Exploring trends in battery manufacturing: Comparative teardown and characterisation of high-performance cells

As demand for higher energy and power density batteries continues to grow, both academia and industry continue to develop across multiple length scales. As academia often focusses on materials development, there is little publicly available information on how industry approaches the challenge of improving their energy storage devices. This is also an issue for the computational community, who require up-to-date baseline data on the latest cells to produce effective models. This work provides a detailed comparison of a range of parameters of two recent cells models from the same manufacturer, E-One Moli Energy’s P45B and new P50B, to give an insight into recent industrial developments. Non-destructive CT shows the difference in the internal architecture, particularly the increased number of windings in the cell jellyroll. Teardown analysis reveals thicker tabs in the P50B to accommodate a higher rated discharge current, and heavier calendering to improve mass loading and coating adhesion. EDX analysis confirms that both cells have a high-nickel NCA chemistry with a graphite/silicon negative electrode Micro-CT and subsequent image quantification show increased tortuosity in the electrodes. Electrochemical results show that the higher tortuosity may contribute to the increased resistance and poorer high-rate performance in the P50B relative to the P45B.