Halifax, Nova Scotia – A PhD student from Dalhousie University has cracked the secret to reincarnation—for retired electric vehicle batteries, of course, which he is hoping will fuel the power grids of the future.
Chris White is looking for ways to convert “second-life” EV batteries to renewable energy sources that may one day be used to power electric grids.
“We want to convert things that run on fossil fuels to run on electricity,” said White in an interview with The Chronicle Harold. “So battery-powered electric vehicles instead of gas-powered cars. And electric heating instead of oil and gas furnaces.
“And then we want to convert our electricity systems to run on renewables instead of fossil fuels, so the electricity we’re using for our cars is clean and not coming from coal power plants, for example.”
White identifies an issue that has yet to be solved when it comes to EV batteries, however.
“And another problem is that electric vehicle batteries—EV batteries—will eventually end up as waste,” said White. “We’re already producing millions of EVs per year and this will soon be tens of millions per year and every EV has a large lithium-ion battery. The biggest ones I’ve seen are about the size of a double mattress.”
A goal for White is finding a way to put these batteries back to work and get the most use out of them as possible.
“You could have hundreds or even thousands of these second-life batteries all linked together and connected to the grid. So we could see these big warehouses full of these batteries popping up all over.”
