Such an advance could help the U.S. reach its goal of making half of all vehicles sold powered by an electric or hybrid engine.Dufek and his research team at Idaho National Laboratory have started using machine learning techniques that incorporate charging data to create unique charging protocols.
"We've significantly increased the amount of energy that can go into a battery cell in a short amount of time," says Dufek. "Currently, we're seeing batteries charge to over 90 percent in 10 minutes without lithium plating or cathode cracking." Powering a nearly dead battery to 90 percent power in mere 10 minutes is not so impressive, as it means that it can get an electric vehicle to full charge in about half an hour. While many researchers are looking for methods to achieve this sort of super-fast charging, Dufek says that one advantage of their machine learning model is that it ties the protocols to the physics of what happens in a battery.
The researchers plan to use their model to develop even better methods and help design new lithium-ion batteries that are optimized for fast charging. Dufek says that the ultimate goal is for electric vehicles to be able to "tell" charging stations how to power up their specific batteries quickly and safely.
Powering each electric vehicle battery with a different charging method can be challenging to achieve, as many types of batteries might need to utilize other kinds of charging devices or methods.Range anxiety is seen as a key limitation by many consumers looking to purchase an electric vehicle. The two routes to alleviate this anxiety are through the development of higher energy batteries and batteries capable of charging in 10 minutes or less.