About
The Faraday Institution's Nextrode project is one of six Faraday Institution projects which aim to optimise the performance of lithium ion technologies. Started in September 2019, it is a collaboration between seven university partners and several industrial partners to research new methods for manufacturing smarter electrodes and to put them onto the path to commercialisation.
The university partners are Imperial College London, University College London, University of Birmingham, University of Oxford, University of Sheffield, University of Southampton and the University of Warwick.
At the Faraday Institution's 2020 Annual Conference, Professor Patrick Grant and Dr Rachel Smith gave an overview of the Nextrode project and an update on progress. Click here to view the presentation.
Further information on each of the workpackages can be found below.
Phase 2 - October 2023 to September 2025
The aim of this workpackage is to advance electrode manufacture through the application of new particle technology science, building on the progress made during the first phase of Nextrode.
Our focus is in four main areas:
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Novel co-operative agglomerates
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Dry powder mixing and flow
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Novel deposition for dry processing
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Advanced compaction modelling.
The aim of this workpackage is to utilise data for the design of manufacturing process steps that enable slurry casting to produce reproducible electrodes with improved property balance.
Our focus is in five main areas:
- Metrology and multiscale approach to deposition, design and control
- Sustainable electrode formulations and design rules
- Low solvent slurry processing
- Digital linking process parameters to electrode microstructure
- Modelling of deposition, drying and calendering.
The aim of this workpackage is to research how to manufacture new arrangements of anode and cathode materials and to understand and quantify any benefits due to these electrode design changes.
Our focus is in five main areas:
- Smart cathodes
- Smart anodes
- Understanding smart electrodes
- Solvent free processing
- Rapid prototyping.
This workpackage aims to link correlative imaging, quantification and image-based modelling to design optimal microstructures and inform manufacturing development, alongside computationally efficient implementation of design models for rapid optimisation.
Our focus is in three main areas:
- Microstructural modelling to inform electrode design and manufacture
- X-ray imaging and microscopy to evaluate novel structures & processing routes
- Optimisation of electrode structure.
The aim of this workpackage is to research the creation and validation of novel data-driven predictive models of electrode manufacturing driving improvements in production efficiency.
Our focus is in four main areas:
- Data driven manufacturing
- Manufacturing/ cell diagnostics
- Advanced metrology for battery manufacture: lab-to-line
- Real time control.
Phase 1 - October 2019 to September 2023
The aim of this work package is to alleviate key constraints in electrode manufacturing by particle level design that enhances downstream processing and improves electrode performance.
Our focus is in three main areas:
- Co-operative conductive additive/binder
- Design of hierarchically structured particles
- Aqueous and solvent-free processing.
Both Dr Denis Cumming and Dr Ruihuan Ge presented at the International Battery Production Conference 2021. Dr Cumming presented on "Electronic pathway length manipulation and impact on conductivity networks in lithium-ion battery electrodes" and the presentation can be found here. Dr Ge presented on "Modelling of Li-ion battery electrode calendering by discrete element method (DEM)". The presentation can be found here.
The aim of this work package is to develop novel metrology techniques and measurements during electrode manufacture to create additional design space and performance gain.
Our focus is in two main areas:
- Mixing metrology
- Deposition metrology.
The aim of this work package is to develop and implement a new generation of manufacturing technologies for smart electrodes supported by numerical design tools.
Our focus is in three main areas:
- Graded electrodes
- Large-area templating
- Additive manufacture.
Dr Yige Sun presented at the International Battery Production Conference 2021 on the "Schwarz-Primitive structured electrodes for lithium-ion battery via 3D printed wax templating". The presentation can be found here.
The aim of this work package is to link correlative X-ray and other imaging, image quantification and image based modelling to design optimal microstructures and inform manufacturing development
Our focus is in three main areas:
- Multi-scale structural characterisation
- Image-based modelling
- Synthetic structures and structural identification.
The aim of this work package is to develop new methods of quantifying and optimising electrode manufacture using data science.
Our focus is in four main areas:
- Data strategy and experimental design
- Data analysis
- Model creation and predictive tools
- Economic and environmental assessment.
Dr Geanina Apachitei presented at the International Battery Production Conference 2021 on the "Study of the cathode coating-drying manufacturing process by design of experiments". The presentation can be found here.
The aim of this work package is to establish a representative baseline of cell performance against which progress can be measured. Collecting this cell data via work package 5 will allow a variety of comparisons to be made, including between partners and over scales. New manufacturing approaches will be calibrated by comparing the resulting cell performance (at the same scale) to this baseline dataset. Here and in all workpackages we will make use of the world-class electrochemical and other characterisation facilities available at all partners.
