Testing of a 1.2kWh lithium-sulfur battery for E-scooter applications is set to start in China using UK firm OXIS Energy’s technology.
The company, along with Danish battery management firm LiTHIUM BALANCE, expects the first prototype battery to be completed and integrated into a scooter early next month.
Oxis initially plans to produce at least 10 demonstrator batteries for 10 scooters, which will be tested by Chinese companies and Lithium Balance, a spokesman told BBB.
A commercial roll-out of the technology has been penciled in for the beginning of Spring 2018 depending on the test results, with the E-scooter being manufactured in China.
“The current range of a lead acid battery is 37km at a constant speed,” the spokesman said. Adding: “We estimate that the range of the lithium-sulfur battery will be about 50km on the same constant speed setting.”
Currently 98% of China’s estimated 30 million E-scooters use lead-acid with the remaining 2% using lithium-ion.
The current prototype battery uses 10Ah OXIS Long Life cells. The next stage will be to build a second prototype using an improved long life chemistry up to 20Ah to increase the battery’s capacity at a reduced weight.
The timescale for this second phase is fourth quarter of 2016, say OXIS.
OXIS CEO Huw Hampson-Jones, told BBB: “There are three distinct advantages in the use of lithium-sulfur batteries compared to lithium-ion and lead-acid.
“The first is the capacity to store much greater amounts of energy, which allows the vehicles to travel over longer distances on a single charge. Secondly, these longer journeys can be undertaken safely without endangering the passengers and the community. Thirdly, unlike lead-acid and lithium-ion, OXIS lithium-sulfur is benign to the environment, it has no toxic or cancerous compounds which pollute the earth when the batteries are disposed at the end of life.”
Oxis has recently invested £2million ($2.27million) into new processes and production machinery in preparation for mass production of lithium-sulfur cell technology.
