With the rapid development of China's economy and the continuous improvement of people's living standards, many people use cars as their daily means of transportation. However, the widespread use of cars has led to a series of air pollution problems. In order to follow the sustainable development strategy, major automakers have launched new energy vehicles to make travel greener and healthier. New energy vehicles are now widely promoted, and batteries, as the power source of electric vehicles, have always been considered a crucial technology in the development of electric vehicles, and also a major bottleneck restricting their development. Their performance directly affects the vehicle's driving range. Therefore, Jiangmen Changyou will introduce several main classifications of batteries and provide an overview of why ternary lithium batteries are gradually becoming mainstream.
Currently, the new energy vehicle market mainly uses four types of batteries: lithium iron phosphate batteries, ternary lithium batteries, nickel-metal hydride batteries, and hydrogen fuel cells.
In the early stages of new energy vehicle development, many vehicles used lithium iron phosphate (LFP) batteries as energy storage devices. So why did so many pure electric vehicles choose LFP batteries in the past? Firstly, LFP batteries have a long lifespan, with a cycle life exceeding 2000 cycles. They also have advantages in thermal stability, with a peak electrothermal temperature of 350-500℃. The internal chemical components only begin to decompose when the temperature reaches around 500℃. This characteristic ensures the safety of LFP batteries. However, its widespread use was primarily due to its lower cost; as is well known, battery costs account for a large proportion of the total cost of a pure electric vehicle. But with the development of new energy vehicles, the requirements for batteries have become increasingly stringent, leading automakers to abandon LFP batteries in favor of ternary lithium batteries in recent years. The reason for this shift is the lower energy density of LFP batteries. For the same driving range, vehicles using LFP batteries are heavier, and excessive weight is clearly detrimental to energy consumption control.
In fact, nickel-metal hydride batteries began to enter people's field of vision as early as the 1990s. The Toyota Prius, which is most well-known, is a representative model equipped with nickel-metal hydride batteries. In terms of energy density, nickel-metal hydride batteries are not much different from ordinary lithium batteries. However, since the voltage of a single battery cell is only 1.2V, which is 1/3 of that of a lithium battery, the battery pack is much larger than that of a lithium battery when the required voltage is constant. This is the main disadvantage of nickel-metal hydride batteries.
Compared to lithium iron phosphate and nickel-metal hydride batteries, ternary lithium batteries offer more balanced overall performance, with higher energy density and volumetric energy density. Furthermore, with the development of the battery industry, the price of ternary lithium batteries has become more affordable for manufacturers. Their energy density is typically above 200Wh/kg, making them more suitable for the current range requirements of the new energy passenger vehicle market. However, ternary lithium batteries have lower safety, being prone to explosions and spontaneous combustion. Therefore, vehicles equipped with ternary lithium batteries have extremely high requirements for their battery management systems, requiring robust overcharge, over-discharge, over-temperature, and overcurrent protection during the design process. However, with technological advancements, especially the application of ceramic separators, the safety issues of ternary lithium batteries have been improved.
Finally, there's hydrogen fuel cell, considered one of the future development directions. Unlike other pure electric vehicles, it doesn't require charging; it only needs hydrogen refueling, making it similar in usage to ordinary gasoline vehicles, which is very convenient. Moreover, hydrogen fuel cell electric vehicles have high energy conversion efficiency, are pollution-free, have a long lifespan, and operate smoothly. Their biggest advantage is the absence of pollutant emissions. So why is the current market share of hydrogen fuel cell vehicles so low? Jiangmen Changyou believes the problem mainly lies in hydrogen production, transportation, and storage. Currently, apart from the relatively mature manufacturing process, many other aspects still have problems to solve. If hydrogen fuel cells are truly needed in the future, a complete set of supporting infrastructure must be established.
Through Jiangmen Changyou's introduction to batteries above, we believe you have gained some understanding of the battery classifications for new energy vehicles. In essence, no single battery type has an absolute advantage; it's just that under specific demands and policy guidance, ternary lithium batteries have gradually become the main choice for new energy vehicles on the market. As an upstream supplier of cathode materials for new energy batteries, Jiangmen Changyou is poised to seize the opportunities and challenges presented by the current boom in ternary lithium batteries and the overall increase in nickel demand!
