Charging the lithium-ion batteries that fuel electric vehicles is a delicate balancing act. Ideally, drivers want to power up as quickly as possible to get back on the motorway, but with current technology, speeding up the process can cause damage to the battery.
When a lithium-ion battery is being charged, lithium ions migrate from one side of the device, the cathode, to the other, the anode. By making the lithium ions migrate faster, the battery is charged more quickly, but sometimes the lithium ions don’t fully move into the anode.
In this situation, lithium metal can build up, and this can trigger early battery failure or cause the cathode to wear and crack.
All of these issues will reduce the lifetime of the battery and the effective range of the vehicle — expensive and frustrating consequences for drivers.
“Fast charging is the key to increasing consumer confidence and overall adoption of electric vehicles,” said Eric Dufek, a researcher at Idaho...