Energy safety
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Inside: EDITORIAL
Energy safety ENERGY SECTOR ANALYSIS
Pushing the frontiers of lithium-ion batteries raises safety questions REGIONAL INITIATIVE
Power-to-gas plants use renewable energy to make sustainable fuel
ENERGY QUARTERLY ORGANIZERS CO-CHAIRS George Crabtree, Argonne National Laboratory, USA Elizabeth A. Kócs, University of Ilinois at Chicago, USA Andrea Ambrosini, Sandia National Laboratories, USA Monika Backhaus, Corning Incorporated, France David Cahen, Weizmann Institute, Israel Russell R. Chianelli, The University of Texas at El Paso, USA Shirley Meng, University of California–San Diego, USA Sabrina Sartori, University of Oslo, Norway Anke Weidenkaff, University of Stuttgart, Germany M. Stanley Whittingham, Binghamton University, The State University of New York, USA Steve M. Yalisove, University of Michigan, USA
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Energy safety Energy transitions have historically required careful evaluation of the safety hazards surrounding emerging technologies. Electrical lines in the 19th century were initially not insulated, leading to unexpected encounters of electricity with people and animals. Gasolinedriven cars in the early 20th century presented very different hazards from those of the horse-drawn wagons they replaced. The advent of nuclear energy in the 1960s created safety hazards that remain unresolved for many stakeholders. We face a similar situation today as renewable wind and solar energy replace fossil fuels, electric cars replace gasoline cars, and large-scale battery storage begins to penetrate the grid. The safety of lithium-ion and next-generation batteries holds a special place in these transitions. Batteries are required across the board, for firming wind and solar generation, for powering electric cars, and for decoupling generation from demand on the grid. A comparison of the safety hazards of gasoline and batteries illuminates some of the challenges. Gasoline has 30–50 times higher energy density than today’s batteries, and 5–10 times higher energy density than the most optimistic projections for next-generation batteries. We are in equally close contact with the gasoline in the tanks of our cars as with the batteries beneath the seats of our electric cars. The hazards, however, are quite different. The hazard of gasoline is fire or explosion from accidental combustion—the same combustion that, in controlled conditions within the engine, supplies the mechanical power to drive the vehicle. In batteries, the greatest hazard is a side reaction not related to the chemical reactions that provide electrical power. At elevated temperatures (above approximately 160°C for lithiumcobalt-oxide cathodes and higher for other cathodes), the cathode releases oxygen that reacts with the liquid-organic-electrolyte exothermally, releasing energy as heat that drives the tempe
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