From pv magazine global
Chinese battery manufacturer CATL presented its new Shenxing Plus LFP battery at the ongoing Auto China 2024 trade fair in Beijing.
The energy density is also higher due to the improved battery architecture. The battery housing, which consists of a single block, is adapted to the structure of the cells. This enabled CATL engineers to accommodate more storage capacity in the volume of the case.
CATL said the gravimetric energy density of the new product is 205 Wh per kg. By comparison, current LFP batteries achieve around 190 Wh per kg.
The Shenxing Plus can be loaded with a high C-rate of four. Charging at a C-rate of four would fully charge a 90 kWh battery in 15 minutes. This would require a charging capacity of 360 kW. The amount of energy required for a 4C charging process depends on the capacity of the battery. For example, a 100 kWh battery would require 400 kW of charging power.
CATL leaves the exact capacity of the battery undisclosed in its product presentation. However, the manufacturer said that it should be possible to charge the energy that would be necessary for a journey of 600 km within 10 minutes. This means that 1 km of range would be charged into the battery every second. A full charge for a range of 1,000 km can be purportedly achieved in 16.6 minutes.
The manufacturer used a number of technologies to make this possible, such as anodes and cathodes covered with different coatings for higher conductivity. The internal battery management system also uses artificial intelligence to predict the impact of high-current charging at the cell level.
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I’ll just keep writing this comment until the authors get it: reprinting a press release about “1000 km range” means nothing if you don’t know the vehicle’s efficiency, the test conditions, and the pack’s degradation. Because I am writing this in the U.S., I’ll write “1000 km” as 621 miles. Let’s use a simple and practical example. If you have a typical American EV, it gets about 3 miles/kWh (its efficiency) at 60 MPH in average weather on a flat highway (the test conditions). Let’s assume a used battery pack with 10% degradation. To go 621 miles, you’d need a total pack size of about 235kWh (assuming you leave about 5kWh of the pack untapped to make sure not to run the battery down to true 0% SOC, which would be extremely bad for the battery’s health). Given this battery’s 205Wh/Kg energy density, and excluding the weight of the necessary battery management system, pack coolant system, pack structure, etc., you’d need 1146kg — 2526 pounds — of batteries! Of course, that’s absolutely nuts. So authors, please, don’t just blindly reprint the claims of a stupid press release.