Using combustion to make better batteries

news.mit.edu
7 min read
fairly difficult
MIT researchers have designed a system that uses flames to produce materials critical to lithium-ion batteries. Their combustion-based method promises to be simpler, much quicker, and far less energy-intensive than the conventional method now used to manufacture cathode materials.
For more than a century, much of the world has run on the combustion of fossil fuels. Now, to avert the threat of climate change, the energy system is changing. Notably, solar and wind systems are replacing fossil fuel combustion for generating electricity and heat, and batteries are replacing the internal combustion engine for powering vehicles. As the energy transition progresses, researchers worldwide are tackling the many challenges that arise.

Sili Deng has spent her career thinking about combustion. Now an assistant professor in the MIT Department of Mechanical Engineering and the Class of 1954 Career Development Professor, Deng leads a group that, among other things, develops theoretical models to help understand and control combustion systems to make them more efficient and to control the formation of emissions, including particles of soot.

"So we thought, given our background in combustion, what's the best way we can contribute to the energy transition?" says Deng. In considering the possibilities, she notes that combustion refers only to the process — not to what's burning. "While we generally think of fossil fuels when we think of combustion, the term 'combustion' encompasses many high-temperature chemical reactions that involve oxygen and typically emit light and large amounts of heat," she says.

Given that definition, she saw another role for the expertise she and her team have developed: They could explore the use of combustion to make materials for the energy transition. Under carefully controlled conditions, combusting flames can be used to produce not polluting soot, but rather valuable materials, including some that are critical in the manufacture of lithium-ion batteries.

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