Y. Preger, V. De Angelis
Sandia National Labs,
United States
Keywords: energy storage, data, modeling
Summary:
The growing demand for rechargeable batteries has inspired the development of new battery technologies that show significant promise in laboratory prototypes, but struggle to scale up and reach the performance needed for commercial products. In fact, the process of scaling up and integrating emerging technologies from lab prototypes into commercial products has traditionally taken a decade or longer. Battery Technology progresses from lab prototypes, to manufacturing, and to systems. Data collected at every step can inform the development of other steps. For example, data from systems in the field can be used to quantify battery-to-battery variation and optimize manufacturing processes. System data can also be used to develop accelerated protocols to validate performance before batteries are mass-produced. Finally, the comparison of material characterization and battery testing data can be used to optimize materials and fabrication before large investments in manufacturing plants are made. However, these feedback loops cannot occur if the data is not all accessible in one place. To address the problem, an open-source Battery Lifecycle Framework (BLC) has been developed. The BLC can be used to track battery data through its full lifecycle from materials to systems. BLC is currently implemented in two configurations. In one implementation, BLC is used to track data from the lab to the field. In a second implementation, the framework is used to build and maintain an online repository of cell testing data at www.BatteryArchive.org. The site was launched in September 2020 and exceeded 5,000 users. The site was created as a public repository for easy visualization, analysis, and comparison of battery degradation data across institutions. BLC is built using open-source tools that are standard in the software industry and have not yet been adopted by the scientific and battery community. In addition to tools to import, validate, and visualize data, the BLC contains a library of analysis tools that can be used to predict battery aging and use the information to optimally operate battery systems in the field. In the presentation, the foundation of the open-source software and its applications will be presented with specific use cases. The objective of BLC is to offers tools that the battery community can use to accelerate technology development.