In recent years, due to the advantages of high energy density and long service life of lithium batteries, more and more people choose to replace lead-acid batteries with lithium batteries. However, people tend to focus on its price when buying lithium batteries.
1. Cost of lithium battery
Compared with previous years, the cost of lithium batteries has decreased significantly. At present, the price of lithium battery is about 130 dollars per 1KWh. However, the specific price is also related to the brand, capacity and quality of lithium batteries.
2. Reasons for the high cost of lithium battery
Expensive materials
In the production of lithium batteries, lithium, manganese, cobalt and other materials required for anode materials are expensive and the price will fluctuate with the market supply. Moreover, cathode materials (generally graphite), diaphragm (polypropylene, polyethylene, etc.), electrolyte (lithium salt, organic solvents, etc.) and other manufacturing materials are also essential, and they all determine the cost. In recent years, however, the cost of lithium batteries has fallen due to the decline in the price of lithium carbonate and other materials.
Battery pack system
Lithium batteries must be equipped with a BMS (Battery Management System), which contains a pre-discharge branch circuit to prevent short circuits, in addition to the SOC estimation feature, which estimates the power more accurately. It can monitor the battery status in real time, detecting the battery voltage, current, etc., and can prevent overcharging or over-discharging from affecting the battery. In addition to this, the battery pack system has to be installed with connectors, relays, cooling systems and other devices, making lithium batteries costly to manufacture.
Complex production process
Lithium batteries in the production of stirring, stacking, slitting, collector and output terminal welding, encapsulation, liquid injection and other steps, the production process is complex, requires the use of a lot of manpower and material resources, which will increase production costs.
Inspection
After the production of lithium batteries, a series of inspections should be carried out, such as the inspection of insulation resistance of the battery cell, the inspection of welding quality between parts, and the inspection of voltage and temperature during charging and discharging of the battery, etc.
The inspection should be carried out on the positive and negative poles of the battery cell. For the resistance between the positive and negative poles of the cell and the resistance between the electrode and the outside, we can choose to use the battery insulation resistance tester, automatic insulation tester and other equipment. All these checks will increase the cost of lithium battery production.
Testing and Certification
Lithium batteries need some tests after manufacturing. Lithium battery core should be UL1642 test, and for the safety test of lithium battery, it should also meet the UN38.3 standard certification, UL62133 certification and so on. These certification tests mainly detect whether the battery has some safety hazards, including thermal runaway, short circuit and other conditions. Testing and certification expenses also increase the cost of lithium batteries.
3. How to reduce the cost of lithium batteries
(1) In the production of lithium batteries, minimize the use of materials to reduce the cost of raw materials in the case of little impact on battery performance;
(2) Looking for alternative materials, the production of lithium batteries need some expensive materials to replace other cheaper and performance does not have much impact on the material;
(3) Recycling of old lithium batteries, from which some recyclable materials are reused.
Conclusion
Although lithium batteries are more expensive to manufacture, they are a very good choice in terms of performance, and prices are likely to decrease in the future as the lithium battery market expands.
