Energy storage is still not considered where it needs to be, but to what degree is that due to regulation, lack of understanding or cost? For Mechanical Engineering Professor Dr. Arumugam "Ram" Manthiram, his answer is cost, cost, cost.
Manthiram, director of the Texas Materials Institute and the Materials Science and Engineering Program, participated in a panel on energy storage at the second annual UT Energy Forum Feb. 3-4. The panel, moderated by Dr. Joseph Beno, senior research scientist at the Center for Electromechanics, brought together experts from industry and academia to discuss the latest issues in energy.
"It's all cost, cost, cost," Manthiram said, which is intrinsically linked to materials.
"All of these go back to the type of materials you use," he said. "What is that magic material that can be lower in cost, have a longer life, better safety, store more energy and can charge and discharge fast.
"Laptops and cell phones are fine with battery technology, but the same technology cannot currently be used for transportation and grid storage."
That's where his research group steps in.
Currently, Manthiram is working toward developing new materials and concepts that could make battery-operated transportation solutions more viable. He said the market is headed in the right direction with the debut of the Chevy Volt, as well as advances in start/stop technology that has recently been introduced in other vehicles.
However, for Manthiram, there is still a lot of ground that needs to be covered in order to have more complete battery-operated, electrical transportation solutions.
"People are still buying combustion engine cars because of the cost," he said. "In order to find materials that will bring down the cost, more basic science and engineering research needs to be done."
Manthiram's hope is to invent the affordable "magic material" in his lab, which will help standardize the technology and bring down the cost. Once invented, he would turn to industry and have it commercialize the technology.
This process could, however, take nearly a decade to come to fruition.
"From lab to commercialization, that could take five years, or 10 years – it's a long time," Manthiram said. "It's one thing to do it in the university lab, and it's another thing to create consumer products. Scale is always an issue. You have to scale up, and when you scale up there will be issues."
However, industry executives remain optimistic about the growth potential of the market.
Mike Hanratty, sales director at A123 Systems Inc., and also a member of the panel, said the surface of the market has barely been scratched.
Hanratty said he foresees start/stop transportation technology becoming one of the first technologies to be adopted across the board because it sees the highest return on investment. He also sees the plug-in hybrid as being another key solution.
"As far as the electrification of vehicles, it is huge," he said. "It has been proven they are several times more efficient than fuel vehicles and we need to improve the efficiency of our vehicles. The market is growing. We're learning."
