IBM Battery 500: A look inside a lithium-air battery

In 2009, IBM researchers set out to develop lithium-air battery technology capable of powering a family-sized electric car for approximately 500 miles (800 km) on a single charge.

Instead of using heavy metal oxides, lithium-air batteries borrow oxygen from the air as the vehicle is being driven, creating an air-breathing battery. This results in lighter batteries with high energy density that extend the car's range from a single charge.

IBM researchers have successfully demonstrated in the lab the fundamental chemistry of the charge-and-recharge process for lithium-air batteries and, if this bold research project is successful, people could see it in cars between 2020 and 2030.

• Category

  Science & Technology

[IBMLabs]

Thanks for your questions. We expect to have a working lab demo by the end of 2013.

As for consumers, our target is between 2020-2030.

The time required to develop this is simply a matter of working out the science.

[labobo]

What is the current status of the project ?

When can consumers get their hands on one ? This year, next year, 50 years from now ?

btw what took you so long ? did the fuel companies pay you of to delay projects like this one ?

They have done it before...

[yakyakyak69]

High Risk is code for "taxpayer Subsidy" aka "Public-Private Partnership". "Fascism should more appropriately be called (Crony) Corporatism because it is a merger of state and corporate power (Public-Private Partnerships)." - Benito Mussolini.

[Sassymui8]

IBM can probably buy half of China ;)

[krzintegraboi]

isnt IBM owned by china now??

[bryanjones007]

I watchin this sittin in my trailer home with my 18- wheeler parked on the front lawn and I'm confused. Lithum air gonna tote my 80,000 pounds boy! I asked Grandpa about this, he said lithum are is bullshit, so its bullshit! Dont debate me boy! You get me angry and Im gonna wake up the wife and knock some teeth outa her mouth. Get me really angry and Im gonna beat my daughters piggy little face! And I'm a Mormon.

[randomkille]

Will this type of batteries be cheaper then Lithium-ion batteries, from a energy stored per kilogram perspective?

[Ou8y2k2]

Right, but hydrated aluminium oxide can be recycled, and would probably still be cheaper than finding kilo- or megatons of lithium to mine.

[qp0wie]

"Aluminium–air batteries are primary cells, i.e., non-rechargeable. Once the aluminium anode is consumed by its reaction with atmospheric oxygen at a cathode immersed in a water-based electrolyte to form hydrated aluminium oxide, the battery will no longer produce electricity"

Source: Wikipedia

[OfficeThug]

You can't use molten salt batteries in cars. They operate at temperatures in excess of 700 degrees Celcius.

They are nice for intermittent grid storage though.

[FAZERADIFERENCA]

Japan's Sumitomo Electric Industries has developed a molten-salt battery that is 90 percent cheaper to build than lithium-ion batteries. Sumitomo said the battery could cost as little as $240 per kilowatt-hour, or 10 percent that of a Japanese-made lithium-ion battery.

SAFE + CHEAP = ECOLOGIC !!! THAT'S WHAT'S EARTH NEEDS!!!

[FAZERADIFERENCA]

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