
The British-based HPP has built one of the greatest internal-combustion engines ever constructed – the 1.6-litre turbocharged V6 found in the back of Lewis Hamilton’s F1 car. Last year the hybrid unit maxed out at 756kW. . Linked to the EQXX’s battery pack is a single 150kW electric motor mounted on the rear axle. It is based on the same eATS unit found in the EQA and EQB. However, it too has. . Air isn’t the only earthly element playing its part in the EQXX, with the sun also assisting thanks to 117 solar panels fitted to the roof. They feed a 12V system to power many of the car’s. . An American start-up Our Next Energy (ONE) has built a prototype battery for a Tesla Model Sthat beats the total claimed range of the EQXX by 200. [pdf]
Yup, the world has come full circle, and air-cooled batteries are about to come into vogue. The core reason for using air instead of liquid to cool the battery is to minimise weight and, importantly, reduce the number of parasitic systems drawing power away from the business of propelling the vehicle.
Electric car batteries need to be cooled at high outside temperatures, to keep them within the optimum temperature range. (Photo: Adobe Stock) This is because of the composition of the cells in the battery, which are a chemical mixture of lithium, cobalt or nickel, graphite, copper, and aluminium.
The battery is cooled by one or more cooling plates through which the coolant flows. The coolant heats up and transfers the heat to another fluid in a heat exchanger. At low ambient temperatures and low cooling capacity, the heat can be transferred to the ambient air via an ambient heat exchanger in the front end of the vehicle.
Batteries, like combustion engines, need to be cooled when operating. Traditionally this is done with liquid. The prevailing method of battery cooling is a ‘jacket’ which encases the entire unit and pumps liquid around it to keep temperatures in check.
Considering the specific requirements of cost and car space, air-cooled heat dissipation is generally regarded as the first choice for electric vehicle battery heat dissipation. The Toyota Prius battery pack uses parallel ventilation air cooling as suggested by Pesaran et al.
Battery cooling is part of the vehicle's Battery Thermal Management System (BTMS). The BTMS includes the cooling and heating module, as well as the operating strategy, control system and thermal management software.

Essentially, the relaxation of the planning rules means that battery storage projects above 50MW in England, and 350MW in Wales can now go ahead without needing to be approved through the national planning regime. The planning regime previously treated storage projects as ‘energy generation’ where projects over. . It means that most electricity storage projects, with the exception of pumped hydro schemes, can be determined through the Town and Country Planning Act, by local planning. . Previously, many developers sought to limit projects to 50MW to avoid the lengthy NSIP process, which also impacts on generation projects that are to be co-located with the storage.. . PWA Planning has a dedicated energy planningteam that can provide a wide range of services to providers looking to progress planning applications. . For developers, investors and landowners, this is great news, and we would encourage them to speak to their planning consultants and other. [pdf]
DEFRA is planning to bring battery energy storage systems (BESS) into the environmental permitting regime. However, some operators may be unaware that they may be subject to it already, putting themselves in potential legal jeopardy.
Planning law in the UK has been changed to allow energy storage projects over 50MW to come on line without going through the national planning process. This could pave the way for a major expansion of battery storage facilities across our towns and cities, to support green energy use in new builds and to balance our energy demand.
The changes to planning legislation for larger energy storage projects were first announced back in October 2019 to allow planning applications to be determined without going through the Nationally Significant Infrastructure Project (NSIP) process.
Energy companies and battery storage developers in the UK can now bypass the national planning process when developing large scale energy storage projects, thanks to a recent change in the law.
In July, ministers passed secondary legislation that will allow battery storage to bypass the Nationally Significant Infrastructure Project (NSIP) process in Britain. This means storage projects above 50MW in England and 350MW in Wales to proceed without approval through the national planning regime.
The Environment Agency, which reports to Defra, wrote a summary of environmental issues pertaining to hydrogen, battery and thermal storage technologies in the autumn. DEFRA is planning to bring battery energy storage systems (BESS) into the environmental permitting regime.

The increase in battery demand drives the demand for critical materials. In 2022, lithium demand exceeded supply (as in 2021) despite the 180% increase in production since 2017. In 2022, about 60% of lithium, 30% of cobalt and 10% of nickel demand was for EV batteries. Just five years earlier, in 2017, these. . In 2022, lithium nickel manganese cobalt oxide (NMC) remained the dominant battery chemistry with a market share of 60%, followed by lithium iron phosphate (LFP) with a share of just. . With regards to anodes, a number of chemistry changes have the potential to improve energy density (watt-hour per kilogram, or Wh/kg). For example, silicon can be used to replace all or some of the graphite in the anode in order to make it lighter and thus increase. [pdf]
This strategy represents a whole of government effort, developed with business. The government’s 2030 vision is for the UK to have a globally competitive battery supply chain that supports economic prosperity and the net zero transition.
Some dramatically different approaches to EV batteries could see progress in 2023, though they will likely take longer to make a commercial impact. One advance to keep an eye on this year is in so-called solid-state batteries.
11 new battery energy storage sites (>7 MW), with a total capacity of 413 MW, came online in Q2 of 2023. This means that the average size of new batteries was 38 MW - but the median was just 24 MW. Essentially, one particularly large site skewed this average:
In China, battery demand for vehicles grew over 70%, while electric car sales increased by 80% in 2022 relative to 2021, with growth in battery demand slightly tempered by an increasing share of PHEVs. Battery demand for vehicles in the United States grew by around 80%, despite electric car sales only increasing by around 55% in 2022.
Other solid-state-battery players, like Solid Power, are also working to build and test their batteries. But while they could reach major milestones this year as well, their batteries won’t make it into vehicles on the road in 2023.
Automotive lithium-ion (Li-ion) battery demand increased by about 65% to 550 GWh in 2022, from about 330 GWh in 2021, primarily as a result of growth in electric passenger car sales, with new registrations increasing by 55% in 2022 relative to 2021.
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