Pack Handling
Work Stream 1
The Faraday Institution-funded degradation project seeks to mitigate performance loss, understand the effects in end-of-life and recycling processes, while facilitating effective decision making.
Battery “passports” will need to be introduced to track carbon footprint from 2024, CO2 emissions from 2027 and recycled constituent components from 2030.
Databases can be augmented to track and trace broader value chains throughout the battery industry including the recycling industry.
Integration of the passport dataspace has the potential to significantly improve efficiency and recycled materials purity driving down costs and increasing throughput rates.
ReLiB is perfectly positioned to interface with emerging battery passport technologies as a potential data source and validation suite to benchmark passporting data structures.
WP1.1
Fundamental Cell Metrology
Scope
The system, process and life of battery cells, modules and packs requires analysis of birth, life, death/rebirth, connected to a framework underpinned with science and understanding of the changes within ta (=a) cell that contribute to state of health (SoH) decline and impact reuse or recycling.
What is Involved
Metrology will be critical in determining the SoH of end of life (EoL) vehicle batteries, informing second life viability, disassembly or recovery decision-making. In previous phases a limited suite has been explored to understand cells at end of life. This package will broaden techniques to understand parameters of change and decision making including advanced acoustics, magneto-electrochemical and mechano-electrochemical analysis, with focus on interfacing battery/pack and automation.
This task will consider the feasibility of embedding techniques to deliver onboard metrology that generates a module/cell ‘track record’ reporting into the BMS to form part of the ‘Advanced Battery Passport’, enabling rapid determination of possible second uses or suitable recovery pathway.
Objectives
- Expand on the work in previous phases to investigate metrology techniques, formats and designs
- Provide underlying understanding of critical cell parameters to enable advanced diagnostic and decision making methodologies
- Consider practical requirements for in-line deployment in real-world
Pathways to Impact
The datasets generated will be made available for the recycling community. UK battery diagnostics companies like Sention Technologies and national facilities like STFC Hartree Centre provide routes to realising commercial impact plus the ReLiB Technology Platform Implementation Plan (ReLiB TPIP).
WP1.2
In-line Testing & Battery Preparation
Scope
This task focuses on management of preparation processes for recycling EoL batteries, including rapid discharging methods and grading for reuse. The next phase will focus on scale-up for increased efficiency. The datasets generated are an invaluable resource for the emerging battery passport (BP) economy so work will evaluate the passport structures to improve in-line testing (ILT) processes.
What is Involved
Rapid non-destructive testing is essential to recovery decision making, with downstream recycling processes of regeneration and upcycling along with mechanical/chemical recovery pathways determined by critical module/cell parameters (e.g. chemistry, SoH etc).
As EV can have between 190 and 8000 individual cells within a battery pack, testing must be rapid and scalable across multiple cells at once.
Previous phases have developed a number of improved testing protocols for EoL decision making and acquired large datasets. The limiting factor is rate of throughput so improvement is required.
Battery passports will contain data invaluable to improving throughput in recycling. The EoL testing developed will augment the passport dynamic data when batteries go for reuse or repurposing.
This work will consider current and likely future chemistries, formats and configurations in the improvement of protocols.
Objectives
- Demonstrate rapid battery discharging techniques for safe downstream processing
- Evaluate possibility of linking testing and evaluation techniques developed in previous phases to proposed cloud-based datasets (battery passports) via data fusion and digital twin from WP1.3
- Assess the response and performance of batteries based on different chemistries, e.g. LFP cathodes, Si anodes, Na-ion
Pathways to Impact
Datasets from WP1.1 and battery passports can be improved through comparison and validation. Protocols and datasets could steer structures of battery passports in the legislative framework design phase (to 2030); UoN is positioned to develop battery passport industry stakeholder partnerships. Fast discharge IP is being protected and will be commercialised through the ReLiB TPIP.
WP1.3
Data-driven Decision Making
Scope
This package analyse and use the data collected through in-line testing, underpinning knowledge gained through understanding cells at EoL. Using cloud-based data analytics frameworks, digital twins and artificial intelligence, an action planner can be generated for each pack, module or cell, laying out the most efficient (and profitable) actions or processes to take.
What is Involved
Battery recycling is expected to transition from crude mechanical shredding to a de-manufacturing process to recover and valorise passive components (casing, wiring, electronics) and active components (modules and cells), identified and located by in-line sensors. Dismantling and simultaneous testing, for future fleets of millions of packs, modules and cells, requires significant advances in: i) automated handling; ii) automated decision-making by intelligently fusing test data from multiple diverse sources, with provenance/history data of such components linked to a cloud-based digital passport system; iii) capability to feed back battery health data to each processed component passport, i.e. advanced EV battery dismantling/recycling will require the cornerstones of Industry 4.0: internet-of-things (IoT), with interconnected information, sensing and tooling.
The ability to test batteries and develop a digital twin, interfacing with key data, will enable a planner to set out the most efficient path for maximum material recovery with the highest value.
Objectives
- Develop a decision-making action planner for multiple formats, manufactures, causes of EoL etc.
- Generate and develop real time digital twins for a Battery Information Management System (BIMS) to enable any ‘Advanced Battery Passport’ to interface with and inform a materials recovery pathway
- Two-way flow of data between in-line testing and cloud-based digital passport (DP), enabling extraction of data from DP and adding new information e.g. state of health at the pack, stack, module and potentially cell levels
Pathways to Impact
Multi-modal (multi-partner) data fusion, decision making, visualization, planning and cyber-physical systems, interlinked with real-time digital twins synchronized with real disassembly actions, can be developed and demonstrated at full-scale using the nationally unique FI testbed at BEIC. Lower TRL ReLiB advances on this test-bed, will generate a base platform to facilitate higher-TRL scale-up via collaborations with MTC, tech SMEs and larger industry players, as part of the ReLiB TPIP.