Any development in new technology brings forth a new dimension in human evolution but few technological developments bring with them their survival wars. The War of the Currents (1880~1890), Videotape format war (1978~80), first Browser war (~the 1990s), HD optical disc format war (2006~2008) to name a few. These wars change the course of technology and the world for the better.

In the EVs market, one such war is already on which is, for EV charging system amongst four types developed by the current EV manufacturers (Tesla’s Supercharger system, CCS-Combined Charging System, CHAdeMO & GB/T. While this may take some time to settle EV segment is very soon going to see the full wrath of another technology war that has already begun with the meteoric rise of Tesla’s EV, THE “WAR OF THE BATTERIES”.

In contrast to ICEVs which had only two technologies based on ignition point of fossil fuels-spark plug ignition (SI technology for a petrol engine) & Compression Ignition (CI for Diesel engine), yet both were complementary and grew over the next 150 years, However, in case of EVs, which may have multiple drive mechanism, yet a well-suited energy source of electrical power is required by all these EVs makers to make EVs acceptable to masses. “Battery” is the obvious synonyms for these portable energy sources. While many of these battery technologies have performed well till now in western countries with a limited number of EVs, the right choice for the Indian mobility market, with multiple challenges is going to play a crucial role in the survival of EV manufacturers. The varied Indian mobility market with extreme weather conditions (rains, temperature, dust, humidity, etc.), challenging traffic conditions including rough roads, (many times waterlogged) and typical non-standard driving habits of people, or a combination of all them, poses a different level of challenge for these EVs and their batteries, affecting the travel range, performance & reliability.

Historically, since the time of 2,200 years old “Baghdad Battery”, the quest for a perfect battery has never died and with time the batteries have come a long way to become integrated with our daily life and depending upon their ability to get recharged, they classified as primary (non-rechargeable) or secondary (rechargeable) batteries.

These batteries have one biggest advantage over IC engines – since, unlike IC engines, they are NOT subject to the limitations of the Carnot cycle dictated by the second law of thermodynamics, and hence they can convert chemical energy into electric energy, with higher energy conversion efficiencies. While this energy conversion ratio could be less than 15%, the EVs offer a much higher energy conversion exceeding 70%.

Though in many applications primary & secondary batteries have interchangeable roles yet as the capacity and load requires increases, the choice also shift from Primary to Secondary Batteries as shown below.

The currently available EV batteries can be broadly classified as below:

• Lead Acid Battery (LAB): These are the cheapest energy source and, in the past, most commonly used batteries in EVs like forklifts, golf carts, or e-rickshaws. Being heavy LABs, they increase the vehicle weight by 25% to 50%. They are used in ICEVs for SLI but they have also powered early modern EVs of GM’s (EV1). However, due to many inherent technical & also environmental issues LABs are not used in modern EVs except a few 3W, e-rickshaws.
• Lithium-Ion Battery (LIB): This is one of the battery technology which is THE strongest contenders or EVs anywhere in the globe and the technology was considered to be so revolutionary that in 2019, the Nobel Prize in Chemistry was awarded for its development. Though these batteries are called Lithium-Ion Batteries, in real terms they do not contain Lithium metal but intercalated1 lithium These LIBs are extensively used in modern EVs.
• Solid-State Battery (SSB): A SSB is a rechargeable battery that uses solid electrodes and solid electrolytes instead of using liquid or polymer gel electrolytes that are found in LIB or Over the time, many of its low energy density issue, low cell voltage, and high internal resistance have been overcome bringing back the interest in SSB batteries, especially when EVs are becoming the new normal. With more than 1,000 patents, Toyota stands tall when it comes to SSB technologies and is already working to introduce an EV driven by these SSB by this year-end (covering 500 km range on a single charge & charging capability of zero to full in just 10 minutes). On the other hand Ford, BMW and Nisan have also announced to bring SSB-driven EVs.
• Al-Air Battery (AAB): This is a battery systems that uses Aluminium (Anode) and ambient air (cathode), with an aqueous or aprotic electrolyte. Though the first Metal-Air battery appeared in 1878 (Zn-Air) and its first commercial production began started only in Post its technical acceptability in the 1960s, other aqueous Fe-Air, Al-Air, and Mg-Air batteries were developed in the 1960s. This is a technology that has been highly underrated yet has maximum potential in context to India, which ranks 5th in the world's Aluminium reserves. With much higher specific capacity and energy densities, it can provide up to eight times the range of a LIB with a significantly lower total weight. However, for AIBs to become a worthy alternative of LIBs, two critical issues need to be resolved – first development of reliable, quick, safe, and effective ‘‘mechanical’’ replacement (Charging) arrangement for Al-Anode and second, creating a large scale infrastructure to recycle (an energy-intensive process) the Al(OH)3 which gets generated in the process of electricity generation. In India, while Log9 Materials2 has been working on this technology since 2015, Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) and Phinergy3 have recently formed a JV (in 2021) to build these ultra-lightweight batteries for electric vehicles (EVs).
• Fuel Cell (FC): The FCs differ from the battery in one way as they can produce electrical energy as long as the active materials are fed to the electrodes or the electrodes do not fail. The most common FCs used for FCEVs as Hydrogen Fuel Cells (HFC), in which stored hydrogen is burnt in presence of air taken from ambiance to produce electricity. To get stable power, the FCEVs, also use a smaller on-board battery to power their electric motor. Unfortunately, Hydrogen is an explosive gas and thus the development of its refuelling network will always have Presently there are only 3 FCEVs publicly available that too in select markets on lease-the Toyota Mirai, the Hyundai Nexo, and the Honda Clarity. However, these EVs and could never gain a larger market and continued to remain novelty vehicles, operating on lease.



• New Battery Technologies: Apart from above technologies presently in vogue, there are many other new & diverse battery technologies getting developed including one where the batteries/ FCs are made part of EV’s shell (thus eliminating the requirements of some of shell reinforcement parts) and each of them would be fighting for its right place in the burgeoning EV market.

• Battery Forming the EV’s Body Shell: This technology allows vehicle body shells to serve as Researchers at the Chalmers University of Technology claim to have produced a working "structural battery" that can both hold a charge and, as the name says, act as part of a vehicle's structure. These batteries are made from carbon fiber, which is already used for both body panels of some high-end supercars and race cars. In the test battery, carbon fiber serves as the negative electrode, while the positive electrode is a lithium-iron-phosphate-coated aluminum foil. They're separated by a fiberglass fabric, which also houses the electrolyte. This technology, if passes muster for safety, might be the key to solving a difficult tradeoff between lowering vehicle mass and raising battery pack size.

While each of the above battery technology would fighting for its righteous place in the burgeoning EV market a rebound of Internal Combustion Engine (ICE) With Hydrogen is also expected with the development of Hydrogen fired IC Engine (H-ICE): A H-ICE is simply a technically upgraded version of the conventional IC engine and used Hydrogen as fuel instead of fossil fuel, a technology developed in 1970. Unfortunately being governed by the Carnot cycle, it has similar energy output constraint as that of standard IC Engines and hence lower than Fuel Cells. Also, these modified IC engines have been found sensitive to match the fluctuations in load. Despite many attempts by Toyota, Mazda, BMW to develop this technology is yet to take off, still in May 2021, Toyota confirmed its participation in the forthcoming Super Taikyu 24 Hour Racing Endurance Series4 with its H-ICEV Corolla having 1.6-litre, inline-3, turbocharged engine. Yet apart from the challenges of handling Hydrogen as fuel (similar as in case of FCs system), the technology has a long time to go before proven.

Epilogue

While many of the older battery technologies e.g. LAB (lead-acid battery), Nickel Metal Hydride Battery (NiMH), Sodium (Na) Nickel Chloride Battery or ZEBRA Battery, Lithium Polymer Battery (LPB) have already lost the preliminary fight in this “War of The Battery” in which IC Engine is once again getting ready to bounce back with H-ICE technology, you never know who will come out as winner in this “War of The Battery” and which energy systems would come out as winner to capture the mobility world in the coming century.

 Though in current times we do not have many legends like Edison & Westinghouse/ Nikola Tesla, still in present times we do have worthy competitors opposite to each other in this “War of The Battery”, yet with so many battery technologies eying for the future EVs market, it would be interesting to watch as to who all will survive this “War of The Battery”, a war which is going to have its battleground on the Indian sub-continent. The winner/ winners will finally capture the Indian EV market not be with the best of technology but a technology with is environment friendly has mass acceptance as well as ease of operation, long life with long-range, reliable and safe yet with low cost. We need to wait and watch this “War of The Battery” which is going witness a bloodbath in coming years while the battery makers need to keep in mind the following four key learnings from the similar technology/ standards wars fought earlier:

• First-Mover Advantage Is No Guarantee Of Success
• Multiple Technologies Can Coexist And Supplement Each Other
• These Wars Are Often More Than The Superiority Of Technology
• Identification Of Demographical Issues And Addressing To Their Challenges Would Be Critical For Success

Ref.

• Handbook of Batteries by David Linden
• Handbook Lithium-Ion Batteries by Masaki Yoshio, Ralph J Broadd & Akiya Kozawa
• Towards the battery of the future Publication by European Commission
• Recent Progress of Meal-Air Batteries-A Mini Review (MDPI)
• Lithium-ion Batteries for Electric Vehicles: The US Value Chain
• Metal-air-Batteries-to-INREP-10122014-YEE
• A Brief History of Non-Aqueous Metal-Air Batteries
• Metal-air batteries by Joan Gómez Chabrera, Alejandro Andreu Nácher, Pablo Bou Pérez
• Brief History of Early Lithium-Battery Development (MDPI)
• Lead-acid-white-paper Published by All Cell Technologies LLC (March 2012)
• Battery 2030+ Road Map: Inventing the Sustainable Batteries of The Future Research Needs And Future Actions by Kristina Edstrom (Executive Editor)
• Book The Savage Tale of the First Standards War by Tom McNicho