— June 30, 2020
Dr. Benjamin Park, Founder and CTO, Enevate
Benjamin Park sees battery technology’s transformations as a narrative of scale. As batteries get bigger—going from mobile phones to electric vehicles and soon the grid—manufacturers will have to keep delivering, and do so sustainably. “We need to be good stewards for the earth,” Park says. His Irvine, California, start-up has developed a silicon anode–based battery that holistically tackles market adoption, cost, and sustainability, according to Park. Range anxiety, or the fear of running out of charge, keeps people from buying plug-in cars. Enevate’s technology will give electric vehicles with 30% more driving range that charge “in the same time it takes to fill up a gasoline car,” he says.
Credit for that goes to the thin, porous, binder-free silicon film used at the anode that swiftly takes up and releases 10 times as many lithium ions as today’s graphite anodes, translating to a more energetic battery. Silicon typically swells and shrinks during charging and discharging and eventually breaks apart, but Enevate’s proprietary spongy film has enough give to accommodate the change in volume. In a ad addition, Park says, it is made from a low-cost, low-grade silicon and does not require energy-intensive processing; graphite has to be heat-treated and purified.
Enevate has support from battery giants LG Chem and Samsung. With the Renault-Nissan-Mitsubishi alliance, the company is developing battery cells for 2024–25 model-year vehicles.
Silicon and lithium metal are both top contenders for next-generation anodes, but “silicon will be the main player,” Park says. “It can deliver the same energy density but be much more sustainable, safer, and easier to implement.”
