The Most Significant Advanced Materials News from 2021, Discussed by IDTechEx - Seite 4

Applications: energy storage

Energy storage remains one of the key areas for materials R&D. Money continues to pour in, but the market is challenging typified by Johnson Matthey announcing in November the intention to exit battery materials.

When looking at next-generation materials graphene batteries still grab the headlines, most notable with GAC making several showcases and announcements on their graphene-enabled fast-charging solution. Lithium-sulphur appeared to take a step backwards with Oxis Energy facing bankruptcy and entering administration in May (Johnson Matthey acquired the IP), but also saw some progression enabled by early-stage materials including Lyten coming out of stealth mode with their "3D graphene" solution and Li-S Energy showing some promising results with boron nitride nanotubes (BNNTs) and LG Chem and NextTech also making key announcements.

There are other materials that are much more likely to make a more immediate or lasting impact on the next generation of battery cells, with silicon anodes and solid-state batteries two essential areas. The reader is directed to a recent article that provides the trends and developments in energy storage in 2021 for more information.

The cell chemistry is what grabs a lot of the headlines, but it is foolish to overlook those improvements taking place within the pack. One exciting advanced materials news here is the use of silica aerogel composites to act as thermal runaway barriers, this has been seen previously in China and has now seen significant progression with Aspen Aerogels announcing orders from a North American and Asian OEM.

Outlook

It is now important to turn our attention to the coming year and what we might expect to have a disruptive impact. Certainly, solutions that enable key market drivers in telecommunications, semiconductor manufacturing, energy storage, and the circular economy will continue to hold a high demand as well as those in the next generation of electronics from augmented reality to sensor deployment for industry 4.0 and personalized healthcare monitoring. As a result, do not be surprised to see more the much-overhyped era of nanomaterials to quietly gain further commercial traction.