That is what is claimed we will have by 2017, according to an article titled “Berkeley team aims to give batteries a boost”, written by Jeremy Thomas (bayareanewsgroup.com). It seems that the DOE is funding a $120 million program to develop new battery technology at a new facility called the Joint Center for Energy Storage Research. This is a 14-member partnership led by Argonne National Laboratory, including Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory, Sandia National Laboratory and a number of other universities and private companies. In January, the Center's Berkeley hub is moving into the lab's new General Purpose Laboratory, bringing its battery scientists, chemists and engineers under one roof for the first time.
The team, headed by JCESR deputy director Venkat Srinivasan, aims to achieve revolutionary advances in battery performance, creating batteries with up to five times the energy capacity of current batteries at one-fifth the cost by 2017. Their plan is to replace lithium batteries with batteries made of cheaper, more durable materials, such as magnesium, aluminum and calcium.
Nearly two years into the project the researchers have narrowed down a list of 100 types of “beyond lithium” battery designs to a handful of promising concepts that are already in the prototype phase.
JCESR's principal investigator, Brett Helms is focusing his research on “flow” batteries that stores energy in a liquid solution of electrolytes that can be pumped through a membrane, generating power when they circulate and react with electrodes. Helms wants to use materials such as sulfur to create a battery with five to 10 times more energy than current flow batteries. He plans to have a working prototype of this battery design by the end of the 5-year initiative. The technology, says Helms, could be used to power electric vehicles someday.
The article mentions that adjacent to the Advanced Light Source building, Toyota has been researching Magnesium-ion batteries.
Using high-power computers, Srinivasan's team has whittled down the number of materials to a few that have sufficient energy capacity, are safe, cheaper and longer-lasting than lithium designs. Within the next year, Srinivasan hopes to have new materials ready for testing and prototypes ready by 2017.
