If you’ve been paying attention to the debate about lithium-ion battery materials, then you will know there is a price problem with lithium, but the real market danger is with cobalt.
While experts doubt that cobalt scarcity will halt the growth of the lithium-ion battery business, demand for the metal is affecting battery markets and increasing the Democratic Republic of the Congo’s stranglehold on supplies.
To the uninitiated, this might seem like a major threat to the lithium-ion energy storage business. But it’s not, for the simple reason that not all lithium-ion batteries need cobalt.
Lithium iron phosphate (LFP), lithium manganese oxide (LMO) and lithium titanate (LTO) batteries are cobalt-free.
The catch is that their energy density is lower than that of lithium nickel manganese cobalt oxide (NMC) or lithium nickel cobalt aluminum oxide (NCA) chemistries.
This can make LFP, LMO and LTO batteries somewhat limited for use in electric vehicles, although these chemistries are still touted for use in vehicle electrification, sometimes combined with other ingredients.
Despite their lower energy density, LFP batteries “are definitely safer and offer a cycle life similar to the more common NMC batteries,” said Mitalee Gupta, energy storage analyst with GTM Research.
Plus, they also work for stationary storage and there are many companies that can supply them. Here are 11 to watch.
AESC
Nissan and NEC’s Automotive Energy Supply Corporation makes combined LMO-lithium nickel oxide cells. But the company has been in the news this month after a planned sale of the joint venture to Chinese investment fund GSR Capital fell through. GSR Capital had not been able to find the $903 million needed for the deal, reports said.
BYD
The Chinese coaches-to-storage giant BYD has a line of NMC products for its electric vehicle business but “right now is one of the biggest LFP players in the storage market,” according to Gupta. Last month it unveiled plans for a new Chinese plant with 24 gigawatt-hours of production capacity a year, as part of a road map to reach 60 gigawatt-hours by 2020.
CALB
Like BYD, the China Aviation Lithium Battery Co. makes LFP and NMC lithium-ion batteries. It was the tenth-largest supplier of electric bus batteries in China last year, Chinese data shows.
CATL
Contemporary Amperex Technology Co. Ltd is also following a similar path to BYD. Following a wildly successful IPO, the Chinese company is preparing to set up new manufacturing plants in China and Germany. Like CALB, CATL makes both LFP and NMC batteries for the electric bus market.
Conamix
Ithaca, New York startup Conamix has been cagey about its cobalt-free lithium-ion battery technology. And the air of mystery seems to have paid off, with the company last month raising an estimated $2 million in Series A funding from backers including Volta Energy Technologies, a funding plataform for energy technology backed by Exelon and other strategic partners.
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