Talk:Lithium-ion battery/Archive 1

Archive 1

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Does anyone know or care about the enviornmental impact of lithium-ion battery disposal? Is this really a "green" technology or are we being duped? 173.16.115.235 (talk) 21:59, 12 October 2010 (UTC)

There is no cadmium or lead in these batteries like some other rechargeable cells, so it makes them more environmentally friendly. --Chemicalinterest (talk) 12:42, 13 October 2010 (UTC)

Li-ion Vanadium pentoxide battery

There is claims that Subaru developed very energy dense Li-ion Vanadium batteries which have 2-3 times more Li ions than regular.Does anyone have exact specs for such type of batteries such as cycle life and Wh/kg and what is problems associated? Why such super battery is not used anywhere including Chevy Volt? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.203.84.56 (talk) 18:58, 20 April 2011 (UTC)

Li-ion intercalation

Could somebody explain to dilettante how so much positive ions could intercalate in material and this material doesn't break down under Coulomb forces?And zero net charge is created? And also if Li ions already miss their external electrons,where are electrons taken from to run in external circuit?Or they donate their second electron for reaction? There is also claim that silicon could absorb as much as 4 Li ions for 1 Si atom.But in this case it is difficult even imagine some crystaline structure which could contain those ions. Positive charges are repulsive?How such thing could exist,somebody explain! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 174.0.228.58 (talk) 00:32, 8 December 2009 (UTC)

1) Most cathode materials have a structure that is capable of being voided. For example LiCoO2 has a layered oxide layer with alternating layers of Li-O-Co-O-Li-O-Co-etc. When you remove the lithium layer there is two competing effects that occur. First you have charge repulsion of the oxygen layers that are no longer flanked by Li-ions. Secondly you have contraction along the c-axis of the hexagonal (P-3M) unit cell because of the loss of the layer. The charged materials are less thermally stable and this is evident in DSC/ARC curves of charged and uncharged layerd oxides. (Short answer)

2) This is a basic electrochemical question of any galvanic cell should cross reference that.

3) Si goes through multiple phase changes as you intercalate lithium. At near maximum intercalation the LixSi becomes amorphous but the Li ions are not a charged species they are a diffused charge which is distributed over the large electron cloud of the Si which has D electrons that carbon does (even though they are same group)

4) Positive charges are repulsed but I answer this with the layering structure of the layered oxides, the structure flanks all the positive charges with the oxygen atoms. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jcamardese (talk • contribs) 01:41, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

Questionable Picture of "Dell laptop burnt by bad Sony lithium-ion battery"

How did the battery get on top of the laptop keyboard and stick there without burning anything else around it? There are no characteristic marks of warped, burnt, or ruptured plastic on the laptop shell. The authenticity of the picture is questionable. It seems to be a simulated fantasy scene and should be noted as such.

Much Material is Questionable

The manufacturers of Lithium Ion batteries have been reluctant to publish very much in the way of useable information on this battery technology. As a result many websites have sprung up, some with apparently reputable origins, to fill the void of information. Some seem to have published speculative information that has no citable origin. Many seem to just copied this information from the other sites. The remainder have published differing speculations. This article seems to have quoted and cited much of the uncited sources. As a result some of the information is useful, but some of it fails to square with real world Lithium Ion batteries.

For example, someone has stated that Lithium Ion batteries must never be deep discharged. Whilst it is true, they should never be discharged to zero volts, there is nothing to prevent a cell being discharged to 2.8 volts without harm (most implementations enforce a 3.0 volt minimum to provide a margin of error).

Someone (else?) has published a table of %age cell degredation with age and temperature (cited from an apparently respectable source). But real batteries are obviously unaware of these sources because there are numerous examples in the wild that have been regularly fully discharged (to 2.8 to 3.0 volts), stored at around 20 °C and kept fully charged in between times. These batteries are over 12 years old and are fully functional. The data in the article suggests that these batteries would have expired years ago, so something is clearly wrong.

I work in the aerospace industry, and am a user of Lithium Ion batteries in many guises. It is a continuing source of frustration that the battery manufacturers just won't tell you some of the things you need to know with respect to battery useage and life information.

Unless, this speculative data can be properly cited from a proper source like the cell manufacturers themselves, it should be removed or at least moved to a section of the article that makes it clear that the information is speculative and possibly inaccurate.

I B Wright 13:50, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

I tend to agree with you. Nothing is referenced properly. 213.78.42.15 (talk) 22:58, 13 December 2007 (UTC)

I am not and do not wish to be a wikipedia editor, but as an ardent wikipedia user who frequently defends it's accuracy--for the same reasons I defend the security of open source software--more eyes means more to catch the errors. But the first paragraph of this article states that Li-ion batteries use lithium in the ANODE, then the article goes on to state that GRAPHITE is the most common material for the anode and the CATHODE materials listed all contain lithium. It is these type of errors that cause my friends and coworkers--all highly educated--to shun wikipedia for any purpose. I certainly wouldn't use wikipedia for the entire basis of an important white paper, but it is (usually) great for a "quick and dirty" look at a subject I know little about. In Li-ion battery technology is the anode or the cathode carbon based and where is the lithium? If I am reading this wrong or if I am breaking your rules, I'm sorry.173.29.52.216 (talk) 07:13, 15 November 2009 (UTC)

Some Chemistry

Although I agree that the entire article's slant towards the practical use and maintenance of li-ion batteries is very useful, perhaps this article could benefit from some more theory, something along the lines of a explanation of the chemistry behind it all. And perhaps, if there exists one, a diagram depicting an li-ion battery's internal design?

It looks like a chemical equation has been added to the article, but it presently reads as:

$Li0.5CoO3+Li0.5C6<-->C6+LiCoO2$

This drops an oxygen into the aether somewhere. Poor oxygen.

According to a site I found [1], a very similar equation is given (replace 'x' with 0.5 and write it with reactants and products exchanged):

$LiCoO_{2}+C_{6}\leftrightarrow Li_{1-x}CoO_{2}+C_{6}Li_{x}$

The charging process would proceed left to right in the form I've given; the discharging process would proceed right to left.

But it would be nice to have a real, honest paper source to dervice this from. Heck, I checked all of the references currently on the Wiki article, and I couldn't find the source for the original equation either. Queer.

1. Electronics Lab, "How to rebuild a Li-Ion battery pack". http://www.electronics-lab.com/articles/Li_Ion_reconstruct/index.html, Retrieved 2006 April 17

OldMiner 23:24, 17 April 2006 (UTC)

I would like to see some electrons in the formula for the reaction. I am trying to check my understanding of things with a few calculations of the weight of stuff in a battery to provide a certain capacity in amp hours and without knowing how many electrons move around for a certain chemical reaction, the reaction formula is pretty useless. It isn't completely useless, as I can add up the atomic weights and get an idea, but I could be out by a factor of 2 or 3 or whatever if the electons released are numerous for one lot of stuff in the formula. Since batteries are about getting electrons moving, logically the formula would be for releasing one electron unless otherwise stated.

There are actually lots of different chemistries of rechargeable li-ion batteries which are lumped in one in this article, commonly found are: LiFePO4,LiCoO2,LiMn2O4,Li(NiCo)O2 see here: http://www.iloveebikes.com/batteries.html Some of the advantages and disadvantges listed in the article apply just to certain chemistries, also the numbers thrown around are not common across all the chemistry variants. Especially the safety aspects. Various (nanotech-)enhanced cathode materials add to the confusion and variety. I think the article is long overdue for a total overhaul and possibly splitting apart. 194.126.108.2 15:18, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

Just appalling

This is one of the worst articles I have seen. It's just embarassing to read. The whole page should be scrapped and started from scratch. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Freddy011 (talk • contribs) 23:49, 16 August 2008 (UTC)

Someone please work on this article: Should start out with introduction as "Battery technology is very secretive". Looks like two half cells to me, two metals laminated with lithium electrolyte (nonaqueous). I emailed a Japanese manufacturer, will see if he answers; and will post results here.

• Edit: I see the NASA label on some batteries, and found Goddard Space Lab (NASA) inventor as well, where the invention was for the laminate coating. Half truth of "Coat of lithium phosphate to common battery structure speeds charging"

Sirmikey1 (talk) 12:13, 29 April 2009 (UTC)

High Temperature Charging

I have experienced very high temperature with power socket attached to the notebook (cable come from adaptor) when charging batteries with almost discharged capacity. Is it normal for lithium batteries?

This webpage seems to state that Li-ion cells should not heat up when charging. It sounds like something may be wrong with your charger or your cell. Maybe it would be worth getting someone to have a look at it?

• Most charger does not apply the ideal method because it is a "slow" way of charging. But it shouldn't be "high temperature"(higher than 40 degrees celcius) as it will risk the battery to catch fire.

"Look at the manufacturing date." Yeah, right. Like they tell you!

The increase in temperature ist most likely not from the battery itself, but from the internal current converter, which converts the current from the AC adaptor to the right current for your battery. --Seidler2547 10:04, 2 February 2006 (UTC)

I was just reading that shorted Lithium ion battery emits dangerous high frequency Xray. What the hell? Sirmikey1 (talk) 12:45, 29 April 2009 (UTC)

That is complete bullshit. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.19.231.103 (talk) 19:16, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

Good content to add to this page

• Picture and explanation of the de facto standard three terminals to the raw battery two terminals explosion/overheating/shortcircuit protection circuit. Explanation on how to charge the battery using both the three terminals and the raw two terminals interface. Also an explanation on how to simulate a three terminal Lithium ion battery when there's no battery would be welcome.
• Picture of a common Lithium ion battery (possibly from a popular mobile phone).

The two/three-terminal approach is VERY manufacturer specific. Laptop batteries often have 5 or more terminals.

A good guess would be: One terminal is ground, one terminal is the protected battery output, one terminal is the input charge voltage (usually 5 volts). A fourth terminal might be a serial communication indicating battery life.

If you wanted to trick a phone into thinking the battery is there, it might be as simple as ignoring the charge-voltage pin and putting the battery across the other two, or it may be as complicated as using a microcontroller to "talk" on that last pin (depending on its purpose). Of course, you would have to have the equipment to figure the purpose of all of these pins out... this isn't the sort of thing I would recommend to even an intermediate electronics engineer. --Mcmudge 18:54, 20 November 2005 (UTC)

This (more than two terminal) discussion may warrant it's own article, or just it's own section for now. It's more of a battery management topic than it is a battery (stricktly the individule cell) topic. I once dissasembled some 40 1.4Ah 18650 cell phone cells (5parallel 8series) to build a scooter pack. No, they didn't last long as they were undersized for the task, as I expected, sized to deliver crusing power(15A) but not accelleration power(50A). A second set of 96 naked ~1Ah prismatic cells (12p 8s) pack is still working well and delivering 10 miles of range [1]. Anyway, the first 18650 cells came in pairs with the milti-terminal management circuit. The circuit was connected to each pair of cells, as they were originally packaged, and though the phone used them both in series for power the circuit had a center tap, which I can only speculate was there to actively keep the pair in ballance. Other than that the only part of the circuit I can positively identify is a 5A fuse, which seperates the positive battery terminal from the positive pad. The other three terminals all appear to be gounds, though only one of them goes directly to the negative battery terminal. I suspect that these circuits are only half of the charge circuit, the other half residing in the phone/device or charger. --D0li0 12:16, 21 November 2005 (UTC)

Please consider this cell pic: http://www.eco-aesc.com/en/laminatecell.html Sirmikey1 (talk) 12:50, 29 April 2009 (UTC)

Revert

While 82.32.184.126's edit added a considerable amount of information, it amounted to little more than vandalism and has been reverted as such. I believe it was completely inappropriate for several reasons:

• It was a copy-paste from a website, and was thus poorly formatted to the point of being unreadable.
• It lost much of its meaning when taken out context.
• Its tone was openly hostile towards the Wikipedia community.
• First-person was used inappropriately. Discussing one's self is basically self-promotion.
• Most importantly, It is intrinsically impossible for an anonymous author to demonstrate he copied information from a website that was his intellectual property, not someone elses.

Anything that the author's information may have added to the article was more than outweighed by the edit's poor tone, marginal relevance, and likely copyright violation.

--Casito 03:17, 10 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Casito you're a bloody fool

You complaints / reasons for a revert were...

• It was a copy-paste from a website, and was thus poorly formatted to the point of being unreadable.

yeah, and I made it extremely clear at the outset what it was, and also made it quite clear that I wouldn't have any problem with any EDITS anyone felt like doing. (why didn't I do it myself at the time? at the time was a 9k gsm connection)

• It lost much of its meaning when taken out context.

rubbish

• Its tone was openly hostile towards the Wikipedia community.

now that is nothing less than complete and utter bullshit

• First-person was used inappropriately. Discussing one's self is basically self-promotion.

mm, it was a copy paste that people were invited to edit.

• Most importantly, It is intrinsically impossible for an anonymous author to demonstrate he copied information from a website that was his intellectual property, not someone elses.

yeah, look at the site in question (http://www.surfbaud.co.uk/index2.php), just above the bottom of the home page, just above the text that says "Copyright © 2005 Surfbaud. All rights reserved."

you'll find some white font coloured text, a pretty adequate demonstration of my intellectual property.

Casito you want to be king of this topic at the expense of actually adding any relevant and useful data for the benefit of the users you go right ahead, you think the tone of this post is openly hostile? It is, but directed at you personally for acting like a tosser, not at wiki.

You say you're a 22 year old mechanical engineering student, I'm a mid forties bloody well qualified and very experienced engineer, and here you are passing judgement on my knowledge for the benefit of everyone else.

You wanna pass judgement on a shitty bit of page editing (which I explained above was due to a flaky and slow connection at the time, and when I got back ashore I clean forgot about this article till just now) go right ahead and I'll agree with you all the way, which is why I said UP FRONT in the posting please feel free to edit or amend this at will so it fits in better.

• Tone it down, or you will simply be banned. Dan100 08:22, Jan 26, 2005 (UTC)
  • There is some worth-while information in there, but posting it in that manner was completely inappropiate. If you want to write an encyclopedia article, write in an encyclopedic style Dan100 08:26, Jan 26, 2005 (UTC)

Lose the egos guys... this is Wikipedia, not an IRC channel. There is not need for phrases like "it amounted to little more than vandalism" and "acting like a tosser". (Leigh8959 March 5 2005 5:30pm PST)

Loss of rechargeability

Does anyone know why Li-ion batteries slowly lose their ability to recharge? I would be interested in a chemical explanation.

This article simply lacks any chemical explanation. -- Toytoy 15:59, May 14, 2005 (UTC)

At full charge the cathode contains several high oxidation state metals that gradually either react (get reduced by reaction) with the electrolyte or lose oxygen. This process causes irreversible reactions that gradually results in the buildup of inactive species at the electrodes. Also overtime the active materials slowly delaminate from the current collectors resulting in less 'active' material involved in the cycling process.

But this process is very, very slow. The quoted 5% a month is way off, perhaps 0.5% or something. Personal tests have shown that these batteries keep charge for a year without trouble, and the millions of laptop and mobile phone users who use them daily is proof that the batteries are solid in the main. The only limit I know of is that the cells start to fail when you recharge them too often, the lower limit being around 300 charges. This is why iPods were having troubles, as they charge every time they are conneted to a PC, and they could be in constant use. 300 charges is under a year in those cases. Djvivnji 09:00, 5 June 2007 (UTC)

Badly formated additions

• http://www.toshiba.co.jp/about/press/2005_03/pr2901.htm

Toshiba is licensing the process from Altair the patent holder.

• http://biz.yahoo.com/iw/050404/083894.html
• http://biz.yahoo.com/iw/050404/083895.html
• http://www.altairnano.com/

This is a encyclopedia article, not a spec comparison sheet. All we need is the range of capacities available in general, not company specific info. Rmhermen 21:35, Jun 6, 2005 (UTC)

Can's the encyclopedia display information about the progress that has been made through out the development life of this technology? How about this? In particular I'm trying to show the rescent increases in power density.

2003

• Specific/Volumetric energy density: ~150-200 Wh/kg / ~250-545 Wh/L
• Specific/Volumetric power density: ~300-798 W/kg

2004

• Specific/Volumetric energy density: 100 Wh/kg / 250 Wh/L
• Specific/Volumetric power density: 2000 W/kg

2005

• Specific/Volumetric energy density: 113 Wh/kg / 250 Wh/L
• Specific/Volumetric power density: 5654 W/kg

--D0li0 01:43, 7 Jun 2005 (UTC)

First these selected data don't show a state of the art. They are just randomly selected data. Second the Wh/kg data don't show any trend so why list them? Third, you are still using a press release of a possible future battery which is not independently verified for the current data. Rmhermen 23:56, Jun 7, 2005 (UTC)

They do show the potential of the art, which will become the state of the art. No trend? How is 300-800, 2000, and 5600 W/kg not a trend, it seems to me to be a 10 fold increase in power density from 500 to 5000. The Altair posts may have been unverified claims, but once Toshiba licensed and build it's prototypes and tested them this technology became proven, no? Do Toshibas measurement devices somehow differ from those you or I might use to measure these cells? So you're saying we have to wait till they go into mass production and we can test them ourselves? --D0li0 01:13, 8 Jun 2005 (UTC)

IO didn't say that the the W/kg data didn't show a trwend. I said that the Wh/kg don't. I said that the W/kg data appear to suffer from selection bias. Toshiba's claims are unverified. You are quoting a company advertisment for a prototype. No one beside Toshiba has one of these batteries and therefore no one run any independent test and verified or dissproven their data. Companies have a long history of painting pretty pictures of their products more gleamiong and impressive than reality. And don't forget thee difference between Li-Ion and Li-polymer. When this does come to market, it may well be considered a new type of battery. Rmhermen 13:04, Jun 8, 2005 (UTC)

Humm, well I guess I'll wait till they go into production or are otherwise validated. Sorry for being such a pain, I'm just really excited about these cells! How about a link to the Electric_vehicle page? --D0li0 20:15, 8 Jun 2005 (UTC)

A bunch info and answers to incorporate

If you'd like to write some content, here are some things I know about Li-Ions. A lot of this is already covered, but I'm sure there's plenty of info that can be added. I am an electronics engineer -- I make circuits that directly use, charge and protect lithium ion, lithium polymer, ni-cad and ni-mh cells. Please incorporate this information as you see fit. This information applies to both Lithium-ion and Lithium-polymer batteries.

The reason for performance loss is oxidization. This is created by time, charge, and heat. To prolong the life of your battery, keep it somewhere cool (the refrigerator; not the freezer) at a 40% charge. Buy your batteries when you need them; don't buy a second battery until it is going to be used. In applications where the number of recharges is more important than single-cycle capacity, lithium batteries are never charged more than 80%.

The lithium battery nominal voltage is 3.6 volts; this is the voltage at about a 50% charge, and the battery stays the longest near this voltage as it is being used. The charge voltage is 4.2 volts, and the lowest "allowed" voltage is 2.5 volts, although most electronic equipment cuts it off at 2.9 volts for safety. A lithium-ion cell below 1.5 volts should not be charged with the normal charger.

Lithium ion batteries range from 15 minutes to 4 hours to charge; the shorter the charge time, the fewer charge cycles the battery can handle. Although it is not always best for the battery, it is safe to say that any li-ion can be charged in 1 hour. This is done by applying a current equal to their amp-hour rating; a 2.2-amp-hour lithium-ion would be given no more than 2.2 amps for one hour, or until the battery hits 4.2 volts, whichever comes first. After the charging battery hits 4.2 volts, a "top-off" charge can be accomplished by continuing to provide current as the battery overcomes its internal resistance, as long as the voltage does not exceed 4.2.

Lithium ion batteries, like most others, have some internal resistance. When discharging stops, the battery's voltage may recover. Likewise, when charging stops, the voltage may drop, allowing for further "top-off" charging until the battery maintains 4.2 volts. Lithium-based batteries are unique in their ability to deliver power at very low temperatures, and may soon be a replacement for winter lead-acid batteries. No heat should be produced from a charging battery.

Voltages below 2.9 have the potential to harm a lithium battery. Many protection circuits and chargers will place the battery into a "trickle-charge" state, which charges the battery at 1/10th of the charge rate until the battery reaches 2.9 volts, and then charging resumes as normal.

When shorted, older lithium batteries have the potential to produce pure lithium, which is highly reactive. While Nickel-based batteries can usually take the place of common consumer batteries (like alkaline), lithium batteries are almost always accompanied by at least a minimum protection circuit that prevents overdischarge, overcharge and short-circuit.

Because of weight and cost considerations, several consumer industries, such as remote-controlled aircraft models, often do not use the protection circuit. This has led to huge amounts of property damage from fire, including lost homes and vehicles. Short-circuits are the easiest failure to understand. When shorted, the power of the battery is released at the highest rate that the battery can deliver; all of this energy turns to heat, and eventually to fire. The remainder of the fires are greatly misunderstood:

Series-charging of li-ion batteries is a major problem. In order to charge 3 lithium cells in series, the final voltage across all of the cells should be 12.6. However, this does not guarantee that the voltage for each cell is 4.2. Inconsistency in battery temperature, pressure and manufacture can cause a cell to fall behind while remaining cells will reach full charge sooner... as the charge continues, the fully-charged cells become overcharged. After a few charge cycles like this, one of the cells may be undercharged, while one is at a critical voltage (4.5V or higher); this is when the battery gets hot. Shrink-wrap around the battery can then prevent the electrodes from separating, and provide a storage for pressure until the battery bursts, sending burning electrolyte in all directions.

Laptops fix this problem by actually having 4 individual chargers on board. While the cells are discharged as a whole, each cell is charged independently, to ensure that no one cell goes higher than 4.2 volts.

Lithium ions also have a debated use-it-or-lose-it "memory effect". It is theorized that a battery that is left fully charged for long periods will lose its ability to deliver power quickly, even though the power is present in the battery. This will cause the battery-controlling circuitry to sense that the battery is low because the battery can't keep up with the electronics. Likewise, batteries that are exposed to a high-draw may not hold their full charge as long. A counter-argument to this theory is that, especially in laptops, the warmth and full-charge provided by the laptop simply accelerate the battery's natural deterioration. Laptop users that usually leave their laptop plugged in should discharge their battery to about 40% and leave it out of the laptop until it is needed.

Also, Lithium-ion technology is fading away, while more development is being done with Lithium-polymers. All of these technologies have their oddballs:

Lithium batteries typically allow for a full discharge in 4 minutes, however, there are some that can dump all of their power in as little as 60 seconds. (That means LOTS of power, really quick)

Lithium batteries typically take a minimum of 1 hour to charge. There are a few that take 15 minutes, but Toshiba has recently announced a battery capable of being fully charged in 60 seconds.

There are several types of lithium batteries that have lower peak-charge and nominal voltages; be sure you know your battery's operating voltages before trying to charge or discharge them.

Mcmudge 18:55, 20 November 2005 (UTC)

Much of the above falls into the class of information wrongly distributed around the Internet (refered to above). The article already has far too much of this to incorporate any more. As already noted, real world batteries seem to be unaware of much of the above and carry on for many years after they should have expired. 20.133.0.13 (talk) 10:15, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

Freezer issue

I have read in the article that Li-Ion batteries should not be put in the frezzer, which is most likely a result of having this information copied over from variuos websites. However, I find no practical reason why you shouldn't. Of course, the metallic pins of the battery should be isolated, as ice and condesation water could cause an current flow, that could indeed destroy the battery. I've done this, and put a cell phone battery into a freezer of about -15°C for more than three months (of course, as recommended, at 40% charge). Result: after letting it warm up slowly, it works as if it was new, no loss in capacity noticeable.

Condensation may well provide a discharge path, but ice is an insulator. This is why railway companies have to go to great lengths to remove or melt ice that forms on conductor rails during the winter periods.

Of course, charging and use at these temperatures should be strongly discouraged, but the "do not put into the freezer" point should be removed or rewritten. Seidler2547 10:28, 2 February 2006 (UTC)

And what about the condensed moisture inside battery? When cooling down from room temperature, the dew point goes down as well, so at the end you have water/ice inside the battery - on the contacts, on inside electronics and so on. May this be the reason why not to store batteries at so low temperatures? #jez 89.239.7.2 17:09, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

Invented by Thomas Edison?

I removed the following text by User:Avé:

Image:Ed_d22m.jpg

Thomas Alva Edison used (and preferred) Li-Ion batteries in his electric vehicles. While powered by Lithium Ion batteries, neither his electric trains that circumnavigated the Menlo Park lab/facility, nor the electric autos gained commercial success, it is worthy to note Henry Ford worked for Edison prior to starting Ford Motor Co.

The Detroit Electric car shown in that 1913 photograph predates commercial Li-ion batteries by almost 80 years. It was available with either lead-acid or nickel-iron batteries, as shown in this advertisement. Nickel-iron batteries were invented by Edison in 1901 and manufactured at the Edison Storage Battery Company.

No he didn't. Edison stole the invention of the Nickel-Iron battery from Jungner who experimented with various combinations of Iron and Nickel before finally developing the Nickel-Cadmium battery in 1899. Jungner found that the Nickel-Iron version was considerably inferior to the Nickel-Cadmium and neither patented it nor developed it further. Both variants were largely unknown in the US until the 1940's allowing Edison to claim to have invented the Nickel-Iron. I B Wright 11:53, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

I was unable to find any sources that suggest Edison invented the Lithium-ion battery. As part of my search, I reviewed all U.S. patents granted to Edison with titles containing variations of the words battery, electrode, or electrolyte. There are 94 such patents. And though I found no description of a device similar to a modern Li-ion battery, I did find references to lithium compounds Edison used in the construction of his nickel-iron batteries. Specifically, Edison discovered he could increase the capacity and longevity of nickel-iron batteries by supplementing the alkaline electrolyte with a small amount of lithium hydroxide. This discovery is presented in the following patent:

• 876,445 Electrolyte for Alkaline Storage Batteries Use of lithium hydroxide in alkaline electrolytes.

  The increase in capacity of an Edison cell in which lithium hydroxid is used, amounts to about ten per cent., while the increase of the time over which the capacity may be maintained is remarkable, and of the highest commercial importance. (pg 1, ln 46)

I also found five other patents in which Edison describes an alkaline electrolyte containing a small amount of lithium hydroxide:

• 1,073,107 Storage Battery Construction of small storage batteries.

  partly filled with the electrolyte 4, which consists preferably of a solution of potassium hydroxid in distilled water with a small percentage of lithia. (pg 1, ln 55)

• 1,167,485 Storage Battery Use of cerium oxide as a cathode material rather than the usual nickel oxide.

  For the electrolyte I prefer to employ a solution of potassium or sodium hydroxid, to which may be added a small percentage of lithium hydroxid (pg 1, ln 86)

• 1,299,693 Storage Battery Addition of tin oxide to iron cathodes.

  For the electrolyte I prefer to employ a solution of potassium or sodium hydroxid, to which may be added a small percentage of lithium hydroxid (pg 1, ln 92)

  An electrolyte containing lithium hydroxide is also mentioned in claims 18–22 and 28.

• 1,379,088 Storage Battery High discharge rate batteries for starting the Ford car.

  such electrolyte preferably consisting of a 21% solution of caustic potash containing about 2% by weight of lithium hydroxid. (pg 2, ln 123)

• 1,377,194 Storage Battery Continuation of 1,379,088.

  …such electrolyte preferably consisting of a 21% solution of caustic potash or a 15% solution of caustic soda, containing about 2% by weight of lithium hydroxid. (pg 4, ln 46)

I also found a patent describing the extraction of potassium and lithium from silicate ore. This suggests Edison used lithium in significant amounts, probably in the manufacture of storage batteries.

• 1,678,246 Production of Alkali-Metal Compounds from Silicates Containing Them

Curiously, five of these patents use the word prefer or preferably when describing the use of lithium hydroxide. This wording is mirrored in the Wikipedia text. Perhaps the nickel-iron batteries described in these patents were mistakenly believed to be Li-ion batteries?

I believe the addition of lithium hydroxide as described in patent 876,445 doesn't alter the basic chemistry of the nickel-iron cell. These batteries are nothing like modern Li-ion cells; they're more closely related to NiCds. —Ryanrs 14:58, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

I think that would make a nice section at the Nickel-iron battery article, I've copied it to Talk:Nickel-iron battery#lithium hydroxide electrolyte which could use the attention. --D0li0 11:09, 20 March 2006 (UTC)

The Edison examples are not really Li-Ion batteries but early versions of the Ni-Cd or Ni-Zn (even NiMH) batteries where protons do the charge transport.

What is the internal resistance of Lithium-ion batteries of higher capacity, say 40AH. Upto what surrounding temperature these batteries are adviced to operate? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.124.16.58 (talk) 05:13, 14 October 2008 (UTC)

Higher-Capacity Lithium-Ion Batteries

New research which I or someone can add when possible. - RoyBoy ⁸⁰⁰ 16:58, 26 June 2006 (UTC)

I hesitate to edit this myself, but the energy numbers given in the article are way too high for real-world lithium-ion rechargable batteries hitting the streets. 100 Wh/kg typically when being discharged from 3,7 downto the cut-off-voltage would be more realistic, and only 60 - 70 Wh/kg if not discharged below 3,5V (for an extended life). These are the numbers found in some other language Wiki contents and these are also the numbers I could find in science literature. Sure, there is an enourmeous technology progress going on right now, but I think, Wikipedia should not just cite the idealised manufacturers data as this will led to wrong conclusions in regard to the technology. Ideally Wikipedia would differentiate between manufacturers data, science data, and practical data. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.63.22.179 (talk) 08:55, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

Polymers = flourinated?

Does anyone have an opinion on Nakajima, T. and Groult, H., eds. (2005) "Fluorinated Materials for Energy Conversion" Elsevier ISBN 0080444725? 66.201.48.26 08:43, 6 July 2006 (UTC)

fixing energy numbers

The numbers in the table need to be fixed so that they are correct and consistant with the article. Also, I was wondering why we're measuring energy in watt hours..? Fresheneesz 08:11, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

Battery capacities are always measured in Wh not J by those that use and test them - because this is a convenient unit, especially as the charge is measured in Ah rather than C. Simply multiplying the charge, in Ah, during charge or discharge by the average voltage, in V, gives the energy in Wh. To convert to SI units is also quite simple 1 Wh = 3.6 kJ. Ahw001 06:17, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Yes, watt-hours are entirely appropriate units for energy in case of batteries or other portable energy sources. I think it's a much bigger problem that those numbers in the article have been sourced from absolutely nowhere. As far as anyone is concerned, those are purely random, though reasonable-looking, numbers.

prolonging real-world battery life

For an average joe who wants to prolong the life of their laptop (or mobile phone etc); the article says keeping it at 40% is best; but u obviously can't keep a battery at 40% all the time; otherwise there is no point in having it. So what is needed is a range of optimum use? i have heard 80%-40% .. 80%-20%. eg. (excluding long periods of time when it wont be in use) is it better to keep a battery at 40% and then drain it to 20% when u actualy need to use it, or keep it at 60% and drain it to 40% when u need it. How would u keep a battery from charging fully, without removing it? (this part seems like manufacturers specifically try to get ur battery to ruin itself) and also, from what i can gather there is no way to increase the battery life of a li-ion battery, once it has degraded.. right? ~BB, aug19.

According to Toyota, they designed their hybrids to keep the NiMH batteries between 40-70% to prolong life & avoid replacement. It seems reasonable to think Lithium has a similar property. - Theaveng 15:28, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

The lower state of charge (SOC) in HEV operation is more related to the regen braking function. The lower the SOC, the higher the power the battery can accept during braking. Sure, it does prolong life, because if regenerative power were forced into a battery at high SOC it would cause damage. Lithium ion batteries do age more rapidly at higher voltages (= higher SOC levels) because they are thermodynamically less stable. Storing them at less than about 60% would probably not yield significant benefits. Furthermore, if stored at very low SOC there is a danger of overdischarge because of continued parasitic discharge from the on-board electronics. - BatteryGuy 23:13, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

Toxicity

I came to the page seeking information about the relative toxicity of this battery chemistry as waste. Nothing found. An addition covering this topic would be welcome.

Seconded. Battery chemistry looks tricky to the non-specialist. "Lead-acid", I can guess the risks; "lithium ion", not so much. Even looking up lithium isn't necessarily going to settle the question: for example, carbon looks friendly enough on paper, but less so when it's in carbon monoxide gas. —Eric S. Smith 15:19, 11 December 2006 (UTC)

Transwikied to wikibooks

This article has been transwikied to b:Transwiki:Lithium ion battery, where it will be modified for use as a how-to chapter. The how to section(s) may now be deleted. --SB_Johnny | ^talk 11:43, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

720 W / kg claim

Everspring [2] claims to sell their 'Lithium ion Power Battery' for $50 / kg at 720 Wh / kg. I could not find real world use of these after a few hours searching the net so I am now even more suspicous of the claims.

It's probably for use in off-grid systems, such as farms with windmills, etc. --SB_Johnny | ^talk 11:07, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

Claim in Electric Vehicle Article

There it says: Lithium batteries have been made safe, can be recharged in minutes instead of hours, and now last longer than the typical vehicle.

Seems to contradict what this article says.

www.teslamotors.com says they are using 4600 lithium ion cells with a fuse at each positive and each negative terminal = 9200 fuses. These are slighty larger than AA size cells. Let's consider an improved (possibly) design: 80 somewhat larger lithiun-ion cells in series. This produces almost 300 volts, which allows a simple, cheap, and tiny charger to plug in the 240 volt ac line. Fusing both terminals of each cell separately seems prudent in event of a bad wreck. Each cell has it's own 2 amp charger, voltage limited at about 4.2 volts. A common 6 volt at 6 amps incandecent light bulb can provide the 2 amps approximately constant current from a 4 volt rms transformer secondary and diodes. A computer stops the charging of each cell several times per hour and leaves that charger off if the terminal voltage exceeds 4.2 volts. This provides about 600 watts of charging for the 200,000 watt battery. This system can run 24/7 if the transformer primary is pluged into a live 120 volt ac outlet. It should run whenever the gasoline motor is running to reduce the probability of any cell falling below 2.8 volts. The 80 bulbs are a very dim idiot light for each of the 80 cells. If the main charger is plugged into 240 volts, twenty or thirty additional amps are supplied to the 200,000 watt battery. When several of the 2 amp chargers have shut down, the 240 volt charger will also be shut down (until all the cells are being charged at about 2 amps) to avoid over charging the 200,000 watt battery. If faster charging is desired, an auto-transformer can boost the 240 volt ac input to 250 volts or a bit more. The 200,000 watt battery weighes 111 kilograms using the bare bones energy density of 1800 watts per kilogram. Using the low number from the text 667 kilograms at 300 watts per kilogram, for 20 seconds. An air cooled battery (or refrigerant cooled battery) can likely weigh 300 kilograms, even with saftey devices and containment in event of a cell explosion. We will need more than 20 seconds if the vehicle is pulling a trailer weighing several tons up a long steep hill. The Tesla roadster battery is 280 amp hours, so it takes(not a hybird)ten hours to charge at an average of 28 amps. Generally we start charging at 50% charge or more, and even big hybirds can use less amp hours. Few homes or small businesses are presently wired to charge much faster than 28 amps average, even though a vehicle size lithium ion battery can likely tolerate a 300 amp charging rate at least briefly. Neil

The reason for the individual cells is purely that the 'A' sized cells are so common, and they all have PTC 'fuses' in them to try to stop thermal runaway. They didn't add the fuses themselves. Pull apart 90% of laptop batteries, drill batteries or any other large battery and you will find arrays of smaller cells.Djvivnji 15:03, 5 June 2007 (UTC)

I had heard that the Toshiba corporation has developed a fast charging battery and circuit system that allows fast charging in minutes and that it may be of some use to the auto sector. It seems promising, provided that the oil companies do not try to take over this technology as well. I think they hold a fair few patents for battery technology for automotive propulsion and will not release them on license - Texaco for example holds the patent (through a subsidiary it bought many years ago) for a battery temperature regulator. 80.195.207.65 13:46, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

Lithium in Lihium Ion cells

Does anyone know how much lithium (in [g]) a 200 wh/kg cell of 1 kg contains ?

no one can give estimates for this type of question? There is a lot of discussion about lithium shortage, but not knowing how much is needed per kWh makes it difficult to calculate from production figures. I'm told it's only 5% which would be only 50 grams for this 200 Wh question. Said another way 4,000 Wh out of 1 kg lithium. 24.214.155.48 (talk) 19:40, 14 August 2010 (UTC)

I presume that "a 200Wh/Kg cell of 1Kg" equals a 200 Wh cell.

For the purpose of determing the ability to bring Li-Ion batteries onboard aircrafts, its common to limit the size to 100 Wh or 7g of active lithium (IAA). I presume that 200Wh compares to 14g of active lithium. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 85.164.120.145 (talk) 22:02, 28 January 2011 (UTC)

0% Li-ion becomes 100%

I gave a 0% Li-ion "dead" battery to a repair shop for about 2 weeks, it can "repair" it to 100% "live" battery. I wonder how they can "renew" it or "repair" it. Can anyone tell me? "Put" it in a freezer? "Charge" it with a "special" charger? "Open" it and "repair" the inside content? 0% to 100% is a real story. What is the real explanation? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 219.79.188.100 (talk) 21:54, 18 March 2007 (UTC).

Some compaanies will repair the battery by replacing the "dead" cells with new ones. The battery packs, depending upon the type, may end up with cells that have more capacity than the originals, and hence last longer. The process is the same regardless of whether it is a NiMH, Li-ion or whatever battery, as it is easier, and safer, to replace all the cells at once.

quote: lithium-ion batteries should be charged early and often

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Li-ion#Guidelines_for_prolonging_Li-ion_battery_life

Guidelines for prolonging Li-ion battery life

• Unlike Ni-Cd batteries, lithium-ion batteries should be charged early and often. However, if they are not used for a longer time, they should be brought to a charge level of around 40%.
• [ ...... ]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Li-ion#Storage_temperature_and_charge

• Storage temperature and charge

|::| According to the table in this paragraph[3]: lower charge means longer battery life. And so If I fully recharge my mobile phone's battery, every one or two days, then I will shorten it's life. Therefore it would be better to only recharge the battery when the phone asks me to. This will take use of the entire safe capacity of the Li-ion battery, but also allows it to be in a low-charged state for some days, expanding it's life-time. (pure logic)

|::| George Valkov 16:58, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

You should let them run down. The internal circuits stop them before they get too low, and you are more limited by the limited number of charges than anything else in reality. Djvivnji 15:06, 5 June 2007 (UTC)

Battery types

There would be a template to all the rechargable battery types (as happens in other topics).

Deep Cycling

"Unlike Ni-Cd batteries, lithium-ion batteries should be charged early and often. However, if they are not used for a longer time, they should be brought to a charge level of around 40%. Lithium-ion batteries should never be "deep-cycled" like Ni-Cd batteries.[7]"

I don't understand what deep-cycled means... Maybe a clarification would help =) --Grant M 01:24, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

It's when you drain the battery (by definition, over 80%, but they usually mean it can be discharged 100%) before recharging. If you deep cycle Li-Ion batteries, the internal circuitry that protects the battery won't have enough power and you'll never be able to charge it again. The internal circuitry does its best to reserve some power for it to function, so normal use won't deep charge it. --Wirbelwindヴィルヴェルヴィント (talk) 18:22, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

|::| George Valkov 9:02, 16 September 2011 (UTC)

If the baterry is to discharged for the internal protection circuit to work, it is still possible to apply a short current pulse < 1s from a higher voltage source, usually < 10V. The switch transistor will temporary break down like a zener diode, allowing a small charge to be applied to the battery. This should be sufficient for the intermal protection circuit to work again, without destroying it.

Things are more complicated if there is a short batery inside and disconnected protection outside. There is a good chance to burn the protection circuit, before the short circuit.

Reliability of references

I have begun going through the references cited in this article and formatting them for consistency. However, the reliability of the ones we are citing is outright scary. For starters, we have a citation to a movie review of "Who killed the electric car." Not a review in a magazine or newspaper, just a review on the home page of some guy named Paul (no last name given). Next we have several citations written by Isidor Buchmann. Some of them are on BatteryUniversity.com, and one is on his personal page. Buchmann is CEO of Cadex Electronics Inc., a company which sells battery testers and chargers so he, and his company, have vested interests. The only truly reliable sources I have seen so far are the patent references, and possible the lithium-ion handbook, although this too is published by a battery manufacturer. I don't think we should just delete the sources that are listed as its better for our readers to at least see where we got our information, but I think it does give un-due credibility to the article and perhaps it should contain some sort of warning. I don't know if we have a template about the reliability of sources listed but we could just make a box at the top of the page like some of the templates do. The section above "Much material is questionable" also discusses this matter somewhat. -AndrewBuck 17:51, 17 August 2007 (UTC)

I'm sorry Andrew.but Isidor Buchmann has been a source of battery expertise for many years. Because he has a successful business, why does that constitute a vested interest? Why dies that make him an "unreliable source"? I personally learned a great deal about batteries from Isidor, going back at least 10 years. Freddy011 (talk) 05:27, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

Buchmann is, as far as has been determined, a completely self-published source (i.e. no independent technical or editorial oversight). Some of what he has posted is flatly wrong. Some of what he posts is culled from the web with no validation; see the section below specifically on Battery University, in which is described how he grabbed something that was just made up and "seeded" for him to find. Ok, you think you've learned a lot from his site - how do you know that what you "learned" was actually true? Jeh (talk) 19:01, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

So far I have been unable to identify any seriously wrong facts in Buchmann's book, and errors do happen in every publication. Since that guy's main business is battery-related it makes sense he knows what he's talking about - I suppose he'd go out of business with chargers and analyzers (which wouldn't work properly) long ago if that was the case. Also I don't see any vested interest here, what possible gain could he have from dispatching wrong battery informations? Arny (talk) 00:26, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

Japanese expert

According to [4], a Japanese expert has recommended lithium ion polymer batteries be used instead of lithium ion. The reference isn't the best though, they don't even seem to realise lithium ion polymer batteries already exist Nil Einne 10:13, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

"real world testing"

I've removed the section entitled "real world testing", about car batteries. The section was misnamed (Li-ion batteries have had years of real world testing) and did not seem to fit the NPOV. LachlanA 02:41, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

• I have removed it again. I think it is not relevant to the article. HumphreyW (talk) 01:29, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

"50 million ohms" ???

I haven't gone through the pain of checking when that statement was added (that internal resistance will eventually rise to 50 MOhms), but it appears ridiculously high and was not backed up by some proper source, especially since it was given as an indicative value. Plus, in practice, even two or single-digit figures for internal resistance would be a hindrance to any practical battery, let alone 50 MegaOhms. EpiVictor 19:25, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

It originally said the resistance was 50 million Celsius so I expect it's not valid Kirtai 08:50, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

Very likely it mean 50 milliohms instead of 50 megohms. Milli abbreviation is small m, mega is capital M. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.19.231.103 (talk) 19:30, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

Explosive safety devices???

"Li-ion batteries contain safety devices that protect the cells inside from abuse, and, if damaged, can cause the battery to ignite or explode."

A safety device that causes a fire or explosion? Perhaps this is meant to say something else...? --Chriswaterguy talk 18:12, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

"Controversy"

Is controversy the most appropriate word(s) for the headline of that section? I think something like "Defective batteries" or something would be better. andkore 21:15, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

Fundamental Point

Are all rechargeable Lithium cells "Lithium Ion"? Some sources seem to define lithium ion as a subset of rechargeable lithium cells, whereas others indicate they are the same thing. I think a definitive statement on this would clear up some ambiguity. Do you think it would be useful to create a comprehensive table of currently availble chemistries, similar to (but maybe not quite as verbose as) the Lithium_battery page? I realise that information from manufacturers can be scarce but even just a listing of the chemistries would be useful. (Namxat 10:14, 26 October 2007 (UTC))

recharge cycle

what is considered a recharge cycle for lithum batterys? every time you plug it in then that is a charge cycle gone? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.218.246.100 (talk) 03:19, 22 November 2007 (UTC)

A 'charge/discharge cycle in this context is a discharge from 100% to 0% charge and then a recharge back to 100% charge. Typically stated as 300-500 cycles. Discharging to 50% charge and then recharging is only half a cycle, thus you can expect 600-1000 half cycles (and so on). 20.133.0.13 (talk) 12:42, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

Add power/size in Battery specifications?

I realise this can be calculated from the other three, but it would be nice to have this statistic at a glance. What do others think? --Skytopia (talk) 11:58, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Link to page selling thinkpad batteries?!?!

The first link in "External Links" is IBM thinkpad t40 battery which is a link to "http://www.power-batteries.net/notebook/ibm/thinkpad-t40-series.html".

I didn't look too deeply, but I'm pretty sure they're more interested in selling people a replacement battery than they are in presenting facts about Lithium Ion Batteries... —Preceding unsigned comment added by Elusiveneutrino (talk • contribs) 09:51, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

Physical size of battery

The battery in the picture at the beginning of the article-- how big is it? Is it as big as a pack of cigarettes? A sea trunk? An automobile? As with any other picture of an unfamiliar object, there should be a familiar object in the picture so we have something by which to judge the size of the unfamiliar object. Jm546 (talk) 18:29, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Additions in the history section Aug 24

the last addition for the history is 1996 which is a little out of date. The last entry also has the year 1996 as the publication year concerning the introduction of Iron Phosphate in L-ion batteries, this is correct. But I added the word "late" before 1996 because two of the technology articles I read had the release marked erroneously as 1997.

Other than that I just added some info from the Online version of the Printed March 6th, 2008 issue of Economist.--Sparkygravity (talk) 13:32, 25 August 2008 (UTC)

Article authors confuse single electrode capacity improvements with improvements in overall battery energy density

Be mindful of the fact that claims of improved energy density around new electrode breakthroughs are typically misquoting the original source. Several times in the article, for example around the MIT virus-based nanowires, original authors' claims that suggest improvement in electrode capacity are mis-represented as potential improvements in overall battery energy density. A 3x improvement in electrode capacity does not equate to a 3x improvement in battery energy density. A suitable complementary electrode is first needed to accommodate a similar capacity, and other inactive materials in the cell must be considered in determining overall energy density. Mrweatherbee (talk) 22:36, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

Charge/discharge efficiency

An anonymous IP user has edited the Charge/discharge efficiency info box to say 80-90%, with the justification being a single source study on power tool Li-ion batteries. I have always thought it was normal to state the coloumbic efficiency for this figure. Power tools put a very heavy load on the batteries and I doubt that this usage is representative of the more common usage that the average person is likely to encounter in things like cells phones and PDAs. If there is no further evidence to support this single source then I will revert it back to the more usual accepted figure of coloumbic efficiency 99.9% HumphreyW (talk) 13:23, 26 February 2009 (UTC)

Power/weight (specific power)

Does anyone have a reference for this? I picked one Li-ion at random and pulled the data sheet:

http://www.panasonic.com/industrial/battery/oem/images/pdf/Panasonic_LiIon_CGA103450A.pdf

I ran the numbers on it, for 2C, and got ~330 W/kg; which is a lot lower than the specified number.- (User) Wolfkeeper (Talk) 17:51, 21 March 2009 (UTC)

Discharging below 3V

It says on two occasions in the text that discharging below a "certain voltage" (2.9 or 3V) is "harmful" and "may render the battery unusable". I think it should be added that this is only due to the internal protection circuitry. The cell itself isn't seriously harmed by deep discharging even down to 0V as far as I understand from http://www.batteryuniversity.com/partone-16.htm and I've also designed and used Li-ion chargers (for in-house use only) which we use for button cell li-ion (which for some reason don't have much protection in themselves). They don't seem to be degraded much when used down to 0V (although I haven't tried this in great detail, but I've seen enough to make a rough conclusion). We use "pre-charging" (i e 1/10 of full charge current) if voltage is below 2,9V. (It might be good to avoid the term "trickle charging" here since this term is since long used for Nickel chemistries etc and then means a continuous small charging current after full charging is completed, to keep charging level at 100%; this is NOT allowed for Li-ion.) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 152.73.73.1 (talk) 12:05, 27 April 2009 (UTC)

Citations or any information from Battery University is unacceptable. In spite of the impressive name and web site, there is in fact no such organisation. The web site is run by an individual who just trawls information regardless of provenance (or accuracy) from the rest of the Internet into one website. Indeed false (but esentially harmless) information has appeared on Battery University within a week or two of having been deliberately planted elsewhere. Unfortunately there was an unforseen result of this, a few portable device manufacturers (including such reputable suppliers like Hewlett Packard) included features in their products to deal with the mythical characteristic.

Having said all that, there are real reasons not to discharge a Li-ion battery below 2.8 volts per cell (2.4 volts for some chemistry variants). Once the voltage falls below the minimum level, the chemistry tends to plate out copper onto the internal structure of the cell. Obviously, if it is recharged fairly quickly, the available current is able to remove the thin layer (though the copper particles can still be a hazard). However, if the recharge doesn't occur for a longer time, the plated out copper acts as a short circuit on the cell and can result in the cell over heating and possible rupture. It is for this reason that a properly designed Li-ion charger will not permit a cell discharged below the minimum voltage to be charged. Attempting to overcome this by manually partially recharging the battery is dangerous unless carried out to a strict procedure (which involves carrying it out in a location where a rupturing battery cannot set fire to anything else).

Li-ion batteries cannot be trickle charged as such, but they can be left floating across a fixed current limited 4.2 volt source. Once the cell voltage rises to 4.2 volts itself, the charge current will in theory fall to zero. In practice, the current falls to a level that exactly balances the battery's self discharge current. In fact, to fully charge such a battery it should be left 'on charge' for around an hour after the indication that the charge cycle has finished. Nearly every charger reports that the charge has finished when the constant current cycle has ended, but this typically occurs at 80% charge and not 100% as indicated. The constant voltage phase adds the remaining charge.

If you are attempting to design your own charger, it should be noted that the 4.2 volt output must be maintained very accurately. A 0.5% reduction in voltage will result in the battery being undercharged by about 10% of its capacity. A 0.5% overvoltage will result in the battery attempting to overcharge by around 25%. This latter effect will not in fact occur and the result is a highly probably rupture of the battery, and the fire that results. Batteries don't 'explode' as such, but they do rupture and the electrolyte, which is highly flammable, is ignited by the spontaneous combustion of other battery components (most notably metallic lithium released from the chemistry). Since the electrolyte is rapidly ejected by the built up internal pressure, the battery is quite capable of setting fire to material several feet away from it. The burning battery is almost impossible to extinguish because it provides its own oxygen. 20.133.0.13 (talk) 10:44, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

It would be helpful if you would document (here, not in the article), what the false information was. Obviously if you have access to reliable sources that document the correct information that would be even better.--Srleffler (talk) 17:18, 31 August 2009 (UTC)

Unfortunately, most of that site is questionable. If much of what was contained on that site were true, no Li-ion battery could possibly last longer than 5 years. In fact, real world batteries can last 15 years or more. The one thing on that site that I can positively say is false is the claim that batteries degrade if discharged below 30% charge. I can say this because myself and 2 colleagues made this defect up and deliberately planted it for the guy who actually runs BatteryUniversity to find and incorporate into the site (and he did it within 2 weeks). It was about the most harmles thing we could think of, but several manufacturers did incorporate features in their products to warn of impending discharge below 30% charge (and to be fair, probably did it with the best of intentions).

Someone has opened a new discussion thread below on BatteryUniversity, and I would suggest that further discussion is continued there (== Reliability of Battery University as a source? ==). 20.133.0.13 (talk) 09:00, 9 October 2009 (UTC)

Picture in infobox

I'm not sure what the picture of the Varta Lithium-ion battery in the infobox is supposed to illustrate? As it's in a museum, is it a picture of an early prototype or is this type of battery still in use today, and if so, what is it used for? Is it an automotive battery? Richerman (talk) 13:55, 27 April 2009 (UTC)

Exploding batteries?

I have removed the reference talking about exploding batteries during charging. If there is a reliable reference detailing actual results with batteries that have exploded please feel free to reinstate the text. I get the impression that the current fear about exploding Li-ion batteries is simply just that - a fear that is backed by no evidence. Many sites post vague claims or single sentences saying "be cautious of exploding batteries" but none that I have found have solid evidence for the claim. Most of the actual evidence of stressed batteries is only catching fire of over heating, but no explosions. HumphreyW (talk) 19:44, 22 May 2009 (UTC)

Ref(0) Failure to follow current and voltage limitations can result in explosion. "If, however, a Li-Ion battery is placed on a charger which is set for a higher terminal voltage than 4.25V per cell, or a higher than rated current, there is a real possibility of fire or explosion. Further, if the battery is connected to a load above its current capability, it will overheat, even if the cells are not taken below the minimum voltage of 2.25 volts/cell."

Ref(1) In the even of an lithium battery explosion it will quickly generate dense white smoke which can cause severe irritation to the respiratory tract, eyes and skin. All precautions must be taken to limit exposure to these fumes.

Ref(2) Failure to follow current and voltage limitations can result in explosion.

Electron9 (talk) 22:08, 29 May 2009 (UTC)

Reiterated from above just to clarrify the point:

Batteries don't 'explode' as such, but they do rupture and the electrolyte, which is highly flammable, is ignited by the spontaneous combustion of other battery components (most notably metallic lithium released from the chemistry). Since the electrolyte is rapidly ejected by the built up internal pressure, the battery is quite capable of setting fire to material several feet away from it. The burning battery is almost impossible to extinguish because it provides its own oxygen. 20.133.0.13 (talk) 10:46, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

Contradiction

The section on advantages contradicts itself. It says both "Li-ion batteries are lighter than other equivalent secondary batteries—often much lighter," and "However, the bulk of the electrodes...and in addition "dead weight" from the electrolyte, current collectors, casing, electronics and conductivity additives reduce the charge per unit mass to little more than that of other rechargeable batteries." These statements cannot both be true as written.--Srleffler (talk) 00:55, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

Disputed

For anyone else confused by the talkpage link in the {{disputed}} tag (in the "Guidelines for prolonging Li-ion battery life" section) that leads to nowhere, but are too lazy to dig through the page history... the comments by the IP who added the tag are here (and the same IP has a few other posts scattered above through this talk page). I'm mainly just posting this here so that that link has a target. Phlip (talk) 09:51, 31 August 2009 (UTC)

I will remove the disputed material from the section. Here is a copy of the section before my edit, for reference:

Guidelines for prolonging Li-ion battery life

• Lithium-ion batteries should be charged early and often. However, if they are not used for a long time, they should be brought to a charge level of around 40%–60%.
• Lithium-ion batteries should not be frequently discharged fully and recharged ("deep-cycled"), but this may be necessary after about every 30^th recharge to recalibrate any electronic charge monitor (e.g. a battery meter). This allows the monitoring electronics to more accurately estimate battery charge. This has nothing to do with the memory effect.
• Li-ion batteries should never be depleted to below their minimum voltage, 2.4 V or 2.8 V per cell depending on chemistry.
• Li-ion batteries should be kept cool. Ideally they are stored in a refrigerator. Aging will take its toll much faster at high temperatures. The high temperatures found in cars cause lithium-ion batteries to degrade rapidly.
• Li-ion batteries should not be frozen (most lithium-ion battery electrolytes freeze at approximately −40 °C; however, this is much colder than the lowest temperature reached by household freezers).
• Li-ion batteries should be bought only when needed, because the aging process begins as soon as the battery is manufactured.
• When using a notebook computer running from fixed line power over extended periods, consider removing the battery and storing it in a cool place so that it is not affected by the heat produced by the computer.

Storage temperature and charge

Storing a Li-ion battery at the correct temperature and charge makes all the difference in maintaining its storage capacity. The following table shows the amount of permanent capacity loss that will occur after storage at a given charge level and temperature.

Permanent Capacity Loss versus Storage Conditions

Storage Temperature	40% Charge	100% Charge
0 °C (32 °F)	2% loss after 1 year	6% loss after 1 year
25 °C (77 °F)	4% loss after 1 year	20% loss after 1 year
40 °C (104 °F)	15% loss after 1 year	35% loss after 1 year
60 °C (140 °F)	25% loss after 1 year	40% loss after 3 months
Source: BatteryUniversity.com

It is significantly beneficial to avoid storing a lithium-ion battery at full charge. A Li-ion battery stored at 40% charge will last many times longer than one stored at 100% charge, particularly at higher temperatures.

If a Li-ion battery is stored with too low a charge, there is a risk of allowing the charge to drop below the battery's low-voltage threshold, resulting in an unrecoverable dead battery. Once the charge has dropped to this level, recharging it can be dangerous. Some batteries therefore feature an internal safety circuit which will prevent charging in this state, and the battery will be for all practical purposes dead.

In circumstances where a second Li-ion battery is available for a given device, it is recommended that the unused battery be discharged to 40% and placed in the refrigerator to prolong its shelf life. While the battery can be used or charged immediately, some Li-ion batteries will provide more energy when brought to room temperature.

--Srleffler (talk) 16:44, 31 August 2009 (UTC)

Please don't remove the material. The IP that posted the disputes has not shown good faith at all. I think the IP has some person grudge against the website in question. As far as I am aware the disputed material is industry accepted advice. Actually I am tempted to simply remove the unproved disputes. Anyone object to removal of the IP contribution? HumphreyW (talk) 16:49, 31 August 2009 (UTC)

Perhaps, but there is no option here. The site is not a reliable source, and if such material is disputed it must be removed, and may not be replaced unless a reliable source is found. If this is industry-accepted advice, it should be possible to find a proper source for it. I will be selective in removing material, however. Some things I will mark "cite needed" for now.--Srleffler (talk) 17:03, 31 August 2009 (UTC)

For what it's worth, the IP's tone does suggest personal dislike of "Battery University". This does not, however, automatically make the IP wrong. It's not our role to evaluate this dispute. We handle content disputes by reference to sources, not by evaluating the motives of the editors involved. If the IP is still reading, I hope he/she will contribute to the article. Perhaps he/she has access to reliable sources that can be of use.--Srleffler (talk) 17:10, 31 August 2009 (UTC)

Why isn't Battery University a reliable source? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.82.231.124 (talk) 20:54, 7 September 2009 (UTC)

Because there is no such organisation. That site is run by an individual (and is widely believed to be the author of the book refenced on the main page - possibly to increase sales of that book.) 20.133.0.13 (talk) 08:44, 9 October 2009 (UTC)

Shelf Life

I've moved these two comments from within the article text here for more open discussion.

[The Shelf Life] section does not seem to apply to real world batteries. It cites batteryuniversity for some of its content. There is in fact no such organisation - that site is run by an enthusiastic amateur who trawls any rubbish from the net. There are items on that site that were deliberately planted for him to find. 20.133.0.13 (talk) 01:36, 7 October 2009 (UTC)

References about problems with the reliability of batteryuniversity would help. Also, if Battery University is a self-published source from Isidor Buchmann then it should be reviewed carefully according to the reliable sources policy. sn‾uǝɹɹɐʍɯ (talk) 06:39, 8 October 2009 (UTC)

Shelf life has been confused with charge/recharging-dependent cycle life; cycle life is another matter entirely. Actually, most lithium-ion cells have excellent shelf lives (10% loss of charge in 8 years, and military cells still delivering full capacity after 20 years of collecting dust. Go shake a brick at that, NiMH! Have moved information accordingly. (Unknown)

References would be good to verify this shelf life information. sn‾uǝɹɹɐʍɯ (talk) 06:39, 8 October 2009 (UTC)

Reliability of Battery University as a source?

The reliability and possible self-publication of BatteryUniversity.com have both brought its use as a source into question and tags appear on citations pointing there. Please add evidence one way or another. sn‾uǝɹɹɐʍɯ (talk) 07:00, 8 October 2009 (UTC)

The source Battery University is used as source material for much of the material in this article. There is in fact no such organisation (and why would a whole university be founded purely on Battery technology alone?). It is known that the site is run by an individual (I have a few names - but the front runner is the author of a book conveniently referenced from the main page) who just trawls any information from the internet and assembles it into an apparently authoritative guide on rechargeable battery technology (and despite the apparently all encompassing organisation name, completely ignores primary battery technologies). The position is made worse because BatteryUniversity seems to be the only place where such a vast compendium of 'knowledge' on the subject exists. The reality is that the battery manufacturers are somewhat reticent to publish too much information on their products leaving the way clear for charlatans to fill the knowlege gap and gain some unwarranted kudos

It is known that several claims in that site were deliberately planted on the internet for the site owner to find and incorporate and indeed myself and some colleagues created one of the battery characteristics (we chose something relatively harmless). Unfortunately more than one manufacturer incorporated features in their products to overcome the "defect" that we created giving the BatteryUniversity site credence than it doesn't deserve. Some otherwise very reputable companies did this, probably with good intentions as a way of maximising the reliability of their product.

We use many types of rechargeable batteries in aerospace projects, and have to get the usage of any battery absolutely right. We are aware that much of the material on BatteryUniversity is just plain wrong and much of it doesn't even match up to real world batteries. If BatteryUniversity was right, the combination of features that 'they' have for Li-Ion batteries would mean that no Li-ion battery could possibly have a life exceeding 5 years regardless of how it is used. That any battery properly looked after can last 15 years or more, demonstrates conclusively that many of their characteristics just don't exist.

I note that several contributors have questioned citations from BatteryUniversity. If I had my way, any material derived from that source would be removed from the article (unless an an alternative credible citation exists of course). However, that is not my priviledge and I concede that it requires a consensus among those that are as knowledgeable in the subject as myself.

Discuss. 20.133.0.13 (talk) 08:39, 9 October 2009 (UTC)

Please do replace the incorrect information with correct information as well as improved citations. Thanks! sn‾uǝɹɹɐʍɯ (talk) 07:59, 13 October 2009 (UTC)

I believe that the point was that there is no reliable citeable source other than original research, which is nor permitted. 81.157.217.225 (talk) 18:53, 28 February 2010 (UTC)

Readers may like to note that the IP address 20.133.0.13 belongs to the Computer Sciences Corporation who are the IT partners of one of Europe's largest Aerospace and Defence companies. It therefore seems highly likely that the author of the above note is indeed involved in the military or aerospace sector (and maybe even both) and thus may have some knowledge of the subject. There are also numerous other contributions to aerospace related articles from that IP address. I B Wright (talk) 13:38, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

The authority...is an IP address...that is registered...to a company...that MIGHT have something to do with companies that have something to do with the subject matter? Wow. This is so much more authoritative than checking out a book or journal from a library. A new high in Wikischolarship. If Stephen bloody Hawking logged on and said F=MA in an article, he'd be swarmed with and and tags...but an anon IP address is the Word. --Wtshymanski (talk) 13:58, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

I didn't say any of what you posted. The if's and maybe's were introduced by you. The IP address is used by the UK's largest Aerospace business, BAE SYSTEMS (not might be as YOU claimed). The author claims to use batteries in his day to day work and as I can't dispute anything he has said (except that I could have named the individual running batteryuniversity.com before it was revealed here), I believe the claim is likely. But then that poster isn't being used as a citation so your post is pointless anyway. I B Wright (talk) 12:37, 27 May 2010 (UTC)

It's a great pity the world-renowned expert on lithium-ion batteries couldn't reach over to his 6-foot shelf of reference material and add a couple of citations for us, instead of sniping at the poor sources already cited. --Wtshymanski (talk) 21:34, 27 May 2010 (UTC)

Battery University is a website for a battery charger company. The owner is an experienced engineer in charging circuits. It is a very good site for information on all types of batteries. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Bruce A. WIlliamson (talk • contribs) 01:37, December 1, 2009 (UTC)

Not correct. batteryuniversity.com is run by a single individual, one Isador Buchmann who happens to work for a battery charger company. The site is not run by his company but serves to promote his allegedly authoritative book on the subject. Both batteryuniversity.com and Isador Buchmann himself are both considered discredited. As already pointed out: it is known that real world batteries possess very few of the characteristics ascribed to them by Buchmann. 81.157.217.225 (talk) 18:53, 28 February 2010 (UTC)

Why are all the important annos here anonymous? Wha't so hard to log in, if you have something creditable to say? פשוט pashute ♫ (talk) 09:49, 9 June 2010 (UTC)

Agreed. --Lexein (talk) 08:18, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

On the basis that 'Lexein' isn't required to be any of the names on your birth certificate, you are probably more anonymous than an IP address. I havn't created a user name simply because I don't have to and it doesn't (appear) to offer me any advantages - except perhaps to hide my IP address and make me more anonymous. 86.179.167.116 (talk) 14:00, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

I would like to see evidence discrediting BatteryUniversity and/or Buchmann. Have any battery companies responded in detail to his claims? If that is presented, I will begin removing (moving to Discussion) each citation of them forthwith. --Lexein (talk) 08:18, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

This is part of the problem. The organisations that are in the best position to provide accurate information on the foibles and disadvantages of the battery technology are the manufacturers themselves. That they choose not to inevitably provides charlatans with the opportunity to fill the voids. This lack of information means that there is little or no physical evidence discrediting battery university. I use lithium-ion batteries extensively for model aircraft use. I can say with confidence that they certainly don't possess half the characteristics that battery university claims for them. But this would be original research or at least POV.

Regardless of any evidence or not, the fact remains that battery university is a self published source of information (published by an individual without the backing of a company or institution recognised as an authority on the subject matter). Wikipedia does not accept citations from self published sources. This is right and proper. After all, you (or indeed I) could publish an apparently authoratative web site, book, scientific paper (or whatever) to support some highly dubious contribution to Wikipedia. The environmentalists have been doing just this for decades which is why they are constantly having to fight back when their handed down doctrines are being regularly challenged. See WP:SELFPUBLISH 86.179.167.116 (talk) 14:00, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

Memory effect

Ni-Cd batteries do not suffer from the "Memory Effect". This is simply wrong. The "memory effect" was first noticed in sattelite batteries using a design which no consumer ever used (sintered electrodes). It was noticed as a result of the sattelite experiencing several charge/discharge cycles as it orbited the Earth. The "memory effect" goblin is just sales hype to promote and justify the newer and more expensive technology. If you take care of Ni-Cd batteries then they work long and well (taking care of them is the hard part). The Wikipedia article on the "memory Effect" links to a good page "Dan's Quick Guide to Memory Effect, You Idiots" which tells you why you've never seen the "memory effect".

Correct. Generally available Ni-Cd batteries do not suffer from any form of memory effect. The concept was seized upon by marketing departments of the manufacturers of Ni-MH batteries as a way of trying to sell a new technology that was (at the time) substatially more expensive than Ni-Cd. Both Ni-Cd and Ni-MH suffer from a nickel whisker growth problem that partially short circuits the cells. Nickel whisker growth can be repaired, albeit temporarily. 81.157.217.225 (talk) 18:53, 28 February 2010 (UTC)

There's some misconception among people in the discussion about charging and battery life. Almost all rechargeable batteries have a finite life. The exception being nickel iron which need their electrolyte changed every 40 years(yes years) but have no known life for the actual electrodes. One of the biggest factors is the charge/discharge cycle. You get maybe 300 full cycles (full charge to full dischrage and back) or maybe several thousand partial discharge cycles. So yes your Li Ion battery life can be extended by charging often. Every time it gets discharged and charged it looses a little capacity. The greater the discharge/charge the greater the loss. Another factor is heat. Batteries of all kinds use a chemical reaction. Chemical reactions happen faster at higher temperatures. So heat accelerates the loss in capacity. That's why placing your alkaline batteries in the frig tends to extend their shelf life (not that you would notice as their shelf life is around ten years). Li Ion cells will get hot one of the paramters in charging Li Ion cells is to monitor the temp until the charge current reaches a certain point. I'm not sure off hand what the value is for Li Ion but for NiMH it is 1degree C per minute. Then you go to maintenance charge. One more thing about Li Ion cells they loose capacity whether they are used or not. After about two years they are as good as dead (remember it's a chemical reaction). This is often confused with self discharge. It is simply a loss in capacity. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Bruce A. WIlliamson (talk • contribs) 01:37, 1 December 2009 (UTC)

Li-ion batteries are only dead after 2 years if they are abused or their charge/discharge life is used up. Properly cared for real world Li-ion batteries last for 10 years or more (in spite of Isador Buchmann's claim to the contrary). Even the laptop battery that I am using to add this note is shown as having a manufacturing date of May 2003 (and still has 70% of its original capacity (according to the internal management chip). 81.157.217.225 (talk) 18:53, 28 February 2010 (UTC)

I concur. I have 3 Li-ion batteries that have not been looked after that well, but they do get used - occasionally. What is their potential life? As they are only 17 years old, it's probably a bit too early to tell. DieSwartzPunkt (talk) 18:07, 1 December 2011 (UTC)

Move

The following is a closed discussion of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the proposal was consensus against move

Lithium-ion battery → Lithium-ion electrochemical cell — The electrochemical battery is simply a pair of electrochemical cells. this article deals around how this type of cell works.— Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.245.90.148 (talk) 12:04, 9 October 2009 (UTC)

• Oppose. "Electrochemical cell" is not a synonym for battery. The present name of the article is clear, common, and accurate. The proposed name is not. This one one of a dozen renames proposed by the anon IP today, none of which should be carried out until some concensus is obtained. --Wtshymanski (talk) 14:46, 9 October 2009 (UTC)
• Strong Oppose and suggest speedy close (is that possible?). This is not what the general public would be looking for. HumphreyW (talk) 15:24, 9 October 2009 (UTC)
• Opppose WP:COMMONNAME 76.66.197.30 (talk) 16:01, 9 October 2009 (UTC)
• Oppose The term "battery" is almost always used by consumers, battery manufacturers, etc. TJ Spyke 17:30, 9 October 2009 (UTC)
• Oppose See WP:COMMONNAME. I'm not objected to indicate that "Lithium-ion electrochemical cells" redirect here, or add it as an alternative name in the lead however (or something similar to that).Headbomb {^ταλκ_{κοντριβς} – WP Physics} 01:10, 10 October 2009 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

Self discharge rate discrepancy: side bar vs. article

I'm no wikipedia editing expert, so I'm loath to revert the edit against my change. But the text of the article says 0.1% or negligible discharge rate, while someone has now used one of the citations of one particular type of Li-ion battery types to suggest upwards 8, 15, or 31% sdr. That's insane. How can one cited source claim NO sdr while this one says up to 31%?!

Something's not right here. My scientific understanding is that the battery itself does not self discharge at all, while voltage/temperature monitoring circuitry does slowly draw power from the cells.

Help! Let's get this side-bar accurate.Jerde (talk) 06:11, 10 November 2009 (UTC)

DOE goals (DEC 2007) which still have to be reached: Maximum Self-Discharge Rate. In order to ensure that the high-voltage battery has sufficient energy and power for CS HEV operation after a long parking period (normally 30 days) without being connected to a plug, the maximum self-discharge rate was set at 50 Wh/day (at 30°C)[[5]. I'll make the numbers more clear as they are temperature related Mion (talk) 23:01, 10 November 2009 (UTC)

Still need to reconcile that the body of the article still claims 0.1%. Jerde (talk) 22:19, 11 November 2009 (UTC)

Finding ref 30 which is supposed to explain the 0.1% did work, have a look for yourself, I think the 0.1 should be converted to a more real number.Mion (talk) 23:30, 11 November 2009 (UTC)

[[6]] would say 5% a month but thats information provided by a producer of batteries, thats not the same as from DOE. Mion (talk) 23:39, 11 November 2009 (UTC)

Battery cost

Energy cost in the summary box is worthless information, and probably incorrect. The energy is electricity, so the cost of electricity with the efficiency of charging are the two important factors for that. Money should not be cited, because there is no standard, and it changes regularly.

As opposed to this, perhaps an approximate ONE TIME cost per kg, or per Wh OUTPUT, of the battery would be very helpful. Could anybody give an estimate of the battery price itself, say per Wh output? (Trying to save myself some research time... how much do the internals for a new Li-ion battery cost the manufacturer of a certain laptop battery, and what power is given by that laptop battery?)

Thanks, Moshe פשוט pashute ♫ (talk) 09:58, 9 June 2010 (UTC)

We are not your Google slaves. HumphreyW (talk) 10:25, 9 June 2010 (UTC)

Cites

Engaged in massive resurrection and fleshing out of citations. Your patience and non-reversion is appreciated. --Lexein (talk) 08:11, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

Question about the Weight of Li-ion battery compare to the NI-MH battery

There are so many people talk about the Li-ion batteries' high capacity and small volume, but you compare these tow battery: compare Ni-MH NIKON EN-4 Battery to CANON NB-5H Battery, you'll not find the advantage of Li-ion batteries. What's more, the shell of the Ni-MH battery seems heavier than the Li-ion ones obviously. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Batteryfaq (talk • contribs) 02:41, 11 August 2010 (UTC)

Embedded Energy in Li-Ion batteries

I've come across two articles that give estimates: these numbers seem pretty high - certainly high enough to be taken into account when assessing the overall picture - I am puzzled by the fact that this aspect does not get more currency.

Nick

Samaras, C. and Meisterling, K., Life Cycle Assessment of Greenhouse Gas Emissions from Plug-in Hybrid Vehicles: Implications for Policy, Environmental Science & Technology, Vol. 42, No. 9, 2008, p. 3171

 --Estimates Li-Ion manufacturing cost at 1700(MJ primary energy)/(kWh battery capacity)

Rydh, C.J., Sanden, B.A., Energy Analysis of Batteries in Photovoltaic Systems. Part I: Performance and Energy Requirements, Energy Conversion and Management, Vol. 46, 2005, p. 1970

 --Estimates Li-Ion manufacturing cost at 1200MJ/kWh plus 310-670MJ/kWh material cost depending on recycled vs. virgin materials.  More interesting figures here too for other battery types.  NiCd and NiMH are both estimated at 2100MJ/kWh plus material energy costs.

Ncollings (talk) 09:03, 13 August 2010 (UTC)

Anode/Cathode confusion

On line 3 the article suggests that on charging the Li+ ion moves from the cathode to the anode. This is not true : Positively charged ions move to the cathode (that's why they are called "cations"). Later in the article (under electrochemistry) it is suggested that the negative electrode is not always negative.

This is really a language question, or definition; (I hope we all know which way the ions move). The terms "negative / positive" refer to the voltage relation between the 2 electrodes. This does not change between charge and discharge. The terms "anode / cathode" should refer to the direction of current flow; it reverses between charge and discharge; therefore the negative electrode is the cathode on charge and the anode on discharge.

(I have just made a similar comment on "Lithium-ion Polymer Baterries") 151.197.232.221 (talk) 01:19, 21 April 2009 (UTC)

The confusion comes from the language used to address the two electrodes of a lithium ion battery. The positive electrode is the one that has the higher potential and the negative one has the lower potential. The battery voltage is the difference between the positive and the negative electrode potentials. It is common (but not scientifically correct) to call the positive electrode as the cathode and the negatice electrode as the anode. This is true only during the battery discharge. During charge, the positive electrode is the anode (where oxidation takes place) and the negative electrode is the cathode (where reduction takes place). Therefore it is correct that during the lithium ion battery charge, lithium cations are transferred from the positive electrode (now the anode) to the negative electrode (now the cathode). (Rachid Yazami, Ph. D., May 10, 2009) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.167.255.211 (talk) 17:37, 10 May 2009 (UTC)

The confusion is even greater than that. It is not uncommon (and wrong) to find the positive electrode of a primary battery refered to as the 'anode' - the Americans seem particularly good at this for some reason. Thus both conventions are commonly in use. I have a remote control (Hewlett Packard no less) that uses one of those CR2032 non rechargeable coin batteries. The battery holder is marked 'anode up'. It is not physically possible to install the battery that way up as the holder is designed to have the positive elecrode upwards. A perusal of the opening sections of the articles anode and cathode should make the matter clear. 86.177.31.209 (talk) 19:42, 11 January 2011 (UTC)

Lower case element names

I found it. It's at Wikipedia:Manual of Style (chemistry)/Nomenclature#Capitalization of elements and compounds and it says element names are lower case. --Wtshymanski (talk) 19:14, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

Li-ion Vanadium oxide battery

There is claims that Subaru developed high energy density Li-ion Vanadium pentoxide battery.Could somebody provide exact specs for this battery such as cycle life and Wh/kg? What problems could have such battery? Why Chevy Volt do not use Vanadium pentoxide battery if they are 2-3 times more energy dense then regular? 24.203.84.56 (talk) 22:58, 19 April 2011 (UTC)

Market shares

"Lithium-ion batteries account for 67% of all portable secondary battery sales in Japan. In the UK lithium-ion batteries account for 4.3% of all portable battery sales and in the EU 1%. [8] [9] [10]"

The citations are dated 2011, 2006 and 2000, respectively. They are in no way comparable. I'm removing the European numbers. --Lowercasedefaultusername (talk) 18:35, 18 September 2011 (UTC)

carbon nanotubes

Just stumbled back across this: "Nanotubes Give Batteries a Jolt". Technology Review. Retrieved 2012-02-14. which discusses the use of carbon nanotubes as the cathodes in lion batteries. Does this belong in this article?

Lfstevens (talk) 02:10, 14 February 2012 (UTC)

charging instructions

Does this article really need two sections of battery charging procedures? 66.87.4.39 (talk) 03:32, 24 November 2011 (UTC).

No it doesn't given that the first has been correctly identified as unreliably sourced. Have deleted the first section - but you could have as well. After all this is an encyclopedia that anyone can edit. DieSwartzPunkt (talk) 17:59, 1 December 2011 (UTC)

Are you referring to source 107 the battery university? because thats run by cadex international? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 109.150.120.195 (talk) 21:22, 9 July 2012 (UTC)

And how does it being run by Cadex Electronics Inc make it any more credible?

Battery University was exhaustively discussed here before someone deleted most of this discussion page. [Inserted by po098 19 Jul 13: there seems to have been routine archiving rather than malicious deletion. The material is available in the archive.] To recap: the battery manufacturers themselves are, for some reason, remarkably reticent to publish much information on their lithium-ion bateries (much beyond size, capacity and cycle life). In the absence of such information, charlatons inevitably spring up to fill the void. The charlaton in this case was one Isidor Buchmann who published a (now discredited) book detailing many aspects of lithium-ion technology that just was not available from any other source. Buchmann also established the batteryuniversity.com website to promote both the book and his battery charger company (Cadex). It was long ago demonstrated that Buchmann had just trawled any information available from internet chat rooms and forums whether apparently reliable or just obvious rumour. Indeed myself and some work colleagues planted one such 'fact' for Buchmann to find and incorporate into his website. Indeed, he did just that, but although we deliberately chose something relatively harmless, an unintended consequence was that at least one major manufacturer built features into a line of products to protect them from the 'disadvantage' that we had conjured up.

If the information in both his book and website were credible, then (according to Buchmann) no lithium-ion battery could possibly last longer than two years. This fitted with many people's experience of laptop batteries where they were discharged and charged every day, thus using up the 600ish cycle life in less than two years (730 days). In reality, properly cared for and regularly used, lithium-ion batteries will last out their full cycle life which can stretch over many decades. I myself have a few examples of lithium-ion batteries which were new in 1994 and still exhibit nearly their full rated capacity.

In spite of the apparent credentials, there is no such organisation as a battery university (and why would there be?). That the site is 'sponsored' by the very person who produced it which makes it a self published source and thus not acceptable as a source of references for Wikipedia (after all we could all do it) - See section 3.2 of WP:RS. I B Wright (talk) 12:32, 3 January 2013 (UTC)

What you have achieved and are describing, in the "normal" situation, where all the (ionic and other) components of the calls are functioning normally and the question is how long that situation will continue and is a variable depending upon the operating environment and other conditions. Which is to say that the theoretical functioning time of the system is indeterminate and that we therefore need to look for modes of abnormal failure. And since the principal functioning mode of the system is for the ionic migration of the lithium ions back and forth between the two cell terminal electronic circuits, that becomes the obvious place to look in what may be called a part function and failure mode analysis.WFPM (talk) 22:05, 2 March 2013 (UTC) Kind of reminds me of the functional performance of the tires on my SUV.WFPM (talk) 22:22, 2 March 2013 (UTC)

Are you by any chance a politician or a public servant? The ability to string three sentences together each of not less than twenty words, that combine to make no sense whatsoever and that have no relevance to the thread is a dead give away. 86.166.71.0 (talk) 15:51, 8 March 2013 (UTC)

So maybe there's a high fog factor, but that's how reliability analysis works. It's like a detective story, and I'm just an Engineer.WFPM (talk) 16:15, 8 March 2013 (UTC)

Also, the Charge/Discharge section says that during discharge the Li+ ions are moving internally from the positive to the negative material, but at that time the electrons would be moving from the negative terminal through the external electrical circuit and back to the positive terminal. And the driving force for that motion should be an action in the negative terminal electrical circuit. And that action should result in the creation of the positive ions at the negative terminal, which would then need to migrate in the direction of the positive terminal through the electrolyte. If a driving force takes place in the positive terminal that creates positive ions in the electrolyte, then the positive terminal would wind up with an excess of electrons. In the Zinc/Silver oxide system the driving force is in the negative terminal creating both electrons and positive ions (hydronium H3O+ ions). And they both move away from the negative terminal during discharge.WFPM (talk) 23:41, 21 March 2013 (UTC)

No I was wrong about what the charge/discharge section said and the ions move from the negative to the positive terminal during discharge, just like in the zinc-silver oxide system. And during recharge the positive terminal receives additional electrons and parks them in the cobalt oxide material while the ions go back to the negative terminal to reassociate themselves with some of the returning electrons. But in the zinc-silver oxide system it is possible to reoxidize the silver of the positive terminal material whereas in the lithium-ion this is described as an irreversible recharge reaction.WFPM (talk) 23:58, 22 March 2013 (UTC)

This association of battery charging with the concept of "Electrical current flow" is confusing, because while the flow of "electrical current" and of "Positive ions" is correctly in the same direction, the concept of electrical power and energy movement is usually considered to be that of the translation of the electrons in the electrical circuit, which is from the negative polarity source of the electrons to the positive polarity receptor point. And the recharging of the battery is done by a returning of the electrons to their initially charged location. And this is a 100% complete description of what happens in the charge-discharge of say an electrical capacitor. However in the lithium ion battery we do not have a complete picture of the charge-discharge process in that the electrical emf and power transfer process is involved with the back and forth motion of the positive lithium ions within the so-called electrolyte. And in the article, it remains unexplained as to why a positive lithium ion in close proximity to a negative point of contact with the electrical circuit is not able to receive the electron and become neutralized as happens in the more conventional battery systems.WFPM (talk) 02:45, 2 May 2013 (UTC)

Research

The process allows the firm to "spray-paint a cathode, then a separator/electrolyte, then the anode. It can be cut and stacked in various form factors.

This appears to lack closing quotation marks. Dawright12 (talk) 13:51, 30 January 2013 (UTC)

I added the closing quote. (You could have done that...) However in trying to verify the quote, I ran into a paywall ($20 for 30 days access). Someone with a sub to the magazine needs to check it. Jeh (talk) 20:35, 30 January 2013 (UTC)

It is to be noted that there are a lot of assumptions being made about the electrochemical properties of the lithium ion charge/discharge process that can only be verified by verification testing. This is because the discharge and recharge process concerned with this (and other) electrochemical systems are not necessarily a reverse procedure, and accordingly involve a different relationship to the process factors. This usually involves some dedicated program for performance (and reliability) testing with relation to any required and expected important environment withstanding and performance requirements.WFPM (talk) 17:06, 23 February 2013 (UTC)

Uh, ok, but... the article talk page is for discussion of improvements to the article, not general discussion of the subject. Are the "assumptions" being made by the WP article editors, or by the researchers cited in the quoted material? Do you think your text should be added to the WP article in some form? Do you have a reference for it? Is your comment relevant to the quote being discussed in this section (about "spray-painting" a cathode, etc.) or is it a separate issue/point? Jeh (talk) 17:23, 23 February 2013 (UTC)

I'm talking about certain categorical statements made in the electrochemical section about the electrochemical charge/discharge processes. The implication is that a recharge process is a reversal of a discharge process which may or may not be true. But each process cycle is a different activity within the system which is involved with the relevant electrochemical (and maybe physical) factors peculiar to the process. And I don't know how to discuss the subject matter without discussing the peculiarities of the subject matter.WFPM (talk) 18:02, 23 February 2013 (UTC)

You might also note that in the Charge/Discharge section of the article it is said that the ions are moved back to the anode during the recharge cycle, where they become "imbedded". You might also note that if they come into contact with the electrical circuit of the anode and loose their ionizing electron, they can also then become a part of the electrical circuit, and thus no longer an ion. And in fact the driving force of the electrochemical system of discharge is due to the ability of the discharging lithium ion to force the subsequent electron circuitry motion and ion displacement within the electrolyte.

This is easier to understand in other electrochemical systems like the aqueous Zinc system, where the zinc anode material goes to zinc hydroxide by creating hydronium ions to move through the electrolyte and carry the hydrogen back to the cathode during discharge, and during recharge the zinc is replated back to the anode, but maybe not back in the same place. And this can limit the cycle life capability of the Zinc anode system. And the zinc electrochemistry is the driving electrochemical force of this system.WFPM (talk) 23:55, 23 February 2013 (UTC)

The individual electrochemical cells of a battery design are designed and created to be individually and uniformly capable of supplying the desired electrical energy and power requirements of the application. A simple battery design would provide a sequential in line interconnection of the cells into a battery unit case. However, a design requirement might be for a more complex design in the interest of volumetric compaction or otherwise such as to result in a folded cell design involving 2 (or more) lines of interconnected cells. This results in the complexity of having individual cells located nearby to physically adjacent cells that are not in the sequential operating voltage range of the battery design and thus potentially capable of a greater degree of damage from an interconnection of the electrical or electrolytic connection of the material between the cells. Also such a design also creates a difference in the operating (heat dissipation and other) environmental conditions within the cells which is dependent upon their location within the battery case in such a manner as to require extensive consideration of these factors related to the reliable usage of such a battery design for an application.WFPM (talk) 21:38, 28 February 2013 (UTC)

See Talk:Separator (electricity) [User:WFPM|WFPM]] (talk) 04:12, 8 March 2013 (UTC)

Talk pages are supposed to be about improving the article. Are you planning to merge some or all of the above material into the article? If you do, you'll need to provide references for all claims of fact. Jeh (talk) 03:30, 11 March 2013 (UTC)

I am trying to provide some understanding of the complexity of the subject matter under consideration. Particularly in view of the inability of the discussion to explain the difference between an electric current and the flow of electrons, which is explained in a different article. In the case of an electrical load circuit, the discussed flow is that of electrons. Within the battery, there is electron flow within the electrical circuit and ionic current flow (in the opposite direction) within the electrolyte. And the actual transfer of electrons between the electrons in the electrical circuit and electrolyte ions is not explained but only suggested. So we don't know whether we're dealing with a reversible electron flow through the battery or else just the back and forth displacement of the electrons between the 2 electrodes like in a capacitor. The design of the Lithium-ion battery implies just the back and forth electron flow process, which might be one of its problems.WFPM (talk) 04:47, 11 March 2013 (UTC)

Note that in the article Separator (electricity), reference number 9 specifically discusses the use of membrane separators to reduce the possibility of lithium dendrite buildup within the anode of the Lithium-ion electrochemical cell.WFPM (talk) 19:38, 11 March 2013 (UTC) PS I don't know why I can't get the link to make the connection to the referred article.WFPM (talk) 19:45, 11 March 2013 (UTC) Okay, I finally got it. Evidently the separation material used is essentially the same as that used in some of the rechargeable Zinc-Silver oxide batteries in some of the Saturn Moon landing program.WFPM (talk) 20:04, 11 March 2013 (UTC

If I were in the Lithium ion battery business, I would pretty quickly determine that the individual 3.6 volt cell is not where the action is. What is needed is a unified cellcase 2 cell 7.2 volt battery (with an internal intercell connector) that would have many more useful applications. How about a replacement for the 6 volt drycell betteries in the widely available 6 volt lantern type light? Depending upon the difficulties of recharging (maybe with 2 interchangeable batteries), you could get maybe 1000 cycles of use of such a system. And if a 7 volt light bulb were required sobeit! Then with individual 7.2 volt individual units you could easily upgrade to 14.4, 21.6, and 28.8 volt battery systems by connecting the unit cells in series and preferably in line. A 2 cell unit could be built cheaper and also almost as reliable than 2 single cells. If you think that I'm copying the design of the automobile battery system you're right. And remember the customer's credo: The best product for the least money to do the job required.WFPM (talk) 16:13, 20 March 2013 (UTC)

Lithium-ion (Lion) batteries are not really suitable for powering light sources because the quoted voltage is only a 'nominal' voltage and is, in fact, only the average terminal voltage as the battery discharges. A fully charged Lion cell has a terminal voltage of 4.2 volts. As it discharges, the voltage falls, not quite linearly but not that far off, to 2.8 volts at which point it should be considered discharged. A voltage range such as this would not be suitable for an incandescent lamp and even less suitable for an LED. Your 7 volt bulb will start off very bright with its applied 8.4 volts and will slowly dim as the voltage valls to 6.0 volts. Every monitor circuit reports fully discharged when any cell reaches 3.0 volts to keep the discharge away from the 2.8ish volt limit. Lion powered equipment should auto turn off when the management circuit signals fully discharged and your light would need to do the same.

Connecting Lion cells in series is not as simple as it sounds. In any battery consisting of series connected cells, a charge management circuit must be built in to overcome the problems caused by capacity mismatch between cells (particularly as the cells age). The management circuit actually performs the cell interconnection as it has to monitor the voltage of every cell in the battery. Unusually for a rechargeable technology, Lion cells can be connected in parallel without any problem whatsover. The cells will conveniently absorb their fair share of the charge without any intervention. Some larger capacity 3.6 volt batteries are often made of parallel connected cells. — Preceding unsigned comment added by I B Wright (talk • contribs) 12:11, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

Yes but the options of such a management system would be limited by the discharge voltage of the weakest cell of the series connected system, which, of course, then becomes an important quality control problem in the manufacturing process. This can occur in other battery systems, like the lead acid submarine battery systems, which incidently, are sometimes built into 2 cell containers. But it does sound more complicated for the multiple cell systems.WFPM (talk) 17:29, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

Also with regard to the discharge voltage limit I can't see anything sacred about the 2.8 low voltage limit, so how about a 6.0 volt low voltage limit on a 2 cell lithium-ion system.WFPM (talk) 22:51, 5 May 2013 (UTC)

Different chemistries always pose different problems. You cannot rely on detecting a 6 volt lower limit on 2 Lion cells in series. You must detect the terminal voltages of every cell individually in a series stack, and stop the discharge as soon as any cell in the stack reaches 2.8 volts (or 3 volts in practice). The problem with the weakest cell in the stack is not so much of a manufacturing problem because cells deteriorate at differing rates. In Lion batteries, the residual capacity of a stack is always determined by the lowest capacity cell. Although true of other chemistries, there is seldom any precautions taken against reverse charging even though it is detrimental to them. It is only the Lion chemistry where over discharge is both catastrophic and can also be spectacular. I B Wright (talk) 15:37, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

That sure sounds like a high degree of precision requirement for a normal battery electrical performance characteristic. The ones I'm familiar with involve the maintenance of a delivery voltage characteristic that is significantly above some "corner point" criteria of the battery's operating voltage performance characteristic. And that necessitates the existence of a designed in overcapacity in order to meet the "statistical probability" of meeting the mission requirement. And whereas a multiple cell stack battery does get involved with individual cell capacity differences, A properly designed and manufactured 2 cell battery would be better able to minimize them. And I can't see the possibility of a reverse polarity discharge of the 2 cell unit and therefor think that its utility is underrated.WFPM (talk) 16:35, 9 May 2013 (UTC)PS maybe I'm wrong on the possibility of reverse polarity, but the battery's operating voltage would then be less that that of a single cell.WFPM (talk) 16:43, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

Li-ion batteries require a considerable precision in their chargers. The output voltage of the charger in the constant voltage phase of the charge must be regulated to a precision much greater than 0.5%. A 0.5% under volt results in the battery being only 85% charged. A 0.5% overvolt results in the charger attempting to overcharge the battery by as much as 25%. In practice, such an overcharge will rarely be achieved as the battery may well rupture before this point. Should a rupture occur, it is not possible to extinguish the burning battery as it generates its own oxygen. In my line of of work, we regualarly used to overcharge these batteries to demonstrate their dangers. I B Wright (talk) 17:04, 10 May 2013 (UTC)

Boy! That's an awfully tight control of the recharging procedure! The control procedure in the article is more on the order of a +/- 5% voltage control procedure, or 4.2 volts +0 - 6.7%. And they don't give the minimum end supply voltage requirement for adequate capacity quality control purposes, except to say that the minimum individual cell voltage should not drop below 2.8 volts. So, besides the reliability problem, we don't have an output end supply voltage requirement to consider as a control feature.WFPM (talk) 21:10, 10 May 2013 (UTC)

Unfortunately, most of the article has been based on information from a discredited source (and is wrong on many levels). Doubly unfortunately, the battery manufacturers are, for some reason, very reticent to provide much information on their technology. This means correcting the article is near impossibe as there are no adequate references to support any change. You can trust me on this point: you do not want to charge a Li-ion cell from 4.41 volts (4.2 + 5%). That is unless you can charge it not less than two (2) metres away from any combustible building or object!!! I B Wright (talk) 15:23, 12 May 2013 (UTC)

I agree! And I didn't say 4.2 +/- 5%. I said 4.2 + 0 - 6.7% (to 3.92 volts, per the military spec). And I'm surprised that Boeing, Who used to be a specialist organization for the management of specialist battery reliability program management programs, get sucked into such a bet on a new albeit inadequately determined technology. I personally think that in the case of the technology of Lithium-ion batteries, the proof of the pudding will be determined in the automobile power application business, where, in the course of things, everything that can go wrong will go wrong, and hopefully then be corrected. As to Zinc-Silver oxide batteries in cars we tried that and they worked fine until one day when the car was parked for a time in the heat of summer, and of course the negative plates overreacted with the electrolyte.WFPM (talk) 01:28, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

I apologise: I misread your post. Interestingly, although previously regarded as a dead end technology, development of silver-zinc batteries has taken off again. But such a discussion is out of place here. I B Wright (talk) 12:39, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

Yeah, They were great for the Apollo program. Nowadays, I doubt if anybody could afford one. But my beef about Lithium-ion technology is their unwillingness of doing what I think I could do with a 2-cell Lithium-ion battery model. I could make a 2 cell battery intrinsically more reliable than 2 individual single cells. And with 4 of them I could also make a more reliable 8 cell battery. And I was trying to discuss with you the construction and management regime necessary to achieve this.WFPM (talk) 17:30, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

Much as I appreciate your faith in my knowledge and experience, this discussion should be brought to a conclusion. This talk page is for discussion improvements to the article and we are not doing that. Before embarking on your experiments, you may care to search the 'net for videos on lithium ion battery fires and how to fight them (and more impotantly, how not to). I B Wright (talk) 11:25, 14 May 2013 (UTC)

Well okay and thanks for the info. But I think that the article about the Lithium-ion battery was not written by an "electrical" person, because he equates the word "current" with the movement of the ions. and,to me, the word current does not mean the flow of ions and is confusing. In electricity, we have Ben Franklin's current flow, which is practically non existent, and electron flow, to the tune of 6.28 x 10E^18 electrons per ampere-second. I always use a picture of a reverse polarity dc welding procedure as an example where you can see the impact of the electrons against the weld metal. And the designs will evolve as they have in the other systems. And you might remember that battery design troubles are highly associated with the electrical power factor V squared/R, which should be taken into consideration when designing highly reliable battery systems.WFPM (talk) 15:46, 14 May 2013 (UTC)

Materials section

This section is a mess. You've got "Lithium-air" under cathodes, attributed to one random university (lots of people are doing Li-Air research), and listed as having "safety" as a benefit, when safety is the single biggest strike against Li-Air if you can actually get it to work. Also, Li-Air is specifically not a Lithium ion battery; it's Lithium metal battery. Lithium ion batteries have no metallic lithium in them.

There's also some very non-standard, ultra-spicific, and probably unhelpful material types in here. Things like 5% Vanadium-doped Lithium iron phosphate olivine, Cobalt-oxide nanowires from genetically modified virus, etc, are probably people trying to insert their obscure research into Wikipedia. Someone looking for encyclopedic information about Lithium Ion batteries isn't looking for that kind of stuff.

Also, Air and Water are listed as Anodes, which is just plain wrong. Neither would be considered a lithium ion battery, and both are used on the Cathode side anyway.

I've cleaned up those bits.

I'm a battery engineer, so I had to point out this weird stuff. Sadly, I don't have the time to fix it, which I realize makes this post kind of a jerk thing to do. I might be able to come back and try to clean it up a little, but I think the section needs a good rework from someone with the Wikipedia knowhow and time.

The lithium-Ion battery is a curious beast. Storing electrons kinda like a capacitor. And supposed to have a battery power delivery capacity 10 times that of the nickle cadmium system. That will be hard to do. A better application would be one that replaced the primary (unrechargeable) battery in the 6 volt drycell portable lantern.WFPM(talk) 00:13, 22 March 2013 (UTC)

One thing the whole battery area could use is clear, distinguishing definitions of "battery", "capacitor", "supercapacitor", etc.

And to summarize, in this article there's all this presumably "reliable" information about the construction and normal operating characteristics of the various types of lithium ion battery systems, but practically nothing about the function and inherent reliability of performance of their active (and also passive) components. This information is usually achieved by a detailed "part function and failure mode analysis" in which each part and component is analyzed as to its functional requirements as well as its failure mode characteristics related to its mission environmental withstanding and also adequacy of performance requirements.WFPM (talk) 03:02, 7 June 2013 (UTC)

I've been dabbling in this article and made a few minor changes and added material too. (To the best of my capability) I've briefly skimmed through all that is been discussed. It has been mentioned before that the materials section is just a jumbled list of obscure research, Does anybody think that it should be removed/or made into a separate list; it is an eyesore in the main article page according to me. Regarding cleaning this article, it is pretty hard to get proper sources (at least for me since I'm new here) on the pure technical aspects of it, so any advice or help? Whatever I've done so far, it has been only on the simple things relating to it that is safety, recycling, battery life etc. -Ugog Nizdast (talk) 08:01, 7 June 2013 (UTC)

You've picked on a subject that involves modern day technological development and accordingly is not amenable a standard method of development of the subject matter. It also involves a lot of proprietary information, and involves details of design and construction that have not yet been worked out and optimized. However, a lot of scientific things like that are happening these days and there doesn't seem to be any consistent plan to deal with them.WFPM (talk) 02:18, 8 June 2013 (UTC)

So shall we clean up this proprietary information and the details about designs which have not been implemented commercially yet? I'm sure we can separate this main article regarding it's standard development and keep the information about constantly updating research aside. -Ugog Nizdast (talk) 07:25, 8 June 2013 (UTC)

I don't mind splitting the materials section into a separate article, but I think it's useful stuff and should not be discarded. The are lots of articles beginning "Research on..." Lfstevens (talk) 15:35, 8 June 2013 (UTC)

Well let's hope that the industry solves all these technical problems and manages to develop a design concept that will meet the requirement of most applications. However, the issue is being confused by the difference in the relative difference in importance of the safety and reliability factors related to the usage of such a battery system. There's a big difference in the safety and reliability requirements of a disposable power supply system from that of a rechargeable manned space flight system. And we're in the process of sorting out all the technical problems involved. And since the technology of the Lion system is still under development, it will no doubt take a while. In the meantime there are certain determined fundamental properties of the system, such as for electrical tool power pack applications, that can be developed and exploited without getting too deep into reliability and safety details. But for the more serious applications a process of rigorous analysis will be required.WFPM (talk) 17:12, 9 June 2013 (UTC) And it is to note that a process of extended technical analysis and experiments was developed (by Boeing and STL and others) during the Apollo Space flight and other programs that is still being utilized (and expanded) today.WFPM (talk) 18:02, 9 June 2013 (UTC) See Reliability engineering.WFPM (talk) 18:20, 9 June 2013 (UTC)

Environmental concerns and recycling

I would like to delete this section, until someone can write it up properly (I can't). Lithium is a very nasty poison (the ion, I mean: the metal is still more dangerous). Absurd to say there are no toxic metals! Also, the page describes variations that use other dangerous chemicals including arsenic. And then, straight after a section describing how extremely dangerous these cells can be in combustion, it is said to be safe to incinerate them! Who would volunteer to live in the fallout zone from that incinerator? --Alkhowarizmi (talk) 04:51, 19 August 2013 (UTC)

I agree that it is not of good quality and does need more sources, but that does not warrant complete removal. The section seems to be decently cited but consider placing {{citation needed}} tags where you feel is necessary. I'm pretty sure it must be possible to find at least one source to give at least a brief view of its toxicity and environmental concerns that you've mentioned. -Ugog Nizdast (talk) 06:20, 19 August 2013 (UTC)

Also note that the standard electrode potential (data page) of the lithium ion is given as 3.040 volts, so the 4.2 volts voltage at the negative terminal (anode) of the lithium-ion electrochemical cell must be supplemented by an additive electrochemical voltage potential in the positive terminal (cathode). This information is not very well explained in the chemical section of the article.WFPM (talk) 20:04, 29 August 2013 (UTC)

Finally, in the lede, could the article say that the lithium ions move from the anode (negative terminal), to the cathode (positive terminal} during discharge so that those persons who think in terms of positive and negative terminals (and electron flow), from remaining confused. Then, while visionizing the process, with the negative terminal at the bottom, we can see the electrons going into the electrical circuit from the bottom connection while the the lithium ions are migrating up through the cell through the electrolyte to the positive terminal. Then, when we recharge the cell, we are pushing the electrons back down into the negative terminal (anode) and causing the lithium ions to return up through the electrolyte to the positive terminal (cathode).Is that right?WFPM (talk) 02:47, 9 October 2013 (UTC)

'Anode' and 'cathode'

The terms "anode" and "cathode" are completely ambiguous in the context of rechargeable batteries and should not be used in encyclopeadic articles which by their nature are required to be technically correct. There are several problems, the most basic of which is that the anode and cathode switch places between charge and discharge (see the respective articles at anode and cathode for why this is so). The problem is exacerbated because the usage of the terms varies among authorities and even the battery manufacturers themselves. In primary batteries, the anode (that should be the negative electrode by definition) is sometimes incorrectly assumed to be the positive electrode. This seems to be more prevalent with US manufacturers and sources for no adequately explored reason. For rechargeable batteries, some sources apply the terms for the discharge condition (anode = negative) and some sources apply either the charge condition or (more likely) the anode = positive case. Many avoid the problem by just stating positive or negative. References in particular require careful interpretation. I B Wright (talk) 18:26, 5 December 2013 (UTC)

Battery lifetime

I was long under the impression that rechargeable lithium batteries had a lifetime in years more or less independent of usage, and that manufacturing date was a key parameter. This has more than theoretical implications for the typical user; for example I avoided buying Li-ion-powered things for occasional use, as in an electric screwdriver used infrequently. In this discussion, but not in the article, I found the following (slightly edited), by someone who appears to know the subject professionally:

"[According to a discredited source] no lithium-ion battery could possibly last longer than two years[, regardless of use]. This fitted with many people's experience of laptop batteries where they were discharged and charged every day, thus using up the 600ish cycle life in less than two years (730 days). In reality, properly cared for and regularly used, lithium-ion batteries will last out their full cycle life which can stretch over many decades. I myself have a few examples of lithium-ion batteries which were new in 1994 and still exhibit nearly their full rated capacity."

I think this, if correct, is vitally important information, the sort of thing I use Wikipedia for. It needs to be in the article. I suppose the difficulty is finding Wikipedia-reliable sources. I certainly came across and was convinced by apparently authoritative sources saying that battery life in years was independent of use. It's the sort of thing technical expertise doesn't protect you from, unlike lots of obviously stupid ideas out there. Pol098 (talk) 13:31, 29 January 2013 (UTC)

(Me again, added later) I've been looking around, and the sort of thing I find, from what I would normally describe as reliable sources, is, from an undated Tektronix document called "Lithium-Ion Battery Maintenance Guidelines: "The typical estimated life of a Lithium-Ion battery is about two to three years or 300 to 500 charge cycles, whichever occurs first. One charge cycle is a period of use from fully charged, to fully discharged, and fully recharged again. Use a two to three year life expectancy for batteries that do not run through complete charge cycles."

I'm not trying to argue that this is in fact correct, but there do seem to be reputable sources for this (and plenty of reputable sources for lots of nonsense). I report this to see what others have to say. I don't know if it's right, simply wrong, or out-of-date and valid for early batteries only. Personally I have just moved away from the firm view that Li-ion batteries have a limited life even if not used, and cautiously hope that this may not be so, and will buy stuff with this idea in mind. In my own, very limited, experience I have several times picked up years-old, cast-aside equipment with Li-ion batteries, expecting them to be dead, and, thinking back, almost always been surprised to find them with plenty of battery capacity (e.g., a 2007 HP iPaq rx5935 used only with external power for occasional GPS use; in late 2014—7 years later—the battery lasted 5 hours with GPS running). Pol098 (talk) 19:33, 29 January 2013 (UTC), life of GPS battery updated Oct 2014.

Tesla electric cars use banks of lithium-ion cells with a warranty of 8 years, so it's obviously possible to get cells to last at least 8 years and probably much longer. Although I've also read they never charge the batteries to 4.2V like most consumer electronics do, which helps them last longer, so I guess it doesn't prove how long a consumer electronics battery can last. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 97.93.81.166 (talk) 21:31, 6 January 2014 (UTC)

The major problem here, as you note, is finding reliable sources of information. Unfortunately, with the dearth of information from the battery manufacturers many reputable manufacturers of equipment using Li-ion batteries have turned to what information is available, and sadly regarded Buchmann as knowing what he is talking about (largely because the evidence that he does not is not easily found). Buchmann states both in his book and on the Batteryuniversity website that Li-ion batteries lose capacity at an alarming rate, such that the capacity would be too low to be of use in around two years. As you have discovered, Li-ion batteries are unable to read and consequently are unaware of the limitation. As you have also discovered, a fully charged Li-ion battery will hold its charge for a surprisingly long time (as you discovered - years). Buchmann also claims that fully charged batteries do not hold their charge long but a 40% charged battery will hold its charge for longer. In reality, the more charge it starts with, the more charge it has after some period of time.

The biggest obstacle to charge storage is that every battery Li-ion battery requires some form of charge management circuit to protect it. In simpler systems that use single cell batteries this may be part of the device that is powered by the battery. The batteries for these will offer the greatest ability to hold the charge as once removed from their device there is no current drain to power the management circuit. More complex batteries (both single cell and batteries involving series connected cells) have a charge management circuit built into the battery casing. These will always provide a current drain path and consequently, the ability to hold a charge shorter - but how much shorter depends on the design of that circuit. The worst offending set of batteries that I have are for a Sony tape based camcorder where the smaller capacity batteries can lose their entire charge in just a few months. I therefore have to carefully check and charge the batteries during periods of disuse, because if the battery is allowed to discharge too far, the management circuit (correctly) refuses to allow you to charge the battery ever again. — Preceding unsigned comment added by I B Wright (talk • contribs) 17:32, 2 March 2013 (UTC)

Useful and interesting. One clarification: if I remember correctly (and I did read it very carefully to decide what to do) the Batteryuniversity website said that a battery charged to 40% and refrigerated will last longer before deteriorating to end-of-life, it's not about holding charge (I don't endorse this viewpoint, merely report it). The comments on a battery slowly self-discharging to an irreversible point make sense. The practical conclusion I draw from all this (unfortunately not sourced well enough to put in the article) is that I will not try to store batteries I'm not currently using at 40% charge or refrigerated. I will keep batteries in use fully charged (i.e., plug my phone into its charger every night); the common notion that this reduces battery lifetime referred to NiCd batteries only, and is suspect in my opinion anyway. So far, this is basically what I have always done. The new bit is that I will also try to rotate batteries if I have more than one, to avoid any discharging to the point of no return. (I actually did this for phone batteries that might run out in use, but only to ensure that I always had a charged spare).

By the way, from previous comments it would appear that the only batteries likely not to have protection circuits which will gradually drain them are those with nominal voltages of 3.2 to 3.7V, i.e. single cells. Pol098 (talk) 14:23, 3 April 2013 (UTC)

Buchmann trawled that bit about charging to only 40% from an internet chat forum. I do not know where the bit about refrigeration came from, but generally cooling any chemical reaction slows it down, so it would appear to make sense. Unfortunately, there does not appear to be any independant refence to support the point. I have never stored batteries at anything other than full charge. They still exhibit near full capacity, but as the oldest examples are only 19 years old, it is probably too early to tell if this treatment has shortened their life in any way. I agree that information such as this would be a valuable addition to the article, but as original research it cannot be unless reliable sources can be found to support it.

If a lithium-ion cell discharges to less than around 2.8 volts (the exact value seems to be one of those bits of information that the manufacturers have decided that we are better not knowing), the reaction starts to plate metal onto the internal structure of the cell. This metal provides a discharge path for any subsequent charge. If severe enough, it can conduct enough current to cause the cell to rupture. This is why a management circuit will refuse to charge an over discharged battery. I B Wright (talk) 11:43, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

Progress in energy density and power density

My understanding from a technical article I read earlier this year is that energy density and power density in Li-ion batteries is improving about 6 or 8 percent per year, but I don't find that covered in the article. Has this been discussed before? Anyone else have a good source for Li-ion performance over time, historically and perhaps projected? Cheers. N2e (talk) 04:38, 15 December 2013 (UTC)

If you can find the required reliable sources to source such information from, then feel free to add to the article as necessary. I B Wright (talk) 17:02, 17 December 2013 (UTC)

Okay, I've been keeping my eyes open for that IEEE review article I had previously read. In the meantime, here are some other sources:

• Key challenges and recent progress in batteries, fuel cells, and hydrogen storage for clean energy systems, SG Chalk, JF Miller - Journal of Power Sources, 2006. (no paywall; full paper available) US government laboratory research
• Issues and challenges facing rechargeable lithium batteries, J.M. Tarascon & M. Armand, Nature 414, 359-367 (15 November 2001) doi:10.1038/35104644. (paywall)
• Challenges in the development of advanced Li-ion batteries: a review, Vinodkumar Etacheri, Rotem Marom, Ran Elazari, Gregory Salitraa, and Doron Aurbach - 2011,Energy & Environmental Science, Issue 9, DOI: 10.1039/C1EE01598B. (paywall)

I'll keep looking. N2e (talk) 23:37, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

"Battery University"

Note: the credibility of the [http://www.batteryuniversity.com batteryuniversity Web site] is discussed extensively in the #charging instructions section. Pol098 (talk) 14:08, 19 July 2013 (UTC) Also #Battery lifetime, and #Dubious information originating from discredited source. Earlier, archived discussion is still available as Talk:Lithium-ion battery/Archive 1#Reliability of Battery University as a source?. Pol098 (talk) 09:57, 25 January 2014 (UTC)

Thanks for bringing this up, this website pops up first on the search engine I think we need to put a big disclaimer over here henceforth. There is currently substantial information with it as a source, I think even I've put some a month ago. Should we go about removing all of it? -Ugog Nizdast (talk) 14:29, 19 July 2013 (UTC)

Most of the discussion of Battery University was moved to the archive, but is available there. Someone in the archived thread said "I note that several contributors have questioned citations from BatteryUniversity. If I had my way, any material derived from that source would be removed from the article (unless an alternative credible citation exists of course). However, that is not my privilege and I concede that it requires a consensus among those that are as knowledgeable in the subject as myself.", and there were further comments. I've removed the references to BU from the article, but haven't deleted the text derived from there; it could be flagged with {{Citation needed}}, or just deleted, according to guidelines (and commonsense).

By the way, I think a lot of stuff on the Web probably derives from BU. I've certainly seen references all over the place to Li-ion batteries only lasting a specified calendar time from manufacture, regardless of use, and have believed them until detailed discussions, the experience of others and, crucially for me, my own experience demonstrated that it wasn't so (and no manufacturers say this, they give maximum number of charge/discharge cycles expected).Pol098 (talk) 16:55, 19 July 2013 (UTC)

A source to help judge the reliability or otherwise of batteryuniversity: http://batteryuniversity.com/learn/article/how_to_prolong_lithium_based_batteries says (as of the date of this comment) in an article with title "How to Prolong Lithium-based Batteries":

"The author of this essay does not depend on the manufacturer’s specifications alone but also listens to user comments. BatteryUniversity.com is an excellent sounding board to connect with the public and learn about reality. This approach might be unscientific, but it is genuine. When the critical mass speaks, the manufacturers listen. The voice of the multitude is in some ways stronger than laboratory tests performed in sheltered environments."

Pol098 (talk) 09:52, 25 January 2014 (UTC) In other words, information is derived from manufacturers' specifications and unverified comments by anybody rather than tests—what Wikipedia would class as a blog. Pol098 (talk) 19:19, 25 January 2014 (UTC)

"The smaller the depth of discharge, the longer the battery will last"

The article states "The smaller the depth of discharge, the longer the battery will last", with a reference tagged as dubious. The statement itself is ambiguous; it is very likely to be trivially true that a battery undergoing 500 cycles with depth of discharge (DoD) 10% will last longer than 500 cycles @ 100%. However, the (unclear) implication is that it will deliver more total energy over its lifetime if cycled shallowly and often (e.g., significantly more than 10 times more cycles at 10% than at 100%).

Even the unreliable batteryuniversity (see several section of this discussion re this source) gives a [http://batteryuniversity.com/learn/article/how_to_prolong_lithium_based_batteries table of lifetime]] as a function of DoD for Li-ion batteries, finding that a battery will deliver 300-500 cycles at 100% DoD, and 3,750 – 4,700 at 10% DoD, This doesn't support the statement, so I've deleted it (although figures for 50% and 25% DoD do seem to indicate longer life; if the source were reliable this would merit some discussion).

On this topic batteryuniversity says of some of what it says on the page linked above: "Research is performed by the Center for Automotive Research at the Ohio State University in collaboration with Oak Ridge National Laboratory and the National Institute of Standards Technology". This may be worth investigating. Pol098 (talk) 11:14, 25 January 2014 (UTC)

As I understand it, the problem here is how this lifetime is defined. Most sources give a lifetime of these batteries as 300-500 cycles (to the point where the capacity falls to half the 'as new' capacity). The assumption is that the batteries are discharged to their end point voltage per cell (3.0 volts) before recharge. Your linked table above gives 300-500 cycles on this assumption, so so far so good. The number of charge discharge cycles available increases if the batteries are not fully discharged. If the batteries are only 50% depleted before being recharged they have a typical life of 600-1000 cycles. But this simply means that the battery will supply the same number of Ampere-hours over its lifetime. The accepted wisdom is that the same battery will survive 3000-5000 charge/discharge cycles if only depleted by 10% of its available discharge capabilty (the figures of 3750-4700 above are almost certain to be experimental data but fall comfortably inside the range).

It is true that not discharging the battery fully, will give a false impression that you have extended its life because it survives a greater number of charge/discharge cycles, but the reality is that the battery survives more or less exactly the same life when expressed as the total number of Ampere-hours (i.e. actual discharged capacity multiplied by the number of charge/discharge cycles attained) that the battery supplies over its lifetime.

The only feature that this ignores is that the battery will give its proper service life if discharged and charged (to whatever level) reasonably frequently. Lithium-ion type batteries abhor being left unused for extended periods, and even though they do self discharge relatively slowly (ignoring the standing current drawn by any built in battery management circuit), lack of use causes the internal resistance to increase. This means that the internal volt drop increases and the battery management circuit will assume that the battery is fully discharged once its e.m.f. minus the internal volt drop falls to 3.0 volts. The battery management circuit will monitor this rise of internal resistance and the circuit can usually be interrogated for the progress of this degredation using the right equipment.

A piece of software exists for interrogating most laptop bateries (and can be downloaded here). I believe that it still only a 'beta' version (after several years!), but I am not aware of any major problems beyond the fact that not all parameters work with all laptop batteries (If Battstat is to be believed, I am currently consuming 2.6 Megawatts of power from my battery!! Even if that should be a lower case 'm' 2.6 milliwatts is just as unbelievable - 33 watts is around the right number). DieSwartzPunkt (talk) 17:22, 31 January 2014 (UTC)

"Lithium-ion type batteries abhor being left unused for extended periods ... lack of use causes the internal resistance to increase." That's interesting, I haven't seen this said in this way before. Is there any sourced information (preferably quantitative) on this? If true, it partly supports the notion that the life in years of a battery is independent of use, that an unused battery will not last longer than one in use ("supports" in the sense that an unused battery would progressively degrade over a reasonable period, though not necessarily as fast a one in use). My own, very limited, experience, and that of others reported in this discussion, is that lithium rechargeables seem to last for many years if not used or used little, though I don't know of comparative internal resistance measurements on used and unused batteries. Pol098 (talk) 11:35, 5 February 2014 (UTC)

As ever, the battery manufacturers are reluctant to publish any usable data on the subject. Li-ion batteries have several failure modes. As far as the internal resistance rise is concerned, this phenomenon seems to vary considerably between battery sources. In general, the effect is hardly measurable using batteries from the established reputable sources (Sony, Panasonic etc.) if they suffer a few months here and there of non use. I have examples nearly 20 years old that still work well. On the other hand unbranded batteries (mainly from Chinese sources) such as are built into many portable devices (and in laptop batteries - particularly after market replacements), which are very vulnerable in this respect. It is not that the reputable sources do not suffer from the problem, the batteries have to be left unused for very long periods of time (years), whereas a few months is more than enough for the unbranded types. The discredited BatteryUniversity (Buchman) attempted to explain the phenomenon but he wrote it off as a gradual decline in capacity which progressed at 5% of the battery capacity per month (used or not).

You can observe this at work on a suitably degraded battery, the first time you attempt to use it after a prolonged period of non use. After recharging, the state of charge indicator on your device, will slowly show the original depletion rate until the battery e.m.f. reaches 3.0 volts per cell when suddenly, the battery is reported as discharged and your device shuts off. On most batteries, next time you charge the battery, the indicated rate of depletion is much faster because the battery management circuit made a note of the battery's new capacity. Not every battery contains such a circuit as some devices contain the management circuit and not the battery, but this can only be done where the battery is a single cell or consists only of a paralleled set of cells having the same voltage as a single cell. DieSwartzPunkt (talk) 18:45, 11 February 2014 (UTC)

Archiving and unreliable sources

This discussion contains a lot of permanently relevant information on false claims made about batteries in sections #charging instructions, #Battery lifetime, #"Battery University", and #Dubious information originating from discredited source. There is also relevant earlier discussion which has been archived, still available as Talk:Lithium-ion battery/Archive 1#Reliability of Battery University as a source?.

I would suggest, and request, that this discussion not be removed to an archive; although still accessible, it will not usually be found by most people. At the moment it's not particularly long; if it becomes too long, Perhaps, if it is decided to move the discussion to an archive, someone could make a new section in the pruned Talk including all the text (preferably unedited, untrimmed) of the sections listed above. This is better than a brief mention, easily missed, that relevant information is available in a (linked) archive. Pol098 (talk) 09:27, 25 January 2014 (UTC)

It is easy to prevent a discussion being archived. Simply post a comment, add your four tildes as normal and then save the post. Now edit the post and change the year on the expanded date to '2024'. The thread will not be archived for the next ten years plus the archive period (typically three months). It's best to leave a note as to why the year is wrong in case some pedant corrects it. DieSwartzPunkt (talk) 19:18, 11 February 2014 (UTC)

3.8 volts

My addition about 3.8 volts was deleted. The Samsung cell phone that I own uses a 3.8 volt li-ion battery. Not sure if there is a reference available.--Wyn.junior (talk) 02:17, 4 March 2014 (UTC)

Unfortunately, all of your edits to this article have been made without leaving an edit summary, and so I cannot easily find the edit of which you speak to verify its references. The fact that you claim to have a battery marked as 3.8 volts is not acceptable in itself because that is original research. An editor less charitable than myself would feel perfectly entitled to delete all of your edits that have no edit summary as a failure to leave such a summary is a frequent symptom of vandalism (though there is no suggestion of such in your case).

The quoted cell voltage is not the actual terminal voltage but the average voltage output by the cell as it discharges (ranging from 4.2 volts down to 3.0 volts as it discharges). 3.6 volts was the most common voltage, but 3.7 volts appeared with the introduction of lithium polymer cells. As the technology develops other average voltages may well appear. If the technology really does now have 3.8 volt cells and you have that all important reference to support the claim, then go ahead, be bold and edit it into the article. But, please, leave an edit summary in the box at the bottom of the edit page, so that the rest of us have some clue as to what you have done. DieSwartzPunkt (talk) 14:25, 12 March 2014 (UTC)

Dubious information originating from discredited source

The mayhem caused by Isidor Buchman and his self publised and discredited website batteryuniversity continues to evidence itself in parts of this article. Material has been included (I have to assume in good faith), quoting sources other than batteryuniversity (one of them possibly a fan page but others more impecable looking). The problem is that the material is 'facts' that are known to have been trawled from batteryuniversity and have since been shown to be untrue. This raises a problem in that the material is included with apparently reliable and verifiable sources as Wikipedia demands (and it may well be that the sources generally are reliable and have repeated the false 'facts' genuinely believing them to be true - after all not everyone is aware that batteryuniversity and Buchman are discredited). So what to do? I can't in good faith delete the incorrect material because it is referenced (and if I did, another editor would be within his rights to revert the deletion). What I have done for now is to tag them as an and stating my reasons in the 'reason' field. I should make it clear that the unreliabilty only relates to the 'facts' in question plus anything else trawled from batteryuniversity. The sources themselves may still have much to offer. How does one proceed from here? I B Wright (talk) 19:18, 5 December 2013 (UTC)

After using [https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special%3ALinkSearch&target=www.batteryuniversity.com Special:LinkSearch]...It turns out there was still some pages which had references/ext links to this site...removed. The sources in question (TechRepublic) should preferably be replaced with any good secondary reference (like a book written by an expert in this field) but till that happens, tagging it seems to be the only thing to do. -Ugog Nizdast (talk) 15:42, 14 December 2013 (UTC)

I, too, would support the cleanup effort. The first step is to ensure that all such statements supported by the dubious sources are tagged, as you suggested. Then, each source/statement can be discussed here on the Talk page to gain consensus of multiple editors before removing the offending statements. At least that is what I would suggest if you want to get maximum support and avoid the problem you mention. Being bold and discussing only if someone challenges you is another alternative, but perhaps more time consuming and contentious. N2e (talk) 04:45, 15 December 2013 (UTC)

It was a book written by an 'expert' in the field that caused all the problems in the first place. It was that same 'expert' that went on to create batteryuniversity.com. Unfortunately many of his disputed (or provenly wrong 'facts') have made it into many other publications (presumably on the mistaken assumption that Buchmann knew what he was talking about). Much of this article has used material derived originally from Buchmann, not just the bits flagged as dubious. As noted above, It has become all too impossible to distinguish fact from fiction with levels of proof meeting Wikipedia's referencing standards. Fortunately, your link search above shows that no extant articles are linked to this site, but a couple of work in progress articles, and references from talk pages are. 86.149.79.140 (talk) 09:27, 17 December 2013 (UTC)

Checking the use of batteryuniversity.com for its use as references as shown above reveals that the two WIP articles are copies of old versions of their respective articles presumably copied in the past for a spot of 'off line' editing. There are a few posts at the reference desk with which we need not concern ourselves too much. The remainder are at article talk pages and seem to be largely underlining the lack of credibility of this source. As of this time, there seem to be no articles that directly use batteryuniversity.com as a reference, so no action is required on that front.

However, as I noted above (and there seems to be some agreement dotted around various talk pages), batteryuniversity.com sourced information is present in this and several other articles having been sourced from secondary sources that have obtained what information they could from batteryuniversity.com. I have no idea what can be done about this on a long term basis. As I note above, I made a start by flagging some of this information as , but this is far from an ideal or long term solution. The biggest problem by far: is the clear inability to sort fact from fiction particularly for the less obvious misinformation. However, I have made a modest start as unsourced dubious or incorrect claims are easily dealt with. I B Wright (talk) 16:59, 17 December 2013 (UTC)

Your work so far is much appreciated. When I had used Special link search I had found four articles in the mainspace which had BU as reference/external link and I removed them. Given its prominence in search engine results...I'm quite sure within months we can find its links added again in these articles (whether by good faith or otherwise), I'll try to keep a check. I wonder if we can get the help of User:XLinkBot with this? (this isn't exactly a case of spam) -Ugog Nizdast (talk) 15:03, 18 December 2013 (UTC)

I believe Wikipedia has a mechanism for black listing particular reference sources such that they cannot be used. Does anyone know about this? DieSwartzPunkt (talk) 19:12, 11 February 2014 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Blocked external links#Request blocking of a link or website (not in use) and MediaWiki talk:Spam-blacklist. Pol098 (talk) 18:46, 28 May 2014 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 2 June 2014

The statement "Lithium-ion is charged at approximately 4.2 ± 0.05 V/cell except for "military long life" that uses 3.92 V to extend battery life." needs a "citation needed" and is possibly even incorrect. I have much personal knowledge of military lithium ion batteries and am not familiar with this. Chaimav (talk) 20:37, 2 June 2014 (UTC)

Partly done: Added citation needed template NQ (talk) 21:23, 2 June 2014 (UTC)

... and I just deleted the paragraph. I come from a military aerospace background and I have not come across this either. Since I cannot verify the claim from any source other than batteryuniversity.com, I have deleted it in accordance with the above discussion and blacklist request. Although the first clause of the first sentence is believed correct, it has no context without the rest of the paragraph. I have deleted a few other unverifiable batteryuniversity nuggets as well. DieSwartzPunkt (talk) 07:33, 3 June 2014 (UTC)

batteryuniversity.com

In view of the above discussions, I have put up a proposal to have batteryuniversity.com placed on the blacklist. The entry can be viewd at [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Blocked_external_links/Current_requests/Additions#www.batteryuniversity.com]. Or you may care to make any views that you have known at that discussion. DieSwartzPunkt (talk) 12:56, 1 June 2014 (UTC)

I don't think that page is active, there's a notice on Wikipedia:Blocked external links which says so and recommends MediaWiki talk:Spam-blacklist instead. -Ugog Nizdast (talk) 17:46, 1 June 2014 (UTC)

That particular page is the blacklist itself and only Administrators can edit it. Although the Wikipedia:Blocked external links states that it is not in use, there is a banner at the top which says "Use <these links> instead". The page I posted to is one of those links. No, I see the problem. There seems to be several locations to propose additions. I shall copy the existing discussion over and se what happens. DieSwartzPunkt (talk) 07:46, 2 June 2014 (UTC)

OK then, new location for the discussion is [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MediaWiki_talk:Spam-blacklist#www.batteryuniversity.com here]. DieSwartzPunkt (talk) 08:01, 2 June 2014 (UTC)

Good job, some months back I thought of doing this myself but got really confused over the number of venues available (most of them inactive). Let's see if your post gets answered...-Ugog Nizdast (talk) 13:21, 2 June 2014 (UTC)

Looking at the age of the oldest request (Oct 2013), I would advise against holding your breath while things happen! Please feel free to add a note of support to the actual discussion. DieSwartzPunkt (talk) 07:11, 3 June 2014 (UTC)

You're right, that looks inactve too. For all its worth, I've added my support there. On the bright side, I think the 'threat' of it getting added back is extremely low. -Ugog Nizdast (talk) 07:55, 4 June 2014 (UTC)

I have now been pointed to yet another blacklist proposal place ([https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Spam_blacklist#batteryuniversity.com here]) and this time. Current discussion copied verbatim. At least this time, someone seems to have initiated some action. Perhaps we need a blacklist of abandoned blacklist proposal sites?. DieSwartzPunkt (talk) 14:49, 17 June 2014 (UTC)

Good news: www.batteryuniversity.com is now blacklisted. DieSwartzPunkt (talk) 17:26, 29 June 2014 (UTC) (UTC)

Excellent...I did some testing too, so this is how blacklisting works. -Ugog Nizdast (talk) 17:54, 29 June 2014 (UTC)

Pouch cells are sometimes called "coffee bag" cells

Pouch cells are sometimes referred to as "coffee bag" cells because of their shape, although I have noticed in the last three years that this use is rare. Should the article mention this at least in the "Shapes" section? Personally, I favour "pouch" usage over "coffee bag", and most of the industry and scientific literature that I've read seems to do as well.

On a more personal note, I have to admit never seeing a "coffee bag" before but rather "tea bags", so the term is rather unusual for me to begin with.----137.132.22.190 (talk) 07:24, 23 June 2014 (UTC)

This is more applicable to the Lithium-ion polymer battery, the artice for which is over there. Naturally, reliable references are required that the term is in widespread use. I had not heard before it was mentioned here. DieSwartzPunkt (talk) 15:25, 23 June 2014 (UTC)

The term is not exactly in widespread use, but it is sometimes used by people in the battery industry. So, this is more like an open question to other editors, should we include it, perhaps as a redirection, or not include it at all? References are few, mostly in slides presented in international battery conferences, which are credible enough.

Just to nitpick, the "lithium ion polymer battery" is exactly a lithium ion battery, there is no difference. The outer presentation of the battery makes it not different from a cylindrical cell, the underlying principles and chemistry are the same. This is kind of a myth that I try to debunk as well.----137.132.22.191 (talk) 07:53, 24 June 2014 (UTC)

If included, a reference will be required that the term is in widespread use. Conference slides are self published and not acceptable as references. Further, they cannot be verified as others will not have access to the slides. 'Lithium-ion' and 'Lithium-ion polymer' batteries are virtually chemically identical, but not constructionally. The difference is responsible for the average discharge voltage being different between the two species. The former averaging 3.6 volts and the latter averaging 3.7 to 3.8 volts (depending on exact construction).

I'm sorry, but, what? The "construction" affects the average voltage? Eh, no. Can you provide a reference confirming this? The theory tells us that an electrochemical system has a specific voltage depending on the electrodes involved, not that it depends on the construction of the electrochemical cell. Moreover, I have never seen an average voltage of 3.8 V. The usual values are 3.6 V (usually NMC chemistry) and 3.7 V (usually LiCoO2 chemistry).

I would argue that conference slides are acceptable references. Those submitted to renowned conferences involve peer review, and they are collected in proceedings, which are made available to attendants and also to the general public. Of course, the proceedings may not be gratis, but that is the same case as with other reference documents like printed books and scientific journals. Please sign your comments.----137.132.22.191 (talk) 01:26, 30 June 2014 (UTC)

Oh, yes, the construction can affect the voltage. Whilst you are theoretically correct that the cell voltage is determined by the electronegativity of the material(s) used for the electrodes, it does not always work out that way in practice. For example if you make a simple battery out of a carbon and a zinc electrode and dip them in an ammonium chloride electrolyte, the assembly has an e.m.f of 1.4 volts, more than the theoretical emf that those electrodes should give (these are the active ingredients of a Leclanche cell - ignoring the depolariser). However, if you alter the construction and add zinc chloride to the electrolyte, the emf rises to 1.55 volts (these are the active ingredients of the zinc-carbon dry cell - again ignoring the depolariser). This without altering the electrodes.

Fot the lithium-ion cell, things work very differently. The fully charged emf of both the common or garden lithium-ion cell and the lithium-ion polymer cell is 4.2 volts. Also, the emf at which either type must be considered discharged is 2.8 volts (some early Sony constructions excepted which are 2.3 volts). What changes between the two types is the voltage during discharge. In the later construction the voltage falls a little more slowly at first and then a little faster later. As I stated above, the voltage quoted on any cell or battery is the average voltage of this discharge. Just looking at real examples of lithium ion cylindrical batteries: Sony - 3.6 V; A later Sony - 3.6 V; Panasonic - 3.6 V; Hewlett Packard battery pack for laptop - 10.8 V (= 3 x 3.6 V in series). Turning to lithium-ion polymer batteries: Sony - 3.7 V; Panasonic - 7.4 V (= 2 x 3.7 V in series); battery recovered from iPad (otherwise unbranded) - 3.7 V; another Hewlett Packard laptop battery pack - 11.1 V (= 3 x 3.7 V in series). The Samsung Galaxy range of smart phones use a battery rated at 3.8 volts (see here). DieSwartzPunkt (talk) 17:00, 30 June 2014 (UTC)

In your example you are already using two different electrolytes, thus changing the system. That is not the same as just changing the packaging, that was my point. My point is, if you use the same formulation in a cylindrical and in a pouch cell, you get the same result. Saying that the difference between the lithium-ion and lithium-ion polymer is "In the later construction the voltage falls a little more slowly at first and then a little faster later" is absolutely without grounds. Where did you get this information from? In that case, they must have certainly different electrolyte formulations too, like in your example. Every cell is essentially different because each manufacturer has their own "secret recipe", with specific electrolyte and additives. Even if you take two cells from Sony, you cannot assume that they have the same recipe, because these cells may be tailored for specific applications. How could we possibly tell? Ultimately, these are trade secrets that may not be disclosed.

It is funny, though, that Samsung lists their cell at 3.8 V. I never saw this before. Does this cell have something special? How can we tell? It may also be just a marketing trick, trying to pass it as a "better", "higher-voltage", and thus "higher-energy", cell.----137.132.22.191 (talk) 06:45, 1 July 2014 (UTC)

Maybe. Maybe not. All the cylindrical (and prismatic) Li-ion cells (those in steel cases) that I have seen are 3.6 volt (with the exception of those early Sony cells). All the 'heat shrink' packaged cells I have seen (including batteries made from them) are 3.7 volt. As for the manufacturers revealing all? There we can agree. The manufactureres have always been reticent to give any information away that they don't have to. This is what has allowed charlatons to flourish offering information that is not available from elsewhere. One such charlaton operates the batteryuniversity web site. DieSwartzPunkt (talk) 12:52, 1 July 2014 (UTC)

Transport restrictions on Li-ion batteries

(This section was split from the topic above Talk:Lithium-ion_battery#There is no mention of LiPo batteries because this discussion grew and it did not make sense in that topic.----137.132.22.190 (talk) 01:43, 4 August 2014 (UTC))

The section "Transport restrictions" says: "Types of batteries covered by this rule are those containing small amounts of lithium, including Li-ion, lithium polymer, and lithium cobalt oxide chemistries." This is wrong. The denomination "Li-ion" already covers "lithium polymer" and "lithium cobalt oxide". The "lithium cobalt oxide" chemistry is indeed the most common chemistry used in "Li-ion", but "lithium polymer" is definitely not a separate chemistry. The sentence could be simply changed to "...amounts of lithium, including Li-ion." I still have my doubts on this, as I'm not sure if the transport regulations prohibit "lithium ion" batteries. They prohibit mostly "lithium metal" batteries, but then again "lithium metal" (non-rechargeable) is not the same as "lithium ion" (rechargeable), there is a fundamental difference there.----137.132.22.191 (talk) 09:33, 24 June 2014 (UTC)

Wrong or not, the transport restrictions list the applicable types. These rules are written to be understood by people who unaware or just don't care how the batteries are put together. DieSwartzPunkt (talk) 14:06, 28 June 2014 (UTC)

I'm questioning the person who wrote this piece of information into the article. I cannot verify the source, so I cannot check this. I'm not sure what the exact document referred to is, but it should be the official one, which I presume, should be enforced by airport personnel. I would not be confident using a reference document that is targeted to the layman person just because they are "unaware" how the batteries are put together.----137.132.22.191 (talk) 01:33, 30 June 2014 (UTC)

From the international air transport regulations issued by the CAA and FAA (as well as other regulatory bodies).

Section 175.10(a) <This is part of what is allowed to be carried>

"(18) Except as provided in § 173.21 of this subchapter, portable electronic devices (for example <long list of examples>) containing cells or batteries and spare batteries and cells for these devices when carried by pasengers or crew members for personal use. Each spare battery must be individually protected so as to prevent short circuits <examples of method> and carried in carry-on baggage only. In addition each installed or spare battery must comply with the following.

"(i) For a lithium metal battery including lithium sulphur dioxide and lithium thionyl chloride batteries, a lithium content of not more than 2 grams per battery; or

"(ii) For a lithium ion battery including lithium cobalt and lithium polymer batteries, an aggregate equivalent lithium content of not more than 8 grams per battery, except that up to two batteries with an aggregate equivalent lithium content of more than 8 grams but not more than 25 grams may be carried.

"(iii) For a non-spillable battery including gell-cell batteries, the battery and equipment must conform to § 173.159(d). Each battery must not exceed a voltage greater than 12 volts and a watt-hour rating of not more than 100 Wh. No more than two individually protected spare batteries may be carried. Such equipment and spare batteries must be carried in checked or carry-on baggage".

Apologies for any typos that I have missed, this is an edited version of an OCR of my printed copy (the only edits are the omissions highlighted otherwise it would be unnecessarily long). I cannot find an online version that is not an 'idiot's interpretation'. As you can see, (i) and (ii) are written more or less as stated above.

Section 173.21 (refered to) covers material carried as cargo, but it is worded almost exactly the same way (packaging methods and lithium limits vary). My copy is too dog eared and dirty to OCR reliably. I can tell you that prohibited from carriage are loose batteries not protected from short circuit, wet batteries and vehicle batteries of any description.

You can tell that I did not write this document (though I have written many others in the air industry), as I would not have included the tautology in (iii). DieSwartzPunkt (talk) 18:20, 30 June 2014 (UTC)

Upon further reading it seems that the transport regulations do in fact include lithium-ion technology together with lithium-metal. For me the key statement is the 8 grams per battery, or maximum 25 grams for two batteries, of lithium content. Given that a typical lithium-ion cell in cylindrical format (18650) weighs around 50 grams, if half that weight, 25 grams, is metallic lithium, that is still allowed to be transported. But given that lithium-ion cells don't have metallic lithium under normal conditions, the content should be very small; I hope less than 1 gram per cell of a battery pack of a notebook computer. This metallic lithium should have been produced by lithium plating, presumably in older rather than newer battery packs.

I think, then, the transport regulations do apply to lithium-ion batteries, although in practical terms there would be no way to determine the amount of metallic lithium in them in order to ban them from transport, unless the content is explicitly stated in the battery pack. This explanation could be added to the article, but probably we need a suitable reference.----137.132.22.191 (talk) 05:32, 1 July 2014 (UTC)

I would challenge the statement, "... given that lithium-ion cells don't have metallic lithium under normal conditions". It would be more accurate to say, "... given that lithium-ion cells don't have metallic lithium when they are new". Metallic lithium is deposited as part of the cells ageing process (which, to be fair, you did note). It is this removal of lithium from the availble reactants that slowly reduces the cell's capacity every time it is discharged and recharged.

This is why the regulations say, "aggregate lithium content". That way it matters not whether it is lithium metal or lithium carbonate or lithium titanate spinel (up and coming). The aggregate amount of lithium can be deduced (more or less) from the cell capacity (in Ah) and the battery voltage (gives number of cells). The amount of lithium is not, unfortunately, fixed by the chemistry. A little research gives the lithium content between 113 g and 246 g (depending on chemistry) per kWh. According to that it means my high capacity laptop battery (99 Wh) contains between 11 and 24 grammes of lithium, so it could be close to the limit. Strangely, no one questioned it the last time I travelled. Cells contain far more lithium than they actually need for the chemistry to operate. Up to 50% of the lithium content becomes bound to the electrodes when the cell receives it first forming charge. This lithium is effectively inert for the life of the battery.

The reason the regulations spell out the types is because there are some countries (the USA mainly) where users interpret the rules in 'black and white'. If (ii) said, "For a lithium ion battery, an aggregate lithium content of [etc.]", Some airport worker would look at a box of batteries marked "lithium-polymer battery"; refer to the regulations and say to himself, "It's OK it only covers lithium-ion. Doesn't mention lithium-polymer". Before anyone knows otherwise some passenger has got a couple of kilogrammes of lithium on board the aeroplane. It does not make for good reading on the crash investigation report. If a new type of lithium-ion battery is developed the appropriate page of the regulations will be upissued to include it in the 'including' list - eventually. DieSwartzPunkt (talk) 12:44, 1 July 2014 (UTC)

What does it actually mean "aggregate lithium content"? Is that the active material, such as lithium cobalt oxide or lithium iron phosphate? That would be pushing the definition too far in my opinion. What source did you use to deduct this aggregate lithium content from the capacity (Ah)? I've never seen such calculation.

Some cells do contain more lithium than is used, this is correct. In the case of LiCoO2, only 50% is used in intercalation and deintercalation. This is a limitation of the crystalline structure of LiCoO2, and not necessarily a manufacturing issue. If more lithium ions are deintercalated the crystalline structure starts to collapse, and oxygen (O2) starts to appear as a product, rendering the cell dead. But this is different in LiFePO4, where most lithium can be reversibly intercalated and deintercalated. When you say "Up to 50% of the lithium content becomes bound to the electrodes when the cell receives it first forming charge", I assume you refer to the formation of the Solid Electrolyte Interface (SEI). Where do you get that number from, 50%? Do you have a reference? The SEI appears in the carbon electrode, not in the positive electrode, and in commercial cells (as opposed to experimental laboratory cells) the loss of capacity may reach 20% in the first cycle, certainly not 50%. Reference: "Relation between surface properties, pore structure and first-cycle charge loss of graphite as negative electrode in lithium-ion batteries". Journal of Power Sources. 97–98: 78–82. July 2001. doi:10.1016/S0378-7753(01)00595-X. {{cite journal}}: Cite uses deprecated parameter |authors= (help). Notice that I say "capacity", not "lithium", as lithium-ion cells don't have metallic lithium. What is lost, then, is part of the active material, which is the compound LiC6 from the negative electrode. The loss of this compound means losing "lithium ions for intercalation", but not really lithium as a metal. I really like to say it this way to stress that there is no lithium metal inside, only compounds with lithium ions.----137.132.22.191 (talk) 03:56, 2 July 2014 (UTC)

Agregate simply means all the lithium whether metal or as part of compounds. 'Equivalent lithium content' is given in the definitions toward the front of the tome (should have read it I guess).

Equivalent lithium content for a battery or battery pack is the rated capacity in ampere-hours for a single cell multiplied by 0.3 and then multiplied by the number of cells in the battery. So that answers that point. This gives my laptop battery as having an equivalent lithium content of 8.2 grammes which is a bit less than the lower limit given above. This is, of course, not the real actual lithium content for reasons that we have already discussed. I have yet to work out what this theoretical lithium content is meant to be equivalent to.

I also just notiiced that the OCR of the rules I quoted omitted the word 'equivalent' from the first reference to 'aggregate lithium content'. This may be because the word is not clear in my copy due to a grease stain. I have added it to the quoted rules above, so you may care to read it again. DieSwartzPunkt (talk) 12:32, 2 July 2014 (UTC)

I just realised this information is posted in a thread in this same talk page above. They provide this link http://safetravel.dot.gov/definitions.html#elc However, I'm curious what the official regulation is. I would like to cite the actual document and not the website, even if it's from a government body.----137.132.22.191 (talk) 03:00, 3 July 2014 (UTC)

My extract above is from the official regulations. Its officially known (just like all aviation regulations) by the totally meaningless title of "49 CFR". Googling may turn up variations because many transport authorities have plagiarised the regulations being too lazy to write their own. The US Amtrak, for example' uses regulations called '49 eCFR' though it is more or less word for word. The site you gave above his it largely correct even though it is somewhat confusingly stated. Don't use their calculation for equivalent lithium content (ELC) though because the answer will be just over 1% too small compared with the official calculation that I gave above. That someone used the wrong calculation never goes down well in the subsequent crash investigation.

Just out of interest, I had a look at what batteryuniversity said about the carriage limits. Not unsurprisingly, they had it wrong as usual. They state that the limit is 8 grammes ELC per battery up to a maximum ELC of 25 grammes. That is not what the regulations say. I can carry two batteries of 12.5 grammes ELC each or I could carry 50 grammes of ELC as long as it distrbuted among 7 or more batteries.

Okay, I have cited it using the template {{CodeFedReg|49|175|10}} which produces 49 CFR 175.10, and a link to the appropriate section. I find this very useful to verify the regulation, which presumably is kept up to date. On first instance, I don't feel it's immediately obvious how to interpret the regulations. They should update and give an example on that bit.----137.132.22.191 (talk) 00:51, 7 July 2014 (UTC)

For reference, there is a recent video on lithium-ion batteries transport in aircraft: Lithium Batteries - Guidance for Cargo and Ramp Personnel. Unfortunately, they group lithium-metal and lithium-ion together, which is not technically correct and may cause confusion, but well, in general it's useful information.----137.132.22.190 (talk) 01:17, 4 August 2014 (UTC)

How much Lithium in a Li-Ion battery ?

I scanned the article (that I've visited several times over the years) and couldn't find any estimate or data from a typical battery, and that information is not forthcoming on the web either, so I think it would be interesting if someone could add such information. Aesma (talk) 08:33, 3 February 2014 (UTC)

If you mean how much metallic lithium, then the answer (for a new battery) is none. However, the evolution of metallic lithium is a product of overcharging and is the principal hazard associated with such abuse. When the battery ruptures, it is this metallic lithium that ignites the flammable electrolyte. The oxygen required to ignite it and sustain the combustion is produced by the battery itself. The rupture is assisted because the battery itself is pressurised. There used to be couple of very good videos on the 'net of what happens when you overcharge these batteries, but they no longer seem to be there. However, I have found this one which still pretty much says it all. It should be noted that Lithium-polymer batteries (strictly they are lithium-ion-polymer) are somewhat safer, but not entirely because they still contain some inflammable electrolyte. The principal impediment at present to developing batteries that are true lithium polymer is that the polymer will not conduct any current below 60°C. DieSwartzPunkt (talk) 19:09, 11 February 2014 (UTC)

I'm a simple answer and simple question person. The truth is that I don't know the answer to your question. But the info on this article is only what can be referenced authoritatively. Most industries don't officially go on record with that detailed of info. It would be nice if they did though, and it's a legit question to ask.--Wyn.junior (talk) 02:20, 4 March 2014 (UTC)

Reference (98) "Lithium-Ion Batteries Hazard and Use Assessment" states "Lithium-ion cells do not contain metallic lithium in any significant quantity to affect fire suppression; in lithium-ion cells, Li+ ions function simply as carriers of electric charge." A few parts of this article were based on the assumption that metallic lithium is in these secondary cells. It is not, only in primary cells (ask any Meth Cook). The article claim that non-aqueous fire extinguishers should be used due to the metallic lithium, and then cited the above reference that states the opposite.

Unless something very unusual has happened, there just no metallic lithium in a Lion cell. None. --DrMemory--Drmemory (talk) 06:55, 29 May 2014 (UTC)

There is currently no fire extinguishant that will put out a burning lithium-ion battery. Lithium-ion batteries at the moment of rupture provide the fuel (electrolyte); the oxygen (an excess left over from the cumbustion reaction) and the ignition source (the metalic lithium ignites on contact with oxygen). This is something you may care to bear in mind next the time you charge your smart phone (or any gadget) and it gets unusually warm during charging. Yes, there is no metallic lithium in a new battery, but that does not remain true as the battery ages. Every time you discharge and charge the battey a small amount of metallic lithium is produced. It is this removal of lithium from the chemistry that causes the capacity to gradually decline. Overcharging will throw larger quantities out of the chemisty. DieSwartzPunkt (talk) 17:37, 29 May 2014 (UTC)

The US Department of Tranportation has published some information on calculating lithium content from the the watt hours

http://safetravel.dot.gov/definitions.html#elc

"Equivalent Lithium Content (ELC). ELC is a measure by which lithium ion batteries are classified.

•8 grams of equivalent lithium content are equal to about 100 watt-hours.

•25 grams of equivalent lithium content are equal to about 300 watt-hours.

You can arrive at the number of watt-hours your battery provides if you know how many milliamp hours and volts your battery provides:

mAh/1000 x V = wh"  

— Preceding unsigned comment added by Chaimav (talk • contribs) 20:49, 2 June 2014 (UTC)

@DieSwartzPunkt: You are wrong again. Lithium-ion batteries burn in a completely different way to lithium-metal batteries. The amount of lithium metal in a lithium-ion cell is insignificant. You have to accept this. In a lithium-ion battery fire, the fire is mostly sustained by the flammable electrolyte and the flammable polymer separator, which like most soft plastics, burns. The most valuable reference in this case is precisely Mikolajczak, Celina; Kahn, Michael; White, Kevin; Long, Richard Thomas (July 2011). Lithium-Ion Batteries Hazard and Use Assessment (Report). Exponents Failure Analysis Associates, Inc.. In that document they explain how batteries burn, the amount of gases released, and other things. The most useful extinguisher seems to be plain water, because it smothers the flames and cools down the burning materials which prevents re-ignition. CO2 seems to be also suitable for small fires. Have I done experiments on this? Yes, I have. I work in a battery laboratory and surely we have had small fires that can be contained with a CO2 extinguisher. ----137.132.22.191 (talk) 23:50, 15 July 2014 (UTC)

@137.132.22.191:. No, I am right - mostly. Your claim that the amount of lithium in a lithium-ion battery is insignificant, is only true for a brand new battery. As the battery is discharged and charged, the lithium is removed from the active chemistry and is converted into metallic lithium. In a cell rupture, lithium spontaneously ignites on contact with oxygen or water (that is any lithium present). It is true that the principal fire hazard comes from the flammable electrolyte (and/or polymer in Li-poly cells), but that fire will be initially ignited by any lithium present. The near impossibility of extinguishing the burning cell is because the heat of the burning cell causes the materials in the cell to decompose and liberate free oxygen. There are plenty of videos on you-tube of batteries bursting into flames even though there are no ignition sources present. In these circumstances, a CO₂ extinguisher is useless, because the modus operandi of such an extinguisher is to starve the fire of atmospheric oxygen. It does not work when the fire is supplying its own. And if there is any burning lithium around, CO₂ will actually help it burn because lithium will strip the O₂ from the CO₂ just as many burning metals do.

I was involved for a long time in the assessment of battery technology for use in military aerospace projects, and I have abused many a battery to assess its characteristics.

Also, do not move other user's posts into other places on the talk page. Apart from bad etiquette, it destroys the logical flow of a conversation. There does not appear to be specific prohibition at TPG, but then I have not seen anyone do it before (you can't legislate against something that has not yet happened). Maybe there should be. DieSwartzPunkt (talk) 18:13, 16 July 2014 (UTC)

@DieSwartzPunkt: You are wrong. The amount of lithium metal in a lithium-ion battery is insignificant, even when the battery is old. Yes, I know lithium plating occurs. But the amount of plating is insignificant, understand this. If you have a brand new cell, how much do you think will plate after a few years? Only a bit, less than one percent per weight! This bit of plating is enough for degrading the capacity of a battery, by creating microscopic short circuits. The cause of failure is mostly internal self discharge and loss of capacity, not bursting into flames. The cell has not magically transformed into a lithium-metal cell, its content is still insignificant. The way you write your comments makes it seem that after a few years, a significant amount of metallic lithium has appeared, and this is simply not the case.

The second part of your reply is also a myth that I've seen repeated by other people. Lithium-ion batteries do not contain enough oxygen to sustain their own burning. Once the cell case (cylinder can, pouch) is ruptured, the ambient air provides the oxygen that can sustain a fire, just like in any other fire. It is a well known fact that CO2 extinguishers are not ideal with lithium-metal fires, because lithium reacts with CO2, as you correctly describe. But again, a lithium-ion battery is different. It is basically burning plastic, which means it can be extinguished with Type ABC extinguishers like Halon or CO2.

I searched again for this video of the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) on lithium-ion battery fires on board a plane: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vS6KA_Si-m8 They simulate the very real scenario of a laptop computer catching fire in the cabin. Go to the 10 minute mark. Recommendations: use Halon extinguishers or water to extinguish such fire. And CO2 extinguishers do work, as pointed out by the Exponent document cited above. I suggest you read that document, it's very informative, and done by professionals.

I don't want to insult your experience, I trust that you have worked with lithium batteries in the past, but you are not up-to-date with the modern research on lithium-ion technology. As far as I know, most batteries for military applications are non-rechargeable, thus why I think you have strong opinions on the lithium-metal cells. Lithium-ion is a different technology, it is not the same, and you have to understand this.

I apologise for moving the text. I admit I sometimes get frustrated when other editors don't reply with proper structure, messing up the talk page.----137.132.22.190 (talk) 01:06, 4 August 2014 (UTC)

@137.132.22.191:. No. My experience is in aerospace and military related uses of the technology and in both primary and secondary technology. What I said is correct. What do you believe causes a rupturing cell to spontaneously burn instead of just leaking its component parts? In theory, a brand new battery (that is: one that has just rolled off the production line) should not spontaneously ignite as none of the constituent parts ignites on contact with oxygen (though in some cases, of course, electrical sparks can provide the ignition source if the cell is shorted during rupture). By the time a battery is placed in service, it is no longer new and enough metallic lithium has been produced that spontaneous combustion becomes possible.

I have deliberately destroyed plenty of batteries of all types and ages for the purposes of type approval in various uses (and so that the aerodrome fire department could assess fire fighting techniques). It is easy to tell if the flame has been produced by lithium because the initial flame colour will have the characteristic crimson to purple colour - this needs high speed photography because the flame takes on this colour anyway as the combustion proceeds. We also destroyed batteries in an argon atmosphere in order to eliminate this spontaneous combustion. Some cells still ignited due to sparking, and once the ignition had taken place, the cells certainly produced a fierce 'torching' flame. The only place the oxygen could come from is the cell itself. Spontaneous combustion becomes more likely as the cell becomes older (i.e. more metallic lithium is present).

I am aware of the FAA material on lithium battery fires and the advice that they provide. Based on our own experiences of attempting to extinguish burning batteries, those materials raised more than a few eyebrows when they first appeared. However, it seems likely that that material has been produced for the benefit of air crew and seems designed to reassure them that a burning battery can be dealt with. The best advice is not to tackle the burning battery itself but to attempt to extinguish anything around it that is burning (for which halon is ideal, but water can be used if appropriate. CO₂ is not generally recommended for anything other than electrical fires or burning liquids at a pinch - you can do more harm than good if the CO₂ discharge 'sprays' the liquid). Tackling the fire as a whole with halon will not affect the battery, but can contain the secondary fires in the time it takes for the battery itself to burn out. The battery will burn itself out relatively quickly, but it does produce a lot of heat. Any residual burning plastic parts will, of course, succumb to halon or water. It is this that that FAA material seems to be based on. Although, I am not aware of any current military uses of rechargeable lithium batteries, there are a number of civil aircraft that use such batteries (Boeing in particular seem to like them).

You may care to remember something which, at first sight, should not be the case, but from an engineering standpoint usually turns out to be accurate. In theory, everything should behave in practice exactly as theory predicts. In practice, nothing behaves anything like theory predicts. DieSwartzPunkt (talk) 16:16, 4 August 2014 (UTC)

Sony's "technical handbook" is not a good source

I contend that Sony's "Lithium Ion Rechargeable Batteries. Technical Handbook" is not a reliable source of information. The document is available from the direct link http://www.sony.com.cn/products/ed/battery/download.pdf

The document in question is assumed to be from Sony because the link is in the sony.cn (China) domain, but exactly how the link is accessed from sony.cn remains a mystery to me. Moreover, the document does not include authors, editors, publishing house, nor publishing date (its first page is just the title, and its second goes straight into the list of contents); at the end it lists world wide sales offices, although for some reason the office in Germany has a UK telephone number (starting with +44) instead of a German number (starting with +49).

It is also a primary source (made by Sony), and it does not provide a further list of references to verify its claims by third parties. I think the document may have been an internal document of Sony China that somehow is accessible to the outside web.

The document itself is not entirely wrong, it has factual information, and it is actually a very good summary of the operation of Li-ion cells, especially for people that know nothing about the topic. However, I think it is not a reliable source that we could use in Wikipedia.

In this article, this reference appears twice, and I think I've seen it in other articles dealing with batteries. It is very tempting to use this as a reference because the document is freely downloadable and because it's "published" by Sony. However, I would avoid it in lieu of an academic book that is much more reliable:

• van Schalkwijk, Walter A.; Scrosati, Bruno, eds. (2002). Advances in Lithium-ion batteries. Kluwer Academic Publishers. ISBN 0-306-47356-9.
• Yoshio, Masaki; Brodd, Ralph J.; Kozawa, Akiya, eds. (2009). Lithium-ion batteries. Springer. doi:10.1007/978-0-387-34445-4. ISBN 978-0-387-34444-7.
• Ozawa, Kazunori, ed. (2009). Lithium ion rechargeable batteries. Wiley-Vch Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA. ISBN 978-3-527-31983-1.

137.132.22.190 (talk) 05:35, 4 August 2014 (UTC)

Tag the reference as an 'unreliable source' and add a 'See talk page' for more info. I have to say that I am inclined to agree with you, but at least Sony must be regarded as having more credence than batteryuniversity.com. I B Wright (talk) 12:08, 5 August 2014 (UTC)

Memory effect in Li-ion cells

It is accepted that, unlike NiCd batteries, Li-ion cells don't have memory effect. Some researchers, however, discovered a memory effect in Li-ion cell using the LiFePO
₄ electrode. I propose we change the lede to read as follows:

They are one of the most popular types of rechargeable batteries for portable electronics, with a high energy density, no significant memory effect,<ref>While it is generally accepted that Li-ion cells don't have memory effect like [[NiCd]] or [[NiMH]] batteries do, researchers from Toyota and the Paul Scherrer Institute in Switzerland discovered a memory effect in Li-ion cells that use the {{chem|LiFePO|4}} electrode. Their results were published in 2013 and it's one of the few publications mentioning this effect for Li-ion cells at all. {{cite journal|last1=Sasaki |first1=Tsuyoshi |last2=Ukyo |first2=Yoshio |last3=Novák |first3=Petr |title=Memory effect in a lithium-ion battery |journal=Nature Materials |date=14 April 2013 |doi=10.1038/NMAT3623}}</ref> and...

I am including the reference to that claim, which is: Sasaki, Tsuyoshi; Ukyo, Yoshio; Novák, Petr (14 April 2013). "Memory effect in a lithium-ion battery". Nature Materials. doi:10.1038/NMAT3623.. I don't want to argue that the memory effect is absolutely present in Li-ion cells. But the fact that it was reported by some researchers, and the results were published in a peer-reviewed journal, deserves some mention. ----137.132.22.191 (talk) 00:02, 16 July 2014 (UTC)

Information of this sort is, of course, always welcome in any article. But it has to backed up with reliable sources. While you have cited what appears to be a scientific report into the issue, I (and probably many others) are unable to access the text of the report. Wikipedia discourages sources that have to paid for, but they can be used if nothing else is available. I carried out a search and have not been able to find this anywhere else, but this may be because it is a recent discovery. This brings us onto a more important issue. The reference that you have provided is a primary source. Wikipedia citation policy requires that this be backed up by a reliable secondary source (and this should be the reference provided in the article). If you can find one, then I would say: go ahead and add it to the article. It does not belong in the lede though without a mention in the main body of the article.

You might also wish to note that nickel-cadmium batteries do not exhibit any form of memory effect. Discussion at the nicket-cadmium talk page has suggested that it was invented by companies trying to sell nickel-metal hydride batteries. That may, or may not, be true, but it is very likely given that no one had heard of memory effect before nickel-metal hydride batteries appeared on the market. I B Wright (talk) 08:19, 16 July 2014 (UTC)

I B Wright: "no one had heard of memory effect before nickel-metal hydride batteries appeared on the market". I have nothing to say about the existence or not of the effect, but I am 100% sure that the idea that NiCd batteries suffered from a "memory effect" long predated NiMH. Pol098 (talk) 11:03, 14 October 2014 (UTC)

Primary or not, the provided citation is a self published source and not permitted (in that the paper has been produced by the authors themselves). A reliable authority backing up the claims is required. 109.149.156.7 (talk) 08:24, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

@I B Wright: I admit that this is a primary source. Still, I want to mention that according to WP:RS, "Material such as an article, book, monograph, or research paper that has been vetted by the scholarly community is regarded as reliable, where the material has been published in reputable peer-reviewed sources or by well-regarded academic presses." The source I provided is published in a reputable, peer-reviewed journal, Nature Materials. The fact that it is not freely accessible without a paid subscription is bad for the regular editor to verify the reference, I admit. However, I still think it is a reliable source, and there are many other editors who have access to the article and can verify its content.

@109.149.156.7: I must disagree with your statement that the source is WP:SELFPUB. It is a primary source, I admit, but it is not self-published. Self-published would be if the authors owned the journal or website, and thus, they could write whatever they wanted unopposed. The article is peer-reviewed, meaning at least the editorial board of the journal read it and accepted it based on scientific relevance. Had it been deemed not relevant, the article would not have been published.

Thank you both for the comments. I will not add this bit of information to the article at this moment, as there seems to be only little evidence on the claimed memory effect. However, I would like to keep the discussion open, so that if in the future more literature comes up we can consider adding the pertinent information to the article.----137.132.22.191 (talk) 23:57, 22 July 2014 (UTC)

If more information becomes available, then I would accept the material. I do not believe it is warranted at the present time. I am not convinced that 'nature materials' is as peer reviewed as you believe it to be. That they have accepted a paper for publication does not necessarily mean that the publication has scrutinised the paper for scientific accuracy. If I had produced such a paper, I can think of a lot better places to first publish it where it would have far more credence. I B Wright (talk) 12:03, 5 August 2014 (UTC)

Based on the article, it seems like memory effect manifests as a small bump in the charge/discharge curve after partial charge cycle. This article claims to be first of the sort investigating such effect, so naturally it is hard to find a different article. As of today no other article citing that one provides another evidence of memory effect in Li-ion cells. For the WP:RS though I am not a wiki expert many scientific WP entries I have seen cite journals like this; many people have access through their institutions and can confirm the validity of the claim. One might want to look at a summary in a public news site[1] Finally I do not agree that this source is WP:SELFPUB, it is a well respected peer-reviewed journal and on the contrary to the comment above, I actually cannot think of many better places to publish this kind of result than Nature Materials. If one has doubts about the peer review process of scientific journals I suggest it should be addressed at a higher level than a talk page of a single article. I say go ahead and add this piece of info, not particularly discouraged by the fact that this page is a mess already requiring a major cleanup. IdentityCrisis (talk) 18:16, 18 August 2014 (UTC)

Scope of the article

It's not clear to me what is the scope of the article: is it for all batteries in which Lithium ions are active or just those which use a negative Lithium cathode? Thus for instance is a Lithium sulphur battery included, and if not, why not?

Maybe the confusion arises because non-rechargeable lithium batteries have a lithium anode and the polarity was seen as the dividing line. I can see the reason for distinguishing the non-rechargeables but I'm not sure that polarity is the right distinction. Chris55 (talk) 12:07, 13 March 2015 (UTC)

Production

The article states that 18650 is by far the most common battery size, and refers to a page on battery nomenclature whihc makes no reference to 18650. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 202.27.54.3 (talk) 01:33, 8 June 2015 (UTC)

Battery Life

This section should explain why self-discharge is so much slower than closed-circuit discharge (why the lithium ions don't just drain the battery quickly when the battery is disconnected). Currently no Wikipedia page, or similar website, explains this, leading me to believe most people haven't thought about it or just don't know. Please prove me wrong.195.169.213.93 (talk) 15:45, 13 July 2013 (UTC)

The battery discharges when a negative electron is accumulated at the negative end of the electrical circuit and then is moved by the electrical potential to the positive cathode where it creates additional lithium ions and depletes the lithium ion charge capacity of the cathode materials. Without this circuit activity, there would be no incentive for further additional lithium ion creation and activity.WFPM (talk) 16:31, 25 July 2013 (UTC)

Just to clarify some errors that I believe exist in this rushed explanation:

• Electrons cannot accumulate in an electrical circuit; they can only accumulate as a static charge in dielectric materials, such as in capacitors. The reason is that electrons repel each other.
• Electrons cannot accumulate (I believe) at the cathode either, since the cathode and anode of batteries are conductive. Li ions, in contrast, can and do accumulate and/or move through the battery when it is under load or being recharged.
• Electrons cannot "create" lithium ions, ever. They are completely different fermions. A Li ion is a Li atom with a missing electron or two (I'm not sure which).
• Saying that cathode materials can be "depleted" is simplistic and incomplete.
• The phrase "circuit activity" is meaningless, and it is not even clear what is meant. There are two circuits in a Li ion battery, one of Li ions, which are massive, and one of electrons, which are light.
• Li ions are not created; they are transported, roughly similar;y to how lead is transported inside a car battery.

For the fuller and more nearly correct explanations, read the article. I suspect that complete explanations are protected as trade secrets by the battery companies. David Spector (talk) 22:53, 12 June 2015 (UTC)

Efficiency

The source paper cited for round trip efficiency of 80-90% was done on NiMH and NiCd cells. It seems like a bad source for information on Lithium cells. Paulwesterberg (talk) 01:14, 22 July 2015 (UTC)

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Battery Swelling

Nothing noteworthy. Coffee pouch battery types swell with a gas of some sort if left for months on end in a charged state. What is it doing? Is it dangerous? Could it affect SoC? Performance versus temps etc. etc. This wiki page needs more info!115.70.80.179 (talk) 20:17, 29 January 2016 (UTC)

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There is no mention of LiPo batteries

(This section originally included the topic below Talk:Lithium-ion_battery#Transport restrictions on Li-ion batteries but it was split in its own section for clarity.----137.132.22.190 (talk) 01:43, 4 August 2014 (UTC))

In this article about lithium ion batteries there is no mention of "lithium polymer" (LiPo) batteries. The latter are exactly the same as Li-ion, with the only difference being that they are in a pouch wrapping, instead of a cylindrical can or a metal container. I am trying to debunk the myth that somehow "LiPo" batteries are fundamentally different from "Li-ion", they are not. It is incorrect to say that "LiPo" is a separate chemistry, it is not. The moniker of "LiPo" is mainly used in the radio controlled model community, I presume due to early marketing. The article of LiPo should probably in the future redirect to lithium ion, but then this article should clearly explain that "LiPo" are the same as "Li-ion".----137.132.22.191 (talk) 09:33, 24 June 2014 (UTC)

This is not correct. As has been mentioned several times by other editors, Lithium Polymer and Lithium Ion may be the same at the chemical level: both use Lithium Ions as the charge carrier, but Lithium Ion batteries can have either a wet electrolyte or a solid polymer electrolyte. The "pouch" is only a variant of the "prismatic" battery form. This can be best understood with an analogy of the near cousin the capacitor. An electrolytic capacitor comes in 3 forms. The "jelly roll" form, the slug form and the multilayer form. The last also being the form for ceramic capacitors (aka MLCC, even if there is only 1 layer) and the middle the most common form for the Tantalum/Niobium capacitor. In this analogy, the jelly roll forms are identical in construction. The multilayer capacitor corresponds to the prismatic battery. In the electrolytic capacitor, solid polymer electrolytes have been developed and these are what a Lithium Polymer battery shares construction with. A standard wet electrolyte capacitor is what a standard Lithium Ion battery shares construction with. Prismatic batteries are shaped into geometric forms and use multilayer construction. A pouched battery is a rectangular prismatic battery in a looser pouch. 208.123.231.135 (talk) 21:23, 6 April 2016 (UTC)

There's two kinds of "LiPo" batteries. One kind uses a solid polymer electroylte, as you explained. This is arguably a "true" LiPo battery, but they've never been commercialized due to problems with charge/discharge rates. The pouch-style LiPo batteries you can actually buy off the shelf still use a wet electrolyte. Yes, these batteries have their cathodes and anodes stacked using prismatic construction rather than jelly roll construction (sort of; the anodes and cathodes are laminated in an alternating pattern on a thin piece of plastic which is then folded accordion style) but that doesn't make a difference other than form factor. It's not like we differentiate between 9v batteries with stacked rectangular cells and 9v batteries with cylindrical cells. --Skrapion (talk) 06:29, 7 April 2016 (UTC)

Link fixup

I found that the link for the reference How to rebuild a Li-Ion battery pack currently number 66, is no longer available on the given link but is available via the wayback machine but not from the most recent snapshots. I was able to find the, probably, intended link at: http://web.archive.org/web/20120101184353/http://www.electronics-lab.com/articles/Li_Ion_reconstruct/index.html which also included a link to download the article as a .pdf file: http://web.archive.org/web/20120103172408/http://www.electronics-lab.com/articles/Li_Ion_reconstruct/How%20to%20rebuild%20a%20Li-Ion%20pack.pdf

I am not clear how to fix this up - hoping someone else has the ability to do it. SlySven (talk) 23:21, 28 October 2016 (UTC)

Quick & dirty. :) Thanks! -Purgy (talk) 08:26, 29 October 2016 (UTC)

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Electrochemistry

The reaction under electrochemistry appears to come from a battery manufacturers data sheet that has been withdrawn and is currently linked to an extract from web archives. The style of chemical notation with "x-1" and x notation doesn't make a lot of sense and the reference isn't ideal. There also seems minor issues with the balancing of reaction.

There is an alternative reaction in course notes hosted by the University of Florida at http://www.naturaledgeproject.net/Documents/SLC/SLC%20Subject%20Supplement%20-%20Lesson%2012%20Final.doc that derive from a variety of organisations, including Griffith University, providing half cell and full reactions with primary references to textbooks. Although this source is promising, I'm not certain the site hosting the paper intends the content to be public, nor am I certain the copyright holder wishes this to be open on the web. I've taken the reaction provided, edited the Wikipedia article to comment out the original reaction and references and amend new reactions with references to the primary sources in the link. This would be in the spirit of a reference to the primary sources.

I've retained the original reference in a subsequent paragraph, where it seems to be more reliable.

Hopefully this passes independent scrutiny and enhances this article. (Peguin blue (talk) 11:02, 26 February 2017 (UTC))

Peguin blue, if you have a reasonable belief that the page cited may disappear at some point from the Internet, you should ensure that it is archived, and a link to the archived content also placed in the article (I didn't check the edits, so I'm not sure if this was done already). --Izno (talk) 19:52, 26 February 2017 (UTC)

Izno Hi; thanks for commenting Izno. I probably haven't articulated myself clearly. The issue is that I've found a secondary source (linked above) with simpler half cell reactions that trace back to two primary references. The primary references are books, so I've included these, with the reactions, in the main article. However the secondary reference looks like copyright material that may not have intentionally been made available freely on the web. If I initiate an archival of that secondary source, I may be compounding inadvertent release with copyright violation. The secondary source looks solid and its content citing primary sources should equally be solid. Those can be used in the main article, since they are textbooks. However, I'm not keen for Wikipedia to be known for exposing copyright material or initiating duplication of copyright material on its main pages. You can look at the secondary source in the link above to assess whether you agree with my assessment. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Peguin blue (talk • contribs) 09:57, 27 February 2017 (UTC)

Longer-term historical perspective, and projected futures

The article seems to have a lot of snapshot/current material, but the Historical section doesn't have good info on the energy density and power density of lithium-ion batteries over time. It seems to me that we would have a better article if this were improved.

Same breadth is missing on future projections of where this technology is, or can be, going. This article in Nature Energy is a good summary overview of the future work areas: Foundations for the future: Challenges remain in understanding battery processes that govern operation and limit performance,

Includes this, which might be helpful for improving the historical progress part of the problem:

Batteries store electricity in the form of chemical energy. Portable electronic devices, electrified transportation, and grid-scale applications require batteries that are environmentally benign, safe, possess high energy density and long cycle life, and consist of low-cost materials. The commercialization of rechargeable lithium-ion batteries in the early 1990s is regarded as the most significant milestone in the revival of battery technologies since their invention by Alessandro Volta at the end of the 18th century. Despite remarkable achievements in the development of lithium-ion batteries in recent decades, the speed of battery development remains rather incremental: over the past 25 years the energy density of commercial lithium-ion batteries has increased fairly linearly by just under a factor of four. State-of-the-art commercial lithium-ion batteries have an energy density of less than 300 Wh/kg, which falls short of the US Department of Energy's target of 400 Wh/kg by 2017.

—N2e (talk) 12:23, 6 October 2016 (UTC)

Future Developments

What's the policy for handling 'news' vs. 'main' issues? LIB is such a broad and active area, that there is always 'news' that could fall into many sections, or sometimes one event might be mentioned in many sections. It looks like this article is primarily for main, well established content and that 'news' should be handled separately.

I pushed the yasunaga Nov-2016 announcement to research.

I'm going to add text under 'Terminology' that redirects news to the main research article.

If there's a better/preferred way, let me know. I see a lot of activity in history, but not much chatter under talk, re news vs main stream policy. LarryLACa (talk) 21:47, 19 March 2017 (UTC)

Anodes

--Hi, would it be worth adding a new article on anode materials & development thereof. The section is not up to either scientific standard nor does it include the reasons for why we don't just use alloying materials like lithium. Ischariot ucl (talk) 02:02, 10 March 2017 (UTC) An article on anode materials for Li-ion batteries split into intercalation, conversion and alloying materials might make sense.

@Ischariot - I have partially addressed the issue of 'new development' by referencing Research in lithium-ion batteries in the main article, see also Future Developments. I think the Researc article is a reasonable place to focus news. From my limited exposure there is an unsurveyable wealth of variation of LIB design. Just last years articles on LIB nano tech alone exceeds the available effort to surface them in Wikipedia. Perhaps the Research section would be a good place to expand on variety. LarryLACa (talk) 06:02, 21 March 2017 (UTC)

@LarryLACa - Very valid points. It just feels fairly arbitrary what is included and what isn't as research, which I can live with in the research article, because as you rightly say there is an insurmountable wealth of it, but why pick out certain developments in the main article? Maybe just shift everything over to the research article. --Ischariot ucl (talk) 07:47, 5 April 2017 (UTC)

batteryuniversity.com

May I please ask for a source for discrediting batteryuniversity.com website? When and why and by whom has this been done?

I know of the other appearance of this reverted tag, and in no way I want to fight against this opinion, I just want to know, and a single revert appears to me as a cheap means to get to know. -Purgy (talk) 07:27, 24 November 2016 (UTC)

@Purgy Purgatorio: batteryuniversity.com is been generally discredited in most parts of the industry almost since its appearance (and there is no such organisation anyway). The web site certainly gives the appearance of being authoritative and unless you are in the know, most observers will believe it (and some equipment suppliers have erroneously included features to offset a non existent 'feature' claimed by the book and/or web site).

The website was created by one Isidor Buchmann with the sole intention of promoting his equally discredited book. Neither the web site nor the book have any backing from a recognised authority on lithium-ion batteries (Cadex International does not count as Buchmann is its CEO). They are both self published sources so they, and any derived source, is unacceptable to Wikipedia standards anyway. If you try to use batteryuniversity as a reference for a claim in an article you will find it is black listed. Buchmann wrote his book at a time when the battery manufacturers were very reluctant to give out any information about their batteries. Whenever there is an informational vacuum, charlatans spring up to fill the void. Buchmann did this by hoovering up every unproven 'fact' he could find on blogs, usenet and chat rooms and putting it in what appeared to be the only authoritative book at the time.

The how to rebuild a Li-ion battery pack document contains many pieces of information that were originally documented at batteryuniversity.com as did many other papers at the time. The nonsense about batteries lasting longer if kept at 40% charge rather than full charge came entirely from Buchmann, and has been denied by the battery manufacturers (and is demonstrably untrue). Indeed if Buchmann (and How to rebuild a Li-on battery pack) were to be believed, no lithium-ion battery pack could possibly last longer than two years. Buchmann came up with his unfounded 'facts' to explain why many laptop users required a new battery after about two years. The reality was that using them on battery every day meant that the charge/discharge life was used up in around two years (and that life was only 500-800 cycles in early batteries - there are 730 days in two years). There are no shortage of examples of much less used batteries that are well over twenty years old - something impossible according to Buchmann.

Buchmann was also responsible for the nonsense about laptop batteries' lives being shortened when left in a laptop running from AC. His claim was that the batteries were being overcharged (because AC was connected). If this was true then there would have been a lot of battery fires (because overcharging 'always' results in a battery fire). The reality was that the batteries were being heated up by the laptop's internal components (processor, hard drive, graphics processor etc.). Lithium-ion batteries do not like temperatures much above 25 Celcius (not the 45 Celcius Buchmann claims). Some laptops did not suffer this problem but only because the heat producing parts were away from the battery (not usually deliberately, but by the luck of the design)

By the way, I have worked with Lithium-ion battery powered systems for over 25 years and have access to much real information on these batteries, though much of it is under non-disclosure agreements for reasons that are unlikely to become clear. --Elektrik Fanne 13:55, 24 November 2016 (UTC)

Thank you for your ample and plausible explanation of your reasons to hold it as discredited. -Purgy (talk) 07:11, 25 November 2016 (UTC)

@Purgy Purgatorio: There was an exhaustive discussion on the subject at the time batteryuniversity was blacklisted. It is probably in an archive somewhere. May we restore the unreliable source tag? --Elektrik Fanne 13:49, 25 November 2016 (UTC)

Of course, please do to your preferences. I thought it were evident from my question that I do not object. Reverting my own edit is, according to my taste, not sufficiently sourced by explicit refs. :D Cheers! -Purgy (talk) 10:25, 26 November 2016 (UTC)

Older reference: /Archive_1#batteryuniversity.com. Ugog Nizdast (talk) 07:18, 3 February 2017 (UTC)

Conditioning

I came to the Wikipedia LIB page trying to find the truth about LIB DoD and SOC storage impacts on battery life (defined either as number of full discharge/charge cycles or lifetime A-h capacity). The page is extremely opaque on this. Given where we've been (see /Archive_1#batteryuniversity.com above), I've updated the conditioning section to note conditioning as unfounded. I know it needs a citation, but I'm erring on the side of being useful instead of formality. Sorry, but I think this is one of the points users want to see. LarryLACa (talk) 06:36, 21 March 2017 (UTC)

Well, thing is, conditioning with regards to batteries happens in the industry. Solid electrolyte interface formation and hence loss of Li-ions from the electrolyte would be detrimental to the cells, so this happens before the final cell is closed & filled with the electrolyte that is in the finished electrolyte. You are completely right that conditioning as in especially NiMH is not necessary.--Ischariot ucl (talk) 07:52, 5 April 2017 (UTC)

Theoretical maximum voltage from the chemistry

Like for article Alkaline battery it would be nice to have included the theoretical maximum voltage from the chemistry. --Mortense (talk) 09:33, 7 June 2017 (UTC)

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So called "low discharge," NiMH batteries

In this section; Lithium-ion_battery#Self-discharge, so called "low discharge," NiMH batteries are described as if they were the hot, new, rare technology, when in fact they are now the default type, and the older now obsolete high discharge NiMH batteries are not easy to find, —not the default as implied. As the reference to this old, now outdated impression of NiMH, a 13 year old cite is given. (There is a new NiMH chemistry on the market every six months.) The problem is; it is unfair, widespread, (and I suspect partly industry-motivated) to compare new Li-ion chemistry with obsolete NiMH chemistry. In context of the section and paragraph, one wonders why the older crap was even mentioned (as I suggested in my comment.).

Some manufacturers now brag of 1-year charge holding capacity and are attempting to encroach on the alkaline market. "Rayovac Rechargeable LD715-8OPA AA 1350mAh"..."Replaces Alkaline AA Cell."

The only old chemistry NiMH AA Batteries I cold find online were for original equipment replacement and for "solar [garden] lights." Inferior in every way, including price.

I corrected the article, immediately it was reverted. (Same-same in the NiMH article...hmmmmm)

Original Wiki said:

"For comparison, the self-discharge rate is over 30% per month for common nickel metal hydride (NiMH) batteries, dropping to about 1.25% per month for low self-discharge NiMH batteries, and 10% per month in nickel-cadmium batteries."

I changed to:

For comparison, the self-discharge rate is over 30% per month for older obsolete chemistry nickel metal hydride (NiMH) batteries, dropping to about 1.25% per month for common modern low self-discharge NiMH batteries, and 10% per month in nickel-cadmium batteries.

But I should have changed to:

For comparison, the self-discharge rate is  about 1.25% per month for common modern incorrect link: low self-discharge NiMH batteries, and 10% per month in nickel-cadmium batteries.

So called "low discharge," AA batteries are now to be expected; this site: https://www.gamut.com/p/duracell-battery-nimh-aa-battery-size-2400-mah-capacity-NzgwNjE=?utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&adpos=1o4&scid=scplp174K882&sc_intid=174K882&gclid=EAIaIQobChMIhNanrfzO1gIVhWp-Ch0T7w3iEAQYBCABEgJX9vD_BwE&gclsrc=aw.ds&dclid=CIz2mJP9ztYCFch9AQodYOUA6g does not even bother to mention they are "low discharge," however, they are: https://www.duracell.com/en-us/product/rechargeable-battery Soon, "low discharge," will be as dated as "talking" motion pictures, "color" TV, and "electric" toaster.

I intend to undue the revert. --2602:306:CFCE:1EE0:119B:90AC:21F7:9541 (talk) 12:09, 1 October 2017 (UTC)Doug Bashford

Wikipedia does not predict the future. You should not edit war, but find an article that reports the current position, then use that as a reference. I find that my NiMH cells discharge themselves. Some, but not all of them are cheap or old. Dbfirs 12:22, 1 October 2017 (UTC)

You may need a new charger: "An ideal charge rate is probably around 4-6 hours (for empty to full)." ...for AA.

I've been carrying three pairs of AA NiMH since 2003, one pair for my current camera, two as backup. If your batteries are 3-5 years old, yes that's discard time.
Welcome to the future: https://michaelbluejay.com/batteries/nimh-brands.html . Do you disagree with any of those specs? Some hold up to 85% charge after a year, 75% after three? Or this: "There's not much reason to get the normal NiMH's, since they're not any cheaper, and their capacity is only a little higher (2700 mAh for a normal NiMH vs. 2400 for a similarly-priced LSD NiMH)." (That's why the high-discharge are hard to find; simple economics.) ...Or dispute the 28 listed "good" brands that sell the modern NiMH's?

You write: "You should not edit war, but find an article that reports the current position." Edit war? I have yet to find anybody who disagrees with my proposed edits. The article itself agrees with my proposed edits. I cite that! ;) My problem, as I stated, is with the wording and what in modern, changed times looks like the opinion/insinuation/logic that Model T Fords are gutless, unreliable, and obsolete, and Model T Fords are the "common" kind, therefore Fords are crap. IE: Model T Fords should not be "compared" to Corvettes. IOW, what the hell do Model T Fords have to do with a modern article about cutting edge new cars? Put more politely for the gentle souls; the wording within the context of the modern marketplace is muddled and illogical and the paragraph seems self-contradictory.

If someone can can please explain exactly what the objection to my proposed edits are, I will try to reword or find a citation or six. If nobody can do that, I will improve the article as suggested for the reasons given.
--2602:306:CFCE:1EE0:119B:90AC:21F7:9541 (talk) 11:47, 3 October 2017 (UTC)Doug Bashford

You twice removed a reference without replacing it with a better one. That's why I advised you not to edit war. Sorry, I misread the edit -- you didn't remove the ref the first time. I agree that things have changed and my newer batteries don't self-discharge at the same rate as my older ones. I'm happy with the article as it now stands, except that we need an independent research reference, rather than manufacturers' claims. Dbfirs 06:48, 14 October 2017 (UTC)

References

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Ambiguous statement in section 10.2 Degradation

Section 10.2 contains the following text: "... increasing if stored or used at above or below 25 °C" Should that read "... increasing if stored or used at or above 25 °C" ? The following sentence seems to indicate that it is elevated temperatures that increase the degradation of batteries. 73.71.72.174 (talk) 01:24, 5 July 2018 (UTC) David Goodenough @ 73.71.72.174 , 18:24H PST 7/4/2018

The reference reports research showing that a different sort of degradation (lithium plating) occurs below 25C. I think you are correct that the main problem occurs with storage and use above 25C. Can anyone read the full reference to check our guess that only minor degradation occurs at lower temperatures? Dbfirs 06:19, 5 July 2018 (UTC)

Perhaps see my recent edit. Purgy (talk) 07:47, 5 July 2018 (UTC)

Yes, that's an improvement. I'd still like to know the exact details of the research, and why some people refrigerate batteries. Dbfirs 09:52, 5 July 2018 (UTC)

I suggest.

I suggest whoever confused LiMn₂O₄ with LiMnO₄ should go and have a nice cool drink of some H₂0₂! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.170.168.108 (talk) 09:40, 9 February 2019 (UTC)

Ned Godshall over-emphasis

@Ciscokid321: Your editing seems to be singularly focused on promoting the contributions of Ned Godshall, with undue repetition of his name, his thesis, his university, his patent, and such primary sources. You even omit the names of his co-authors and co-inventors in the text, and assign priority over other work going on at the same time. This would be much better if we wrote it more neutrally, preferably based on secondary sources. And if you are Ned Godshall, you should declare that WP:COI and let others decide how best to handle this. Dicklyon (talk) 01:54, 10 May 2019 (UTC)

@Ciscokid321: You've continued editing the article for over an hour after I pinged you to this discussion. I will now revert to before your contributions, and then maybe you'll join the discussion here. See WP:BRD. Dicklyon (talk) 14:07, 10 May 2019 (UTC)