Real graphene battery car mass production?

These days, in the new energy vehicle industry chain, it is necessary to produce some "exploding" heavyweight products in order to show their status. Especially in the field of power batteries, which are the heart of electric vehicles, players have to create their own killer mace.

Battery "magic material"

GAC GROUP also made a big move after BYD launched the blade battery, the Tesla / Ningde era built a million-mile battery, and Honeycomb Energy showed off the jelly battery. GAC GROUP told investors on the interactive platform that the research and development of graphene battery is ongoing and that the technology is expected to be put into mass production testing by the end of this year. As a comprehensive intelligent electric vehicle brand built by GAC, the "Ian", which is about to operate independently, will carry relevant technical achievements.

So, what is the advantage of graphene battery, which can be compared with blade battery and so on?

Generally speaking, as a new type of nano-material, graphene has ultra-high thermal conductivity and electrical conductivity, so it is known as "magic material" in the scientific community. Although most of the electric cars running on the streets are equipped with lithium batteries, graphene is actually recognized by the scientific community earlier than lithium battery materials. Geim and Noosholov, the discoverers of graphene in 2010, won the Nobel Prize in physics a decade ago. It was not until last year that three special contributors to lithium batteries had just won the Nobel Prize.

China also attaches great importance to this magical material. The 13th five-year special plan for scientific and technological innovation in the field of materials formulated by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, especially graphene material technology as a key area of development. Based on this material, graphene batteries have also been pushed to the forefront of the industry. compared with lithium batteries, graphene batteries are much safer and have better heat dissipation, without heating, burning and burning problems caused by rising temperature. and the charging speed is very fast.

It is understood that GAC GROUP started the relevant layout research and development as early as 2014. After 6 years of continuous research and development, GAC has gradually mastered the preparation and application technology of three-dimensional structural graphene (3DG) materials with independent intellectual property rights. In November 2019, the "super fast charging battery" based on this 3DG material independently developed by GAC was officially announced to the public. Now, its graphene battery mass production research and development work has finally moved from the laboratory to the real car.

According to GAC GROUP officially, the related graphene technology has been patented, covering graphene preparation, supercapacitors, fast-charging batteries and other technical areas. Among them, the "super fast charging battery" has completed the testing of the battery core, module and battery package samples, and carried the whole vehicle for high-power charging test, and the battery life and safety have reached the use standard. It can achieve 80% charge in 8 minutes, charge for 10 minutes and a range of 200-300 km. The charging speed is comparable to refueling.

From this point of view, if GAC GROUP can really achieve mass production of graphene battery cars, it will be of extraordinary significance. But is it that simple?

Real graphene battery

In fact, although graphene battery is considered to be an important technology to promote the progress of the battery industry, and many enterprises have joined in related research in recent years, it has not made a great breakthrough on the whole, and it is not easy to take it out of the laboratory. GAC GROUP also said frankly that although a real car test has been carried out, whether the graphene battery can eventually achieve mass production still needs to be verified by the real car.

In retrospect, it is not without surprise disappointment in the process of commercialization of graphene batteries. In December, there were media reports that Huawei P40Pro would use graphene battery technology and was expected to become the world's first graphene battery mobile phone, when Huawei's official French Twitter account forwarded the news. Affected by this, the domestic graphene concept stock Tiannai Technology, Xinjin Road, Del Future and Zhongke Electric have soared one after another. However, the Huawei P40 released in October does not contain the technology.

In addition, Toyota launched a graphene battery concept car, the Fisker (Fisk) EMotion, as early as 2018. This car is equipped with 145kWh's graphene super battery pack and has a range of more than 645km, killing Tesla's main model every minute. However, the car, which claims to be the world's first graphene battery car, has since disappeared.

So, since graphene was recognized by the scientific community earlier than lithium materials, but its practical application lags far behind? Among them, the high cost is a great obstacle to the mass production application of graphene battery. Graphene has one of its deadliest weaknesses, which is expensive. It is reported that graphene is currently sold for up to 600 yuan per gram on the market, which is called "black gold". Does this sound like a deterrent to the practitioners of new energy vehicles?

Prior to this, Xu Zhengpeng, president of spruce Wisdom, said in an interview with the media, "whether graphene is used as the main material or additive in the battery, it can improve the electrical conductivity." If the power battery uses graphene as the main negative material, the cost of the electric car will be very high, and if it is used as an additive, it can barely accept its cost. "

Strictly speaking, only as an additive is not a veritable graphene battery. Xu Zhengpeng said, "there is no real graphene battery on the market so far." He said that some companies claimed to have been able to mass-produce graphene batteries, but that was just a partial generalization. At present, the real graphene battery is still too extravagant, it is difficult to achieve mass production and market.

In addition, some people in the industry believe that at present, the main material systems of many so-called graphene batteries have not changed, with positive electrodes of ternary, lithium iron phosphate or manganese, and negative electrodes of graphene or metal oxides, as well as electrolytes and diaphragms. The main function of graphene is to improve electrical conductivity, not a new technology.

From this point of view, whether GAC GROUP's graphene battery car is "24K pure black gold" or just a gimmick needs to be further explored, and the significance of mass production will also need to be reassessed.