How Are Electric Car Batteries Made?

Cristian Presură – Physics Through Stories

Curious about how EV batteries actually work and why they're both awesome and frustrating? In this video, we break down the science behind electric car batteries, explore their challenges, and see why the future still belongs to EVs. Stay till the end for a special announcement! Subscribe to join our community and comment what you found most fascinating. #ElectricCars #Batteries #Tech #Science #EV  👉 This channel was created in collaboration with https://www.youtube.com/@presura  0:00 - Electric Cars: An Introduction 1:09 - Current Challenges for Electric Cars 3:16 - Growth and Battery Challenges 4:48 - How Batteries Work 5:43 - Lithium-Ion Battery Structure and Operation 9:00 - Alternative Battery Uses (Removed Ads) 9:51 - Energy Density and Improvements 12:49 - Future Developments and Optimism

Transcript

00:00in just over 10 years we should only be driving electric cars that's what the european union wants

00:05for this to happen we need lighter and cheaper batteries for cars

00:10let's go into detail in this video about how ev batteries work to understand their advantages

00:15and challenges stay until the end to see why i believe that even though the electric car market

00:22has slowed its growth the future still belongs to them until the end of the video dear friends

00:28an announcement i have been nominated for the romanian influencer awards 2024 in the education

00:33category on the list you will also find other dear friends alex attention katmeri horia zaya fed or dan

00:40kadar in the tech category so you have someone to vote for i like what i do i can never

00:46say that's

00:46it i've learned everything there's nothing left to find out with your help i keep learning too

00:52i'm trying to put a link here somewhere on the card so you can vote but i'll also leave the

00:56link in the

01:07description

01:08announcing a few years ago when everyone believed in electric cars i didn't believe today when people

01:15are becoming skeptical i'm optimistic a few years ago i used to tell people this car batteries are heavy

01:22they're expensive and on top of that they don't work well at low temperatures you'll end up

01:27stranded on the road in winter i used to tell them but they wouldn't listen electric car sales exploded

01:33as you can see in this chart in 2020 there were three million in 2023 almost 14 million electric or

01:42hybrid

01:42cars were sold but what i said wasn't nonsense what is holding back this growth is electric car batteries

01:50the battery of the daisha spring costs about 7 000 euros weighs almost 200 kilograms and gives you a

01:58range of 200 kilometers that's in the summer in winter much less at 50 the range is only 80 kilometers

02:07and charging takes 13 hours at home and if you have a fast charging station it takes one hour these

02:14numbers aren't very appealing to me as a result people are readjusting the company audi which still

02:20wants to produce only electric cars by 2033 says that the transition will be slower meanwhile they'll

02:27also produce hybrid cars the same goes for general motors the reasons one high prices usually for those

02:35with deeper pockets at tesla the electric battery exceeds 20 000 euros i have a kia picanto it costs me

02:4310 000 euros 9. i read that a kia ev9 the electric car costs 50 000 euros i think i'll

02:51pass another problem

02:52is the public charging stations the united states would need 180 000 it only has 40 000 fortunately i have

03:00one

03:01right in the parking lot in front do you have one to these concerns is added the usually low number

03:07of

03:07kilometers you can drive with an electric car on a single charge which becomes even lower during winter

03:13buyers are growing skeptical that doesn't mean the electric car market is collapsing in 2023 in north

03:21america 40 percent more electric cars were sold than in the previous year in total there were 1 million

03:27vehicles and china with its production of 5 million electric vehicles annually is ready to take over

03:35the european market how much of that will be allowed is another discussion where is the problem as i

03:40anticipated essentially the problem is in the batteries look the electric motor is essentially much

03:47simpler than the combustion engine we all agree on that all kitchen appliances use electric motors

03:53other wise the car is made the same way body seats steering wheel and so on the difference is the

03:59energy

04:00source the battery electric energy or the fuel tank thermal energy batteries for electric cars have some

04:08intrinsic disadvantages compared to the gasoline tank they have a lower energy density both by volume and

04:15by kilogram this makes the batteries bulkier and heavier in addition batteries charge more slowly than

04:21gasoline which is poured directly into the tank and let's not forget electric batteries are still

04:27expensive even though their price has dropped as for the price of fuel electricity or gasoline the

04:33difference is not very big and it also depends on how prices evolve on the market why do batteries

04:39have all these problems to understand let's go back to how an electric battery is made after that i'll tell

04:45you why despite the disadvantages i'm optimistic here is the volta battery the first battery made of

04:51zinc copper and a layer soaked with salt between them it's called an electrolyte how does it work

04:59the electrolyte eats away at the zinc and releases some of its electrons then some of the zinc ions

05:05diffuse into the electrolyte and reach the copper atoms they give up some of their electrons to the

05:10zinc which becomes neutral and no longer matters thus at the interface with the electrolyte two zones are

05:17formed one with free electrons and another with positive copper ions arranged near the electrons if

05:23that's the case when we place a bulb a load between the two zones the electrons can thus reach the

05:29copper

05:29ions more easily through the conductor and the bulb in this case a current is formed and the bulb lights

05:35up

05:36the problem with volta's battery is that it can't be recharged how do rechargeable batteries work

05:43let's take the example of lithium ion batteries which are most commonly used in electric cars and by the

05:49way i like this headline from 10 years ago lithium is used because its valence electron is the most

05:55weakly held by the nucleus the electron of hydrogen for example has an energy of minus 13 electron volts

06:02that means you have to give the electron an energy equivalent to 13 electron volts to remove it on the

06:09other hand the ionization energy of lithium is five electron volts if you want to steal its valence

06:15electron lithium is one of the atoms from which this electron can be easily stolen if the electron you

06:21only need an energy of five electron volts we say that lithium has a high electronegativity it easily

06:27loses its electron here's the structure of a lithium ion battery on the left is a cobalt oxide crystal

06:34which contains lithium atoms on the right are layers of graphite which can also be found in pencil leads

06:41and in the middle is a specially designed separator however the crystal on the left has ionic

06:48characteristics this means that in the crystal lithium has already lost its valence electron and has

06:54become a positive ion watch what happens when we charge the lithium ion battery an electric field is

07:01created inside between the positive and negative sides of the power supply what does an electric

07:06field do it exerts a lawrence force on the electric charges positive electric charges are pushed in the

07:12direction of the field while negative electric charges are pushed in the opposite direction in

07:17other words this field separates them let's see now what happens in the crystal the valence electrons of

07:23the lithium atoms which were wandering around the crystal so to speak actually have a special role

07:28in the cohesion of the crystal but we won't go into detail so the free electrons in the crystal are

07:34also influenced by the electric field they will move the other way because they have a negative charge

07:40they reach the electrodes flow through the conductor and then the electrons reach the graphite layer on

07:46the right here they settle roughly in a layer on the other hand the electric field also acts on the

07:52lithium

07:52ions and is strong enough to pull them out of the crystal

07:56they thus diffuse to the right pass through the separator membrane which is specially designed to

08:02allow only lithium ions to pass then reach the graphite and settle randomly between its layers

08:09they stay apart from the electrons in the graphite which they want to reach electrostatic attraction draws

08:15them but the graphite structure blocks them what occurs when we discharge the battery the electrons still

08:22want to reach the lithium atoms they came from they can do this by freely moving back through the electric

08:27conductor

08:28thus generating electric current however this way they only reach the crystal where the lithium ions are missing

08:35this is where solid state physics comes in the crystal was built in such a way that the energy of

08:40the lithium ion

08:41and electron system is lower when they are part of the crystal than when they are separated in graphite

08:47this means that the lithium ions will also return to the crystal because the total energy will be lower

08:53basically the lithium ions easily diffuse back into the crystal they left through the membrane

09:00these batteries are good not only for cars they can also be used in photovoltaic systems if you want to

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09:20production the professionalism and over 18 years of experience of the team ensure a fast and safe

09:27installation this way you will turn your home or business into an autonomous energy center also the

09:33financial benefits are significant with notable reductions in electricity costs with eco solaris

09:40you will get continuous support and specialized consultancy so you can have the best experience

09:45visit the eco solaris.ro website now to find out more information i'll leave the link in the description

09:51all right how does understanding how lithium ion batteries work help us well it helps us see why

09:57countless improvements are possible in the future in other words why am i now more optimistic

10:03when it comes to the future of electric cars let's estimate together the energy density of a lithium ion battery

10:11how well it's clear that the energy is stored in the lithium ions when they are separated

10:17how much energy does a lithium ion release when it gains an electron

10:21in electron volts an electron volt is a unit of energy the calculation is easy we multiply the battery

10:28voltage of about 3.7 v by the charge of the ion which is equal to the electric charge of

10:34the electron

10:35in absolute value so a single ion gives us an energy of 3.7 electron volts a lithium ion however

10:42is part of

10:43the lithium cobalt oxide crystal unit the mass of this unit is 1.6 times 10 to the power of

10:49minus 22 grams

10:52then we use wolfram alpha and divide the energy stored in a lithium ion about 3.7 electron volts

10:57by the mass of the lithium cobalt oxide crystal unit which is 10 to the power of minus 22 grams

11:04we express this in watt hours instead of electron volts and wolfram alpha gives us an energy density

11:11of about 1000 watt hours per kilogram wow i didn't expect that it's not far from the actual energy density

11:19of a lithium ion battery in practice which is about 200 to 300 watt hours per kilogram of course in

11:26practice the density is three to four times lower than the theoretical value for many reasons we also

11:31have the separator layer we also have the graphite which adds extra weight the energy density will become

11:38lower and lower plus in practice the lithium cobalt oxide crystal the separator layer and the graphite

11:45are placed on some foils which are then packed tightly and these also weigh something plus in

11:51practice not all lithium ions diffuse toward the graphite in fact we can say it the other way around

11:58when engineers managed to achieve an energy density only a few times lower than the maximum theoretical

12:03value of 1000 w kg which we also calculated that's truly extraordinary congratulations to them

12:10why is the above calculation important because it tells us not only what the problems of car batteries

12:16are like low energy density but also how they can be solved it's true that a battery energy density of

12:22200 wk is low to travel 500 kilometers without recharging a car needs 80 000 w kg that means the

12:32battery can

12:32also weigh 400 kilo glass on the other hand the energy density per volume of electric batteries is also

12:39lower than that stored in a gasoline tank that means batteries take up more space than gasoline and

12:46yet my optimism comes from the calculation above so how can we increase the energy density per kilogram

12:52by looking for a lighter crystal how can we boost energy density per volume by searching for and

12:58researching more complex crystals how can we lower the prices of electric batteries well we find a

13:04cheaper way to manufacture the crystal which is a major part of the cost or by finding other crystal

13:09in structures that have the same function but are cheaper to manufacture i was going to give you

13:15examples of such structures because research in the field of electric batteries is booming right now

13:21then to show you examples of batteries that make it possible for electric cars to reach even 1000

13:26kilometers on a single charge unfortunately this video has already become too long but i will do that in

13:32a future episode please leave me links to interesting materials in the comments until next time i remind you

13:38that i have been nominated for the romanian influencer award 2024 in the education category vote by clicking

13:46this link right here i'll add the link in the description until next time i'm christian presura physics explained

13:54you are cool and i wish you all the best goodbye

13:57good bye

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