Background on InnoVentum and ADB (Asian Development Bank) InnoVentum is striving to give Power to the People by making renewable energy affordable and available. • 1.6 billion people have no access to electricity at all. To start with, InnoVentum is targeting “island economies” like the Philippines, the Maldives and Sri Lanka where most energy today is produced by diesel and gasoline generators. • InnoVentum is offering a typhoon-resilient solar-wind hybrid solution called the Dali PowerTower and this needs a battery back-up. • Most human aid organisations today require significant capacity – amounting to 30 kWh per set – and modern Li- Ion Battery (LIB) technology, but expect lowest possible LCOE (Levelised Cost of Energy) and best possible sustainability/LCA. • InnoVentum is using iKnow-Who to organise a collaborative University Competition

1. INNOVENTUM
Li-Ion Battery Breakthrough
For Better Sustainability,
Durability and Affordability
Briefing Material by
Sigvald@innoventum.se
Marcus@innoventum.se
Ala@innoventum.se

2. Background on InnoVentum and ADB
(Asian Development Bank)
• InnoVentum is striving to give Power to the People by
making renewable energy affordable and available.
• 1.6 billion people have no access to electricity at all. To start
with, InnoVentum is targeting “island economies” like the
Philippines, the Maldives and Sri Lanka where most energy
today is produced by diesel and gasoline generators.
• InnoVentum is offering a typhoon-resilient solar-wind hybrid
solution called the Dali PowerTower and this needs a battery
back-up.
• Most human aid organisations today require significant
capacity – amounting to 30 kWh per set – and modern Li-
Ion Battery (LIB) technology, but expect lowest possible
LCOE (Levelised Cost of Energy) and best possible
sustainability/LCA.
• InnoVentum is using iKnow-Who to organise a collaborative
University Competition
Dali PowerTower in the Philippines

3. 3© www.iknow-who.com
Background on www.iknow-who.com with twenty
Breakthrough Innovations made with some of the
World’s Industry Leaders
• Setting a new standard for
digital writing (2003) • Cutting ammonia emissions
by 95% (2008)
• Solving the Locking-Pin
Challenge (2006)
• Developing revolutionizing
Downstream Equipment at
half COGS (2007)
• Breakthroughs in
Functional Foods (2001)
• Porsche’s Ceramic Brake
System (2001)
• New manufacturing method for
Porsche’s lightweight carbon-
reinforced body parts (2004)
• Project insights published in
Harvard Business Review:
http://hbr.org/2005/12/bringing-
the-college-inside/ar/pr
• New Crowdsourcing
System (2004-2006)
• Doubling both flexural
strength and fracture
toughness while enhancing
translucency (2011)
• The World’s first carbon
negative wooden towers for
small scale wind turbines
(2006-09)
• The World’s first hybrid wind
and PV solution in renewable
materials (2012-13)
• Developing a new
napkin folding machine
(2008-10)
Dental Ceramics
Company
• Rare-earth material
Replacement (2012)
• Breakthrough Polymer
without any emissions
(2012)
• Enhancing lifetime of the carbon strips (2010)
• Inductive Contactless Power Transmission
(2011)
• Business model innovation to Commercialize
the Inductive Primove Technology (2011)
• Cutting Energy
Consumption and CO2
Emissions by 50% (2013-
ongoing)
• The new ICEpower conversion
module for audio applications
(1999) cutting energy consumption
by 90%

4. Technical Specifications/Performance
Requirements by ADB
• Nº Cycles 5000 with 80% DoD
• IP50
• Electrical data: Un = 48 V, capacity 27.5 kWh/set
• PN 13 kW/set
• Pmax 16 kW/set
• Total capacity of the two sets 55 kWh
• Weight – not important
• Volume – not important
• Operating Temperature between 0°C and 30°C

5. Commercial Li-ion electrodes
Energy
Power
Safety
Performance
Life span
Cost
Nickel cobalt aluminium (NCA)
Energy
Power
Safety
Performance
Life span
Cost
Nickel manganese cobalt (NMC)
Energy
Power
Safety
Performance
Life span
Cost
Manganese oxide (LMO)
Energy
Power
Safety
Performance
Life span
Cost
Iron phosphate (LFP)
Energy
Power
Safety
Performance
Life span
Cost
Titanate (LTO)
Energy
Power
Safety
Performance
Life span
Cost
Cobalt oxide (LCO)

6. Background on the Breakthrough Approach
• To perform extreme technology breakthroughs, InnoVentum relies a technology
development company, iKnow-Who.com, founded in 2001 by Prof. Dr. Dr. Sigvald Harryson
• iKnow-Who.com has solved 20 extreme technology challenges for a large number of
Fortune 100 companies and some Fortune 500 companies
• The approach used is to select and coach 4-5 university teams to compete to solve the
challenge. Although the teams compete, the approach brings the teams into different modes
of collaboration so that they learn from each other’s solutions
Dali PowerTower in the Philippines
• To create LIBs that are affordable, durable and sustainable, we
are planning for Challenge number 21 in collaboration with
university teams from
• Lund, Sweden
• Göteborg (Chalmers), Sweden
• Nanjing and potentially Peking University from China

7. Challenge Description
• Find the best LIB solutions (in terms of deep-cycling capability, cost
and sustainability) that are suitable for renewable energy applications
Steps:
1. Analyse solutions used today (state-of-the-art).
2. Think about possible improvements of the existing technologies.
- Costly, rare and toxic materials need to find affordable, available and sustainable
substitutes.
- Most likely, new applications of nanomaterials can take LIBs to new levels, but the challenge
is to find out which nanomaterials and how to apply them.
3. The improved solution should be possible to produce in current LIB
manufacturing processes – or else time to market will be too long.

8. Framing the
Goals of the
Competition
Intelligence to
Select the Best
University
Teams
Kick-Off +
Coaching to
Build Initial
Concepts
Concept
Creation and
Mid-term Review
Concept
Consolidation,
Completion
and Feedback
Hundreds of
Ideas and
Possible
Approaches
5-15 Initial
Concepts
Hand over
of Finally
Selected
Solution
3-6 Business
Cases
Coaching of the University Teams – Throughout the
Collaborative Competition
Final Product Formulations,
Laboratory Material
and Test Data
Final Review,
Concept
Evaluation and
Patent
Protection
Strategic
Framework with
Clear Selection
Criteria
Module I + II Module III Module IV Module V Module VI
Typical Steps in a Collaborative University Competition
– Timeline 6-8 months depending on complexity and university schedules

9. Example of a University Team participating in a
Collaborative University Competition
! One Professor focused
on Advanced Materials
! One Associate
Professor focused on
Material Science
! Two PhD students
! Eight Master Students
doing their final year
project work, who take
the opportunity to
focus their project on
Challenge – while
getting intensive
coaching from the
Professors and the
iKnow-Who.com
coaches

10. 10© www.iknow-who.com
Example of Possible Breakthrough Approaches (I)
! Cathode in Si-based carbon materials reaching 4200 mAh/g in theory. Cheap and
environmentally friendly, BUT exposed to volume effects. Finding new ways to prevent/
reduce the volume effects can be a potential breakthrough
! Nitrogen doped graphene as cathode
! Parylene = thin film produced through chemical vapor deposition. Poly-p-xylene.
Excellent membrane to separate anode and cathode

11. 11© www.iknow-who.com
Example of Possible Breakthrough Approaches (II)
! Silicon-Anode: As silicon has a high specific capacity and a low discharge potential, it is an
interesting alternative for the LiB anode, since the usual anodes present lower capacities. On
the other hand, silicon is unstable during charge/discharge cycles and a well-known problem is
that its volume changes radically. That leads to pulverisation of the material, which decreases
the number of cycles. The team is developing an approach using silicon nanowires to handle
the volume changes and thereby avoid pulverisation.
! Nanoparticle Cathode: For the cathode material the idea is to find a material that is
compatible with the silicon anode and the electrolyte. Possible solution is the use of
nanoparticles in the existing cathodes. Nanoparticles were chosen since their microscaled
agglomerates and composites result in minimal diffusion path lengths through the slow
diffusion phases. The team keeps a strong focus on packing density to maximise active
material content.

12. Anode: Silicon, Silicon Oxide (SiO2)
Advantages
• Very high specific energy
• Fast charge
Disadvantages
• Volume expansion of 400%
• Durability
Breakthrough opportunities
• Silicon has one of the highest theoretic specific energy capacities for
Lithium Ion technology (10x improvement over graphite). Volume
expansion associated with its structure compromises life cycle. Hybrid
materials with silicon and carbon has been gaining a lot of attention in
the last few years.

13. Nano Technology for the Anode
• Titanium dioxide: In 2014, researchers at Nanyang Technological University used titanium
dioxide in an anode and achieved 10,000 charging cycles. The battery can be charged to 70%
in two minutes. They used a gel material made from titanium dioxide, an abundant, cheap
and safe material found in soil. They developed a simple method to turn naturally spherical
titanium dioxide particles into nanotubes. This nanostructure sped up the charging reaction.
• Carbon nanotube: In 2014, researchers at University of California, Riverside developed a
battery that charges up to 16 times faster with 60% additional energy density. They use a
three-dimensional, cone-shaped cluster of carbon nanotubes. That same year, researchers at
Northwestern University found that metallic single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWCNTs)
accommodate lithium much more efficiently than their semiconducting counterparts.
• Nanowire: In 2007, researchers at Stanford University invented the nanowire battery, which
improved battery performance. It uses nanowires to increase the surface area of one or both
electrodes. Both replace the traditional graphite anode.
• Nanopourous Nickel-fluoride: In 2014, researchers at Rice University announced a method
to create a flexible, long-lasting battery. They used nanoporous nickel(II) fluoride electrodes
layered around a solid electrolyte without using lithium. The device retained 76% of its
energy density after 10,000 charge-discharge cycles and 1,000 bending cycles.

14. Innovation: Cathode
Existing materials can be used in novel structures. A123 Systems has developed a
nanostructured LFP electrode that promises increased power and longevity.
Lithium vanadium phosphate (LVP) has been suggested as a potential future material
for the positive electrode. Vanadium phosphates share advantages with iron
phospates (LFP) such as high safety and long life. Commercial development is aiming
to increase charge rate and decrease cost.
Addition of graphene nanosheets to positive electrodes can improve rate capability
and cyclability.
Nanophosphate® structure (A123 Systems)

15. Nano Technology for the Cathode
• Nanophosphate: In 2012, researchers at A123 developed a battery that operates in extreme
temperatures without the need for thermal management material. It went through 2,000 full
charge-discharge cycles at 45 C while maintaining over 90% energy density. It does this using
a nanophosphate positive electrode.
• Three-dimensional nanostructure: In 2011, researchers at University of Illinois at Urbana-
Champaign discovered that wrapping a thin film into a three-dimensional nanostructure can
decrease charge time by a factor of 10 to 100. The technology is also capable of delivering a
higher voltage output. In 2013, the team improved the microbattery design, delivering 30
times the energy density 1,000x faster charging. The technology also delivers better power
density than supercapacitors. The device achieved a power density of 7.4 W/cm2/mm.
• Nanosized Balls of Lithium iron phosphate: In 2009, scientists at Massachusetts Institute of
Technology created nanoball batteries that increased charge rates 100 times. They are
capable of a 10 second re-charge of a cell phone battery and a 5 minute re-charge of an
electric car battery. The cathode is composed of nanosized balls of lithium iron phosphate.
The rapid charging is because the nanoballs transmit electrons to the surface of the cathode
at a much higher rate. The batteries have also shown higher energy density, power density
and cycle durability.

16. Innovation: Reducing Complexity and Cost
Standard NCA cell vs.Tesla cell
US Patent US20100136421
The battery packs powering electric vehicles fromTesla Motors are assemblies of 7000
standard cylindrical cells from Panasonic (NCA, 3100 mAh). It is estimated that the
production cost of aTesla battery packs is lower than $200/kWh.The key to achieving this
price point was reduction of cell complexity by removal of redundant cell safety
mechanisms and instead implementing management on battery pack level. The process
reduces cell production cost but requires more sophisticated engineering design to
guarantee hazard containment.

17. Example of Old and New Breakthrough Approach
! Focus on the Cathode, Using Graphene instead of Graphite. The surface is a
nanomaterial with better properties; The key lab of soft chemistry and functional
materials has made graphene for several years; Contacts to companies that can
produce graphene appr 30 minutes away from university;
! The solution is as green as graphite; The graphene can also be used as conductive
material in coating and hybrid materials

18. Bio-Organic Fast Charging Batteries – Still
Part of LIB?
• Battery technology based on explorations
into self-assembled nanodots (nano-crystals)
of biological origin improves the charging
time enormously: the green material used
to create the battery flash charges in 30
seconds and provides extended battery
lifetime.
• The bio-organic nano-crystal technology is
seen as a sustainable solution that can
replace current lithium-ion batteries.
• The technology is expected to reach
commercial maturity by 2016.

19. 19© www.iknow-who.com
! Customer Attractiveness
! Business Fit
Challenge Evaluation Criteria

20. 20© www.iknow-who.com
Customer Attractiveness, Criterion I
X1: Durability in terms of number of cycles at 80% DoD (Depth of Discharge)
! 5000+ cycles = 5
! 4000 – 4999 = 4
! 3000 – 3999 = 3
! 1000 – 2999 = 2
! Less than 1000 = 1
Weight of the criterion in evaluation = 40%

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Customer Attractiveness, Criterion II
X2: Power Performance: Speed of Charge Release
! 2000+ W/kg power performance (on cell level) = 5
! 1000 – 1999 W/kg = 4
! 500 – 999 W/kg = 3
! 300 – 499 W/kg = 2
! Less than 300 W/kg = 1
Weight of the criterion in evaluation = 20%

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Customer Attractiveness, Criterion III
X3: Affordability: Cost per kWh
NB: Considering cost of kWh for battery (not cell) manufacturing
! Less than 200 $ per kWh = 5
! 201 – 300 $ per kWh = 4
! 301 – 400 $ per kWh = 3
! 401 – 599 $ per kWh = 2
! More than 600 $ per kWh = 1
Weight of the criterion in evaluation = 40%

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Business Fit, Criterion I
Y1: Implementation Time
! Existing technology, mass manufacturing = 5
! Existing technology, small-scale manufacturing = 4
! Developing technology, lab manufacturing = 3
! Developing technology, convincing experiments = 2
! Developing technology, conceptual phase = 1
Weight of the criterion in evaluation = 30%

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Business Fit, Criterion II
Y2: Sustainability
NB: Concentration by weight
! No harmful or rare materials used, very high recyclability = 5
! No harmful materials, minimal amounts of rare elements, high recyclability = 4
! Limited use of harmful or rare materials, recyclability around 50% = 3
! Limited use of harmful or rare materials, recyclability around 30% = 2
! Considerable use of harmful or rare materials = 1
Weight of the criterion in evaluation = 30%

25. 25© www.iknow-who.com
Business Fit, Criterion III
Y3: Patentability
! Technology is novel, one or more patents are possible, freedom to operate = 5
! Technology is known (not patentable), but there is freedom to operate = 4
! Technology is novel, one or more patents are possible,
but no freedom to operate = 3
! Technology is known, patentable discoveries are possible
with further research = 2
! Technology is known and heavily patented,
no freedom to operate = 1
Weight of the criterion in evaluation = 40%

26. 26© www.iknow-who.com
Assessment and Evaluation Criteria Overview
Challenge Criteria and Weights
Asia contact: Jeff Gallagher Pronto Concepts Hong Kong Ltd. jeff@prontochina.com +852 6285 0607