ARPA-E held their annual Energy Innovation Summit in March in Washington, DC. This meeting draws nearly 1,800 energy innovators and industry experts to discuss the latest in energy related technologies. Nexceris’ Li-ion Tamer® off-gas monitoring technology was selected from a very competitive pool of new innovations to be highlighted as a cutting-edge technology that has led to strategic partnerships with the US Navy. You can watch the video below to learn more about how the Navy is using this game changing technology to enhance the safety of their lithium ion battery system. We would like to provide the same level of protection for your energy storage systems.
During this project, the project team was able to demonstrate the following:
- Early Warning – Lithium ion cells vent gas prior to thermal runaway. Detection of this vent gas can provide early warning that a cell is about to go into thermal runaway.
- Advanced System Diagnostic – The detection of cell off-gas is a unique indicator of cell faults which can precede indications from traditional temperature and voltage measurements without the need for physical contact or electrical interrogation of the cells.
- Failure Mitigation – When the off-gas signal is used to isolate the cell from charge and load it can stop the cell from going into thermal runaway.
Li-ion Tamer® off-gas monitoring systems were developed by Nexceris to provide enhanced safety for the Navy’s lithium ion energy storage systems by providing an early indication of cell faults before it goes into thermal runaway. The application of this technology was developed under an Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E) project.
Lithium ion batteries provide many recognized values including high power densities, low maintenance, and a variety of types to support both energy and power applications. These advantages are driving their implementation across many different industries including the military. However, there are still many concerns over the safety of large format lithium ion batteries. These concerns are magnified when battery fires could put personnel and property at risk. This need for safety and reliability is what is driving the US Navy to ensure that lithium ion battery installations onboard ships are properly protected from battery failures.