CIC energiGUNE culminates the SAFELiMOVE project with significant advances in improving the safety, reliability and performance of solid state batteries
The SAFELiMOVE project, led by CIC energiGUNE and financed by the European Union through its Horizon Europe programme, has completed its activity with the achievement of advances in solid-state battery technology in terms of materials and design, as well as in terms of energy densities and scalability, which open the door to the manufacture of more efficient and sustainable devices, with a special impact on electric vehicles.
CIC energiGUNE, a leading Basque research centre in electrochemical and thermal energy storage and conversion, and hydrogen technologies, has concluded the European SAFELiMOVE project – launched in January 2020 – with the achievement of significant advances in the field of solid-state batteries that will be decisive for the manufacture of more efficient and sustainable devices and for the promotion of electromobility.
“The achievements obtained in SAFELiMOVE are crucial to advance towards a wider implementation of solid-state battery technology in relation to renewable energies and electric vehicles, which will contribute significantly to climate change mitigation efforts,” said María Martínez-Ibáñez, Principal Investigator of the project at CIC energiGUNE.
Specifically, the work carried out over the last 48 months by the consortium led by the Basque centre – in which 14 European partners and one Canadian partner have participated – has been decisive in successfully advancing in three fundamental aspects: the development of advanced materials; the analysis and optimisation of interfaces; and the scalability of solid-state technology towards various prototypes.
In this sense, as highlighted by María Martínez-Ibáñez, “the challenges and problems faced during the development of the project have allowed us to learn how to design the future direction of this technology”, thus taking a fundamental step towards the future creation of a competitive European solid-state battery technology.
In fact, according to the conclusions of the project, the work carried out has enabled the gravimetric (350 Wh/kg) and volumetric (680 Wh/L) energy density values achieved to be very remarkable, exceeding in some cases the state of the art of some lithium-ion batteries. Although there are still many challenges to be faced to truly demonstrate the industrial viability of solid-state batteries, the SAFELiMOVE results suggest the potential of this technology to be used in electric vehicles, as well as for electronic devices.
This responds to the main challenge of the SAFELiMOVE project, which was to develop a new generation of batteries for electric vehicles, based on a solid-state electrolyte, resulting in a safer, more reliable and high-performance lithium battery.
This challenge is also in line with the strategic objectives of the European Union to position itself as a reference in the EV battery sector. Indeed, further development and optimisation of SAFELiMOVE’s technology could lead to competitive advantages for the European battery ecosystem and significant improvements in continental electromobility, such as increasing driving range by an additional 300 kilometres on a single charge; reducing charging time; increasing safety by eliminating potentially flammable liquid electrolyte; and reducing battery cost by 50%, thanks to the use of highly efficient materials and processes.
