EnABLES Newsletter Issue 10 – July 2021
Contents
- Powering the IoT Conference
- Unveiling the use of protic ionic liquid based electrolytes with lithium metal batteries
- Position Paper Launch – “… think about battery life …”
- Energy Harvesting Summer School 2021
- 500 sign ups – Thank you 😄
Powering the IoT Conference
The EnABLES – Powering the IoT – Online Conference on May, 19th brought together a wide range of stakeholders from the field of energy harvesting, energy storage and micro-power management. With the focus on powering IoT applications, different technologies and use cases were presented. It included speakers from the following organisations: Perpetuum Ltd, Ilika Technologies Ltd, Italcoppie Sensori SRL, TEGnology ApS, Swiss Airtainer SA, Sanmina Corporation, Enerthing GmbH, Imperial College London, Université Catholique de Louvain, Politecnico di Torino, University of Southampton, Tyndall National Institute and University of Perugia.
The event kicked off with a session on “Industry Perspective” and another one on “Databases and simulation tools”. After the lunch break, a series of “Real life use-cases” where presented. This was followed by a session on “Thermoelectric and Solar Based Design”.
During the panel discussion in the afternoon, representatives from industry and academia such as Roy Freeland, Denis Pasero, Séamus O’Driscoll, Raphael Salot, Aldo Romani and Gerd vom Bögel discussed two highly relevant topics on the emerging field of powering the IoT. The first topic was “Energy harvesting impact on Green ICT and CO2 reduction”, the second “Adopting energy harvesting technologies in real-life products”.
More than 150 participants registered for this. The feedback was absolute positive with quotes such as: ‘I really liked the industry applications focused, I had planned to stay for only 1-2 sessions but stayed the entire event’, ‘I really enjoyed the event … in particular the panel discussions.’, ‘All the presentations were relevant, and high quality. I usually fade away … but this one kept me interested. The unique aspect was that there was little academic material, it was … direct industry applied.’
Unveiling the use of protic ionic liquid based electrolytes with lithium metal batteries
GAME Lab @Polito, in collaboration with the Institute for Technical Chemistry and Environmental Chemistry, Center for Energy and Environmental Chemistry Jena (Friedrich-Schiller-University Jena) recently presented the first examples of lithium metal cells stably and safely operating with PYRH4+-based protic ionic liquid (PIL) electrolytes, enabled by encompassing vinylene carbonate (VC) in the PIL-salt solution. VC additive undergoes electrochemical decomposition/polymerization during initial cycling creating a protective barrier at the electrolyte/electrode interface, thus enhancing the stability window of PIL based electrolytes. Newly designed electrolyte formulations enabled reversible cycling of Li-metal cells with PILs to achieve excellent stability with both standard LFP and 4V class NMC-based cathodes. Remarkably, the Li metal/PIL solution-VC/NMC cell almost reached full capacity (≥160 mAh/g) and highly reversible operation at ambient temperature and different current regimes up to 1C-rate (viz., charge and discharge of the battery in about one hour, which is remarkable for solid-state device).
This is the first demonstration of successful use of PIL-based electrolytes in Li-metal batteries, and such an initial proof-of-concept represents an important contribution for the realization of cutting-edge, safer, high energy density batteries to power next generation electrical devices to face the global energy/environmental challenge.
Details in:G. Lingua et al., J. Power Sources 2021, 481, 228979, DOI: 10.1016/j.jpowsour.2020.228979 (Open Access)
Position Paper Launch – “… think about battery life …”
On 27th June EnABLES formally launched a Position Paper to coincide with the recent launch of the Horizon Europe €95.5 billion work plan. In it we call on the EU and industry leaders to think about battery life from the outset to ensure batteries outlive the devices they power. This will help tackle the issue of e-waste and guarantee safer more reliable power sources for devices where batteries are not easily changed, such as medical technologies, implantable devices and technology in harsh and difficult to reach environments. It emphasizes the need to not only increase the energy supplied by batteries, so they last longer, but to also reduce the amount of power the devices consume. It also recommends harvesting and the use of ambient energies such as heat, light and movement to further extend battery life.
Currently it is estimated that by 2025, there will be 1 trillion IoT devices in the world and on average 78 million batteries will be dumped every day by 2025 if we do not improve the life span of wireless Internet of Things (IoT) devices. The aim is to ultimately deliver ‘power autonomy’ with batteries sustainably recharging themselves which would help achieve the European Green Deal target of carbon neutrality by 2050. The paper outlines examples of technology outputs from EnABLES including several testimonials from industry and academic subscribers to our Transnational Access program. The ‘Power IoT’ ecosystem and its criticality is also explained. 5 key actions are recommended with EnABLES already demonstrating leadership in developing the technologies, methodologies and ecosystem of collaboration needed (we already have >500 subscribers to EnABLES now!)
Energy Harvesting Summer School 2021
Registration
| Venue: Perugia, Italy |  |
| Date: 15th-18th Sep 2021 | |
| Scientific Director: Luca Gammaitoni, NiPS Laboratory, Dipartimento di Fisica e Geologia, Università di Perugia | |
| Lecture topics: Fundamentals of energy, advancement in Energy Harvesting, future perspectives for the Energy Storage, Micro-Power Management & System Integration for the Internet of Things |
The Summer School “Powering the Internet of Things” 2021 is approaching! This is the final event of formation and dissemination supported together by the University of Perugia (Italy) and the EnABLES EU-granted project. The Summer School will take place in Perugia from the 15th to the 18th of September 2021, in parallel with the International Conference SR40, celebrating the 40th anniversary of the first paper about Stochastic Resonance. The school is a great opportunity for graduate and PhD students, post-docs, young researchers and in general for all the scientists interested in the topics of energy transformation at microscales for IoT applications, such as energy harvesting, storage, micro-power management and systems integration. It is not only an occasion of learning from highly skilled professionals of IoT, but also an opportunity for encouraging collaborations and the comparison between different and complementary competences. The event will be organized in a mixed modality: remote attendance or presencial participation. Students attending the school in-presence are encouraged to present their own research and works in a “flash” poster session.
A social event is foreseen the afternoon of Friday the 17th September: a guided tour in an historical winery to discover the secrets and to taste one of the most appreciated products of Umbrian land, the wine.
For more details about registration, and to know the agenda of the event, please visit our Webpage
500 sign ups – Thank you 😄
We are delighted to see our research community grow to over 500 – signed up to our Network. Over the past 17 months (since Covid-19) we have concentrated on delivering information to our research community through online events/webinars. This has helped us create further awareness of our Access / Expertise Programme and strengthens the links between all ‘power IoT’ stakeholders (academia, industry, developers, integrators, end users, etc.).
Our network has grown significantly over this period and now totals over 500 stakeholders who have signed up to receive information about our offers from our various partners across Europe and joined our community for us to collaborate in developing the next generation of ‘power IoT’ solutions. Please help us further build our ecosystem now by telling your colleagues about the benefits & ease of access to our programme and give them the opportunity to contribute to and learn from our repository of expertise and technology offerings. Thank you 😄
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