Automakers and battery producers already put some measures in place to decrease the danger of thermal runaway, together with battery administration techniques that may detect and management battery circumstances to forestall fires earlier than they happen. Thermal insulation supplies—together with these made with aerogels—are a part of the rising arsenal that may restrict the harm if thermal runaway does happen.
One potential disadvantage to these supplies is that they add bulk to a battery, which reduces power density—the quantity of power {that a} battery can retailer in a sure quantity or weight. Larger power density interprets to longer vary for an EV, an important promoting level for a lot of drivers. The advantage of aerogels is that they’re super-light, since they’re principally air—so that they don’t restrict power density as a lot as different supplies would possibly.
Aspen’s thermal obstacles are usually between one and 4 millimeters thick and could be stacked between cells. Relying on the automaker and car in query, the associated fee to include it in an EV runs between $300 and $1,000, Younger says.
COURTESY OF ASPEN AEROGEL
The market is ramping up shortly. When the corporate started promoting its battery supplies in 2021, it did roughly $7 million in gross sales. In 2023 it had reached $110 million, and that’s on observe to greater than double once more in 2024, Younger says.
Aspen Aerogels at the moment makes supplies for EV batteries at its manufacturing facility in Rhode Island, which additionally makes supplies for different companies, together with the oil and fuel trade. “We’re simply busting on the seams of that plant,” Younger says. The DOE mortgage will help development of a brand new facility in Georgia, which can be completely devoted to creating materials for EV batteries. The plan is to have that facility working by early 2027, Younger says.
“This mortgage is to actually get them at scale for his or her first business facility in Georgia,” Shah says. The corporate might want to meet sure monetary and technical necessities to finalize the funding.
“This mortgage is critically necessary to us, to assist us with the completion of that venture,” Younger says.
Correction: A caption has been up to date to appropriately determine the fabric pictured as a thermal barrier.