One of the main concerns of potential electric vehicle (EV) buyers is range anxiety: the worry that their battery will run out before they get to their destination, and they won’t find a charging station before it does. The Department of Energy (DOE) is responding to this challenge with a $131 million investment to improve the EV battery supply chain and support EV innovation, announced on January 18, 2024.
Of the total, $71 million will fund 27 projects to develop clean mobility options, improve EV battery supply chain challenges and extend EV driving range.
These projects include developing high-capacity long cycle lithium-sulphur (Li-S) batteries, and boosting mechanistic modeling of those batteries; improving 12-volt lead acid batteries for safe use in EVs; developing advanced integrated on-board charging; creating wireless charging concepts for heavy-duty vehicles; testing dimethyl ether engines for off-road uses; researching hydrogen combustion engines; inventing sustainable, lightweight novel and polymer composite vehicle components; researching domestic magnesium production; and developing innovative public transportation and mobility systems. A full list of these projects is available here.
The remaining $60 million is going to the United States Advanced Battery Consortium (USABC), a battery research and development consortium set up to develop the next generation of EV batteries. The consortium is tasked with bringing together “a significant fraction of the major manufacturers of electric drive vehicles in the U.S.” to collaborate on this work, according to the funding opportunity announcement (FOA) released in June 2023.
The consortium’s research priorities include batteries with enhanced performance, battery designs that use earth-abundant materials that can be accessed domestically (and reduce reliance on foreign-sourced nickel and cobalt), and more cost-efficient battery recycling processes. The research encompasses batteries for a variety of automobiles, from light- to heavy-duty vehicles.
The consortium’s work aims to help boost battery innovations that respond to the needs of EV manufacturers, strengthen the domestic battery supply chain and recycling sector, and address the critical challenges standing in the way of widespread EV commercialization.
Encouraging EV adoption in the U.S.
While EVs are becoming more commonplace—more than 3.6 million had been sold in the U.S. as of April 2023, according to the DOE—they still face significant competitive disadvantages compared to their internal combustion engine counterparts. Battery costs have fallen more than 90% since 2008, but are still relatively high compared to gas-powered engines. At the same time, their market growth has resulted in increased demand on the rare critical minerals needed to manufacture EV batteries.
The DOE’s support of research into new or alternative battery chemistries is intended to help lower EV costs while reducing dependency on those minerals. This funding supports the White House’s broader goal of 500,000 EV chargers across the country by 2030.
“The investments announced today will supercharge the development of a convenient and reliable EV network, and expand the domestic battery supply chain—securing our nation’s energy independence and spurring economic opportunity,” said U.S. Deputy Secretary of Energy David M. Turk in a DOE press release.