Powering the UK: Predicting battery performance in electrical vehicles
The electrification of cars is crucial to future-proof the automotive industry and the 100,000 or so UK jobs that rely on it. The University of Southampton is undertaking fundamental research to help the UK create an electric vehicle battery industry, building on its world-leading research in this field.
The challenge
A flagship policy of the Industrial Strategy, the Faraday Challenge, represents a substantial £250m UK Government investment to provide the UK automotive industry with significant global leverage in the form of a highly skilled workforce, attracting Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEMS) to set up battery factories, and in turn supply the UK car industry with the components it needs.
A sizeable part of this investment is The Faraday Institution, initially consisting of four large consortia sharing £40m of an £80m grant for fundamental research into automotive batteries. The consortia are focused on multi-scale modelling – of which the University of Southampton is a key part – as well as battery degradation (also with Southampton participation), recyclability and new solid-state electrolytes.
Fundamental materials
To be able to design and supply all the systems within electric cars, the industry needs to better understand the materials involved, and the interactions between them. Central to this is a full mechanistic understanding of the materials within battery packs.
The heterogeneous structure of batteries means the materials within it undergo many chemical reactions. Southampton’s multi-disciplinary team from Chemistry, Maths and Engineering are working together to model the characteristics of these materials, and will be developing computational modelling tools to design better materials and devices, predict changes in their behaviour in service, and optimise performance under extreme conditions.
Fast-forwarding research
These computational modelling tools will fast-forward fundamental research, enabling accurate prediction of the performance of materials in different circumstances and climates, and extending the lifetime and performance of batteries.
“We are interested in finding ways for batteries to work better in lower temperatures. Consumers in cold climates simply won’t accept a battery failing to work at minus 10 degrees” says Associate Professor Denis Kramer, who leads the COLDSTART work package within the Multi-Scale Modelling consortium.
Central to the project are Southampton’s hugely powerful super-computers. The University’s computing infrastructure is well placed to handle the demanding calculations from day one, until the team can also use the Faraday Institution’s own dedicated, super-computer located at University College, London, once it is built.
Accelerating science
The Faraday Institution has a clear research focus and deliverables, putting considerable pressure on the Southampton team to produce substantial outputs within the space of a year.
“The sheer scale of the research is interesting”, says Associate Professor Kramer, “We have the luxury of substantial resources but very little time. The challenge is to accelerate the scientific process with people and resources. This mission-driven research will certainly bring new challenges, but also new opportunities to realise ambitions fast.
“The multi-scale capability of the modelling methods we’re developing will be extremely valuable not only to existing and future battery systems, but also to areas beyond battery cars such as in fuel cells, flow batteries, and for modelling other electrochemical interfaces such as in Corrosion Science and beyond.”