Unlocking the value in second-life electric vehicle batteries

With global electric vehicle (EV) sales hitting 4 million this summer, increasing attention has been paid to the end-of-life issues of EV batteries. Recycling the batteries to recover the raw materials seems to be the default solution. However, after their first life as powertrain for electric cars, the batteries could still hold 70-80% of their initial capacity which can be further utilised in second-life applications such as stationary energy storage before being recycled. More and more companies across the automotive and energy sectors are now seeking solutions to unlock more value within second-life EV batteries.

 

Given the increasing importance of this topic, IDTechEx will be opening a special session on second-life EV batteries, which is the world's first dedicated conference session on this topic, as part of the event Electric Vehicles: Everything is Changing, USA 2018 at Santa Clara Convention Center, CA, USA. We will have speakers around the world to share their latest insights and experience in how they generate value from second-life batteries across various energy storage applications.

 

FreeWire Technologies is a Californian start-up company which is also the world's first company to use second-life batteries in commercialised products. FreeWire offers EV charging solutions and mobile distributed power through the product Mobi which uses second-life EV batteries to reduce the cost. The CEO of FreeWire will be speaking at this event Electric Vehicles: Everything is Changing, USA 2018 to share their experience in developing the mobile energy storage in delivering EV charging to consumers while effectively integrating demand into the grid.

 

Japanese energy storage company CONNEXX SYSTEMS has been testing the feasibility of second-life EV batteries in stationary energy storage systems with solar power generation in India. By using low-cost second-life batteries, CONNEXX aims to reduce the cost of energy storage to smooth renewable integration with the grid. We will have the CEO of CONNEXX SYSTEMS speaking at the event to share the latest progress on their second-life battery project at a solar farm in India.

 

London-based start-up Aceleron tests and grades used batteries from consumer electronics, EVs as well as medical devices for reuse and resale as certified second-life batteries. Aceleron develops the technology to test the battery quickly and identify the right applications for those batteries. The company also designs and builds serviceable lithium-ion battery packs that customers buy once and can reuse them for as long as they like. The

 

COO and CFO of Aceleron will be giving a talk at our event to introduce how they extract value from second-life batteries.

 

One of the widely discussed challenges for second-life batteries is the uncertainty of their degradation during second-life. To evaluate second-life degradation will require historical data of the battery during their first life in EVs. With onboard battery usage data available, the cost of testing second-life batteries could be significantly reduced. Battery management technology company Dukosi develops cell-level intelligence to optimise battery lifetime, monitoring and increasing the chance for second-life use. The company's cell management systems (CMS) records the battery usage data at the cell level so that at the end of their first life in EVs the CMS will provide a 'CV' of each battery cell thereby reducing or even avoiding the cost for testing second-life batteries. We are delighted to have the CTO of Dukosi to talk about what data can be kept, what it might signify and how it can be used to increase second-life value.

 

If you would like to learn more about innovative solutions for second-life batteries in industrial implementations, be sure not to miss the second-life battery session in our next leading event on the topic: Electric Vehicles: Everything is Changing, USA 2018 on 14-15th Nov 2018 at Santa Clara Convention Center, CA, USA, hosted by IDTechEx.