is often attributed to the heat generated during the process. Graphene’s exceptional thermal conductivity allows it to dissipate this heat far more efficiently than traditional materials like copper or aluminum. This property enables faster charging times, with some researchers claiming graphene-based batteries could charge to 80% in just 8 minutes—a game-changer for EV adoption.
3. **Thermal Management**:
Graphene’s ability to conduct heat is unmatched. It is 23 times more thermally conductive than graphite and even surpasses copper, which has long been used as a standard conductor. This makes graphene an ideal material for managing the intense heat generated during battery operation, ensuring longevity and stability.
### The Role of Aluminum in Graphene Batteries
Another exciting development involves the integration of aluminum into graphene batteries. Researchers at the University of Queensland have successfully developed a graphene-aluminum hybrid battery that combines the benefits of both materials. This innovation not only enhances energy density but also addresses the issue of rare metal dependency. Unlike traditional lithium-ion batteries, which rely on cobalt and lithium, these hybrid batteries use aluminum—a far more abundant and sustainable material.
The potential applications for this technology are vast. From EVs to commercial vehicles and even cargo ships, graphene-aluminum batteries could revolutionize how we power our world. Their ability to charge 60-70 times faster than conventional batteries would make them ideal for quick recharging stations, potentially making EVs as convenient as gasoline-powered cars.
### Challenges in Scaling Graphene Production
Despite its immense potential, the widespread adoption of graphene is still hindered by one major challenge: production costs. Currently, producing graphene is a complex and expensive process, limiting its availability for mass-market applications. However, companies like GMG (Graphene Manufacturing Group) are working on innovative methods to mass-produce graphene at a lower cost. Their proprietary process converts methane into hydrogen and graphene, effectively capturing carbon in the process—a significant win for the environment.
### The Future of Energy Storage
As we look ahead, the future of energy storage seems increasingly tied to graphene’s potential. Its unique properties offer solutions to some of the most pressing challenges in battery technology—energy density, charging speed, and material sustainability. While there are still hurdles to overcome, particularly in scaling up production, the progress made by companies like GMG offers a glimmer of hope.
The transition from fossil fuels to renewable energy is not just about solar panels and wind turbines—it’s also about the batteries that store this clean energy for later use. Graphene has the potential to be the game-changer we’ve been waiting for, making renewable energy more accessible and reliable than ever before.
### Conclusion
Graphene’s impact on battery technology is nothing short of revolutionary. Its ability to enhance energy density, improve charging speeds, and manage heat more effectively positions it as a key player in the shift toward sustainable energy. While challenges remain, ongoing research and development are bringing us closer to a future where graphene batteries become a reality—paving the way for a cleaner, more efficient world.
What aspect of graphene excites you most? Whether it’s its potential to revolutionize EVs or its ability to store renewable energy, share your thoughts in the comments below. After all, science thrives on curiosity and collaboration.
"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enFor the last century, we’ve produced theenergy we need by burning things.Whether it be coal in power plants, or gasolinein our cars, the energy we’ve needed hascome from fossil fuels.Not too unlike our cave dwelling ancestorswho burned wood for warmth.But if we are to progressto a cleaner civilizedfuture in the next century, we need to lookto renewable forms of energy.And because we can’t control when the sunshines or wind blows, that means storing thatenergy for when we need it, and that of coursemeans batteries.It’s why I talk about batteries all thetime on this channel, and why you’re inluck because today there’s some breakthroughresearching happening into graphene batteries,that you guessed it, can be a “game changer”.Now if you’re thinking, didn’t you doa video on graphene, yes I did, but that wasa graphene supercapacitor, an electrostaticform of energy storage, as opposed to chemicalenergy storage like the battery in your smartphoneor EV.So how does Graphene change the game, whatsorts of benefits might it bring, and whatexactly is graphene?Let’s dive in.I believe batteries and battery research areone of the most important areas of sciencethis decade.And graphene has long been heralded as a miraclematerial that is stronger than steel, lighterthan titanium, and better at transferringelectricity and heat than copper.Graphene is a variation of carbon — butmore specifically, a variation of graphite— that stuff inside your pencils.But unlike typical graphite, or other formsof carbon, graphene is only one atom thick— which basically means its a 2 dimensionalmaterial.Why does this matter?Well, materials are electrically conductivebecause electrons can freely move across theirsurface.So the more surface area a material has, themore electrons it can facilitate.If you unfolded just one gram of graphene,it would have a surface area of nearly 2700square meters — roughly the size of 10 tenniscourts!Graphene also has a tightly-bonded, hexagonal,honeycomb-like pattern.This shape gives it all sorts of unique propertiesbecause those electrons have so much spaceto move around.Not only is graphene insanely good and conductingboth heat and electricity, it’s also insanelystrong — with a tensile strength four timesthat of steel!Yet despite that strength, it still remainsincredibly flexible.These properties have elevated graphene toone of the most coveted materials on the planet.But its graphene’s unique electrical andthermal conductive properties that make itso attractive to battery researchers.To understand why that is, let’s break downthe different parts of a battery so we canbetter understand how different breakthroughscould help give us a better battery.At it’s core a battery takes input energyand stores it, to get output energy at a latertime.If it helps think about two water tanks, oneon the floor, and one on your roof.You could exert some energy and carry bucketsof water from the floor tank and pour it onyour roof tank.Then later when you needed, open a valve andlet this water flow back down via gravity,and power a water wheel.This is gravitational potential energy, andwe’ve basically built a gravity battery.But a gravity battery has super low energydensity, you’d need lake on a hill, to reallystore any energy this way.To power our phones and cars, we need somethingmuch more energy dense, like a chemical battery.In a conventional lithium ion battery, wehave a few parts.The cathodeThe anodeA separatorAn electrolyteElectrodes on both the anode and cathode tocarry electronsTraditional lithium ion batteries have graphiteanodes, and various types of cathodes likeNMO (nickel manganese oxide) or NMC (nickelmanganese cobalt).In very broad strokes, cathodes are selectedfor their ability to attract an electron fromlithium, leaving lithium ion, a positive elementmissing 1 electron.When a battery is charged, this lithium iontravels through the electrolye through theseparator and gets intercalated or wedgedinto the graphite latticein the anode.Thefirst way we can improve on todays battery,is by replacing the graphite in the anodewith graphene.Graphite’s hexagonal honeycomb structuremeans it takes 6 carbon atoms to hold on toone lithium ion.And this is what limits how much charge abattery can hold.Graphene, though still a hexagonal honeycomblattice, is only 1 atom thick, and able tohold lithium ions on both faces, and eventhe edges.As a result graphene has a theoretical capacityof 744 mAh/g compared to graphite at 372 mAh/g.Here is a chart of the mass of various partsof a Lithium Manganese Oxide EV Battery.33% of the weight is cathode, and 15% anode.If we used the theoretical values for graphene,we could reduce its weight by 6% to just 9%,we could use that mass for the cathode instead,increasing it to 39% of the total batteryweight, and increase energy density by 18%.That means a 300 mile range Tesla Model 3,could now go 354 miles.With no added weight.But it get’s even more interesting, if welook back at that table, you’ll see there’s11% copper and 19% aluminum in the batterymass.These are the electrodes, or current collectorswhere the electrons travel through.Aluminum is on the cathode side, even thoughits a worse electrical conductor than copper,because copper reacts with lithium in adverseways.Copper is used as the current collector onthe anode side, as shown on this amazing animationby Jordan on his channel the Limiting Factor.In fact after this video, go check out thisvideo he made, trust me you’ll thank melater.So this then gets into the next benefit ofgraphene, its electrical conductivity.The copper electrode is 200x more electricallyconductive than the graphite anode.But if we swapped the graphite anode for agraphene one, we might not need the copperat all.That’s because the entire graphene anodeconducts electricity 333 times better thangraphite, or 68% better than even copper!So if we coulde get away from needing copperat all, or even reduce the amount, that extramass we saved could again go into more cathodeand anode material.Future research could possibly even allowfor a graphene current collector on the cathodeside, reducing the level of aluminum and increaseenergy density further.Ok so that’s a look at how graphene canhelp with the battery anode, but its worthpointing out, there’s a lot of researchgoing into battery anodes that doesn’t requireany graphene.The other new kid on the block is silicon,and it has the ability to store 10x more lithiumions than graphite.Tesla’s batteries today already have a smallpercent of silicon in its anode, and I hadthe chance to chat with Fabrice Hudry of OneD Battery sciences.(INSERT INTERVIEW)So while graphene isn’t the only game intown when it comes to a better anode, it doeshave another very special property, and thatis its thermal conductivity.Graphene then is basically a world recordsetting material for both thermal and electricalconductivity.It’s this combination that allows for oneof graphenes greatest benefits.Super fast charging.Imagine charging your ev to 80% in just 8minutes, something that can take over 40 minutestoday.That’s pretty much as fast as a gas fillup,and something the Chinese Company GAC plansto promote in their upcoming models.GAC First made the news by offering a 1000kmrange EV with their Aion LX plus, which usesa silicon sponge anode(link).But they have also made the news for somegroundbreaking progress on a graphene anodebattery capable of charging at 6C.1C means a battery can charge or discharge0-100% in 1 hour.6C then means it can do this in just 10 minutes.The limiting factor when it comes to batterycharging speeds is all the heat that it produces.No battery is 100% efficient, so some of theenergy used to charge ends up as heat, insteadof energy stored.To understand how graphene can help batteriesin terms of heat, let’s look at the thermalconductivity of graphite, aluminum, copperand graphene.Aluminum conducts heat 1.6x better than graphite,Copper 2.7x better than graphite, and itsthis quality that makes copper used in electricwiring in everything from electronics, toevs and homes.But graphene, is absolutely off the charts,at 23x better than graphite.If i were to hold a meter long plate of apoor insulator like ceramic on one side, andtake a blowtorch to the other, my hands wouldbarely even get warm.The heat just doesn’t transfer well throughceramic, in contrast, do the same thing toa plate of copper, and before long, it’llget too hot to touch.But take a plate of graphene, and the heatwill race to your hand.This is an excellent property for a batterymaterial, because with a well designed coolingsolution like most EVs have, and most theheat of the battery will be sucked out ofthe battery walls via cooling ribbons.Its this combination of excellent thermaland electrical conductor, that makes grapheneso lucrative for batteries.Ok so we can increase energy density withgraphene in the anode, and dramatically increasecharging speeds throughout the battery, butthere’s one more benefit we need to talkabout.Thanks primarily to Tesla, we’ve seen lithiumion battery prices plummet in the past decade.From nearly $1,200 / kWh in 2010, to just$137 in 2020.This is largely due to the production of moreand more battery factories, and increasesin supply due to increases in EV demand, againprimarily due to Tesla.But here’s the thing, while manufacturedlithium ion battery prices have been falling,the same can’t be said for the price ofraw lithium.(link)The prices for raw lithium have been prettysteady in the same period, except for a smallprice rise in 2018, until prices came backdown in 2020.But since, lithium prices are absolutely soaring.Whether its massive demand for EV batteries,the pandemic or a host of other factors, thiswill be the biggest challenge for lithiumin the coming decade.It’s not just the prices, lithium is alsonot especially abundant on earth.Here is a chart of crustal abundance in PPMfor some various elements.Graphite480Copper50Graphene480Lithium20Aluminum82000Graphite comes in at 480PPM, Copper at just50, but Lithium comes in at just 20 PPM.Compared to the most abundant metal in theearth’s crust Aluminum which comes in at82,000 PPM.This abundance of aluminum would make it akiller choice for batteries, in fact we’vedone a video on the aluminum air battery whichwe’ll link in the show notes.But that is a primary cell, meaning it can’tbe recharged.Instead you’d bring your car with a depletedbattery, have it swapped out, and that oldpack would have to be recycled.Researchers at the University of Queenslandin Australia have successfully developed agraphene-based supercapacitor/ battery hybrid.Remember, we talked all about supercapacitorsin our previous video, which you should definitelycheck out.This battery uses aluminum, so technicallyits a graphene aluminum battery.Director Professor Alan Rowan and his teamof researchers have been working on devisingways to make graphene into a more efficientelectrode for powering batteries.This hybrid battery ivolves embedding aluminumions into a perforated graphene mesh.This graphene-aluminum latter acts as thecathode while the anode is made of pure aluminiumfoil.The research caught the attention of the Australia-basedGraphene Manufacturing Group or GMG, who arein the process of applying this breakhtorughresearch to battery cells which they planto introduce to the market within the nextyear or two.Prototype batteries can reportedly chargebetween 60 and 70 times faster than lithiumion batteries.Even if this is only theoretical, it’s nostretch to imagine these batteries charingto 80% in just a few minutes.And, because graphene conducts heat far betterthan lithium, researchers suggest their batteriescould last 3x as long as standard lithiumion batteries!Now, there is a catch with this technology.Right now, these graphene-aluminum hybridbatteries have energy-densities between 150and 160 watt hours/ kg.Tesla's 4680-type battery cell has a densityranging between 272-296 Wh/kg —almost doublethe amount of energy!Even Tesla's current Model 3 cells have about260 wH/kg, with an average range of about330 miles.Assuming graphene aluminum batteries of similarweight, that means they’d max out around115 miles on a single charge.So in that sense these batteries don’t quitestack up yet.But, remember they can charge up to 70 timesfaster than lithium-ion batteries.Which means in the real world, the experiencemay be closer to pulling in to a station fora quick recharge before heading back on theroad.In fact, in may even be faster than fillingup a car with gas.This could make plug-in EVs more accessible,especially for people who don’t have accessto home chargers.Plus how about busses or other commercialvehicles and cargo ships, where the addedweight wouldn’t really be a problem.As of June 2022, the company has commissionedits graphene aluminium-ion batteries (“G+AIBatteries”) in pouch cell format and thatthe first G+Al battery pouch cells have beenmanufactured.Currently, their tech is being utilized ata pilot plant.While the batteries aren’t going to hitthe market just yet, these are major steps,meaning the technology is closer than ever!But its not just the batteries themselvesthat are a big deal.As I said before, one of the biggest thingskeeping graphene from hitting the market iscost.One way GMG has worked around that is by developingmethods for mass producing their own graphene!While the method is propriety, and thereforekept pretty tightly underwraps, their meansof developing graphene brings the cost downsignificantly.Not only that, but the process could potentiallybe a win for the environment.Again, the exact process is abit of a mystery,but according to the company it involves aprocess that converts methane into hydrogenand graphene, essentially a form of carboncapture.So then there you have it, graphene can revolutionizethe battery in quite a few ways, and is beingpursued by quite a few different companies.Ditching rare metals like lithium and cobaltin favor of aluminum would be the game changerof game chargers, and would all but renderfossil fuels obsolete.But the the great big elephant in the roomis how we’re going to produce graphene ata commercial scale.Is researching being done today going to leadto a future where graphene is as common asgraphite?Or will graphene costs and supplies alwayskeep it out of reach.Sadly this, as it ever has been, is the greatunknown.But before you leave a comment saying graphenewill never be a thing, just remember that’swhat everyone said about everything untilit wasn’t.There was a time when many wrote of lithiumion batteries as a fools errand, and yet herewe are.That’s the beauty of science, and why iget excited thinking about all the brilliantminds hard at work on the great challengesof tomorrow.Hopefully this look should give you an ideafor why I’m so excited about graphene, andobviously it isn’t just me.Let’s hope for some good news on graphenemanufacturing breakthroughs like the onesGMG is working on in the very near future.A world full of dirt cheap batteries justcant come soon enough.But what do you think?What aspect of graphene has you most excited?Sound off in the comments below.\n"
