While the technology could be as much as five years away from being introduced to the market, the breakthrough could make electric vehicles (EVs) more appealing to those who are sceptical of changing from internal combustion engines.
Another problem with fast charging is that battery capacity often degrades over charging cycles.
One solution to this conundrum is to tailor the charging protocol in a way that optimizes speed while avoiding damage for the many different types of battery designs currently used in vehicles. But developing optimal protocols requires a huge amount of data on how various methods affect these devices’ lifetimes, efficiencies and safety. To combat this issue, Dufek’s team developed a machine learning algorithm to analyze between 20,000 and 30,000 fast charging data points to see how batteries age when charging quickly.
“We’ve significantly increased the amount of energy that can go into a battery cell in a short amount of time,” says Dufek. “Currently, we’re seeing batteries charge to over 90% in 10 minutes without lithium plating or cathode cracking.”
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