All battery companies in the world are looking for cheaper and more environmentally friendly ways of production. Companies from Tesla By Samsung SDI after LGare working on technology that will revolutionize and reduce the cost of producing cells. We are talking about dry coating technologywhich is to replace the energy-intensive wet process of manufacturing cathodes and anode electrodes, key components electric car batteries.
“Among the competitors of LG batteries, it is the leader” in terms of dry-coating technology, Kim Je-Young, who became LG Energy Solution’s chief technology officer in December, told Bloomberg News in an interview, adding that LG began developing the process a decade ago.
LG reveals implementation schedule
LG has revealed for the first time a timeline for commercializing the revolutionary technology. Kim said LG plans Completion of a pilot production line for the dry coating process in the fourth quarter and full-scale production is expected to start in 2028.
With dry coating, battery manufacturers can save on energy, equipment costs and space. They don’t have to invest in dryers or solvent recovery systems. Kim estimates that dry coating of electrodes can reduce battery production costs by 17 to 30 percent.
Others are trying too, Tesla was the first
Tesla acquired the start-up Maxwell Technologies in 2019 dry coating. However, an attempt to implement this technology into battery cell production in Austin, Texas, was not a complete success.
In 2020, Tesla promoted the dry method for electrodes. However, according to Reuters, the American electric vehicle manufacturer has only been able to implement this process for the anode section of the battery. Tesla’s Method did not work for cathode.
Volkswagen, who is also trying to develop dry film at his company PowerCo, called the technology a “game changer.” VW estimates that implementing the technology could enable companies to use 30 percent less energy and 50 percent less space.
LG has a solution for the cathode
Experts say that producing a cathode using the dry method is more difficult than producing an anode because cathodes are usually made of materials that are more difficult to process.
The dry electrode production process developed by LG can be applied to both cathodes and anodesregardless of the cathode particle size, Kim said. He added that applying dry electrode production to cathodes with smaller particle sizes is very difficult.
Stand up to the Chinese
LG is banking on breakthrough innovation such as dry coating to boost its efforts to compete with Chinese battery makers.
His The market share of electric vehicle batteries fell to 12.6 percent this year. compared with 14.6% a year earlier. This is largely due to the expansion of Chinese players such as Contemporary Amperex Technology and BYD. The average price of a lithium iron phosphate (LFP) battery in China fell 44% in April to $53 per kilowatt-hour, BloombergNEF reported.
