What is a Lithium Ion Battery? Know its ABCs Here

Lithium-ion batteries power the lives of millions today, but do you know what a lithium-ion battery is? The technology it uses is growing popular with each passing day due to its ability to recharge quickly and provide high density while also being lightweight.   

If you are wondering what a lithium-ion battery is, we have all the information you need! 

It is essentially a rechargeable battery that is made of cells. A lithium-ion battery also famously known as the Li-ion battery, is an advanced battery technology that utilizes lithium ions as the key component in its whole electrochemistry. The safety characteristics, cost, performance, and chemistry vary across the types of Li-ion batteries. 

Prior to understanding what a lithium-ion battery is, it is important to understand the basics of a battery and its working. A battery is typically made of an anode, cathode, separator, electrolyte, a positive and a negative current collector. The electrical current flows from the positive current collector via a device being powered to the other current collector (negative). The separator blocks the electrons’ flow inside the battery.  

Image source: Luminous 

What is a Lithium-Ion Battery? 

Let us now dive into understanding what is lithium-ion battery and its working.  

The life of a lithium-ion battery is defined as the total number of full discharge and charge cycles to reach the failure threshold. This is in accordance with the terms of impedance rise and capacity loss.  

The Li-ion battery cycle life is affected by several different stress factors including the state of charge, the charge current, the discharge current and the temperature.  

Lithium ions move from the anode and pass through the electrolyte till the time they reach the cathode. This is where they recombine with the electrons and neutralize electrically. At the time of a discharge cycle, the lithium atoms in the anode are ionized and then separated from the electrons. By now, you must have understood what a lithium-ion battery is, so let’s look at its working in more detail. 

The Working of Li-ion Batteries

• The lithium ions are small enough to be able to move through a micro permeable separator between the anode and the cathode. Also, because of the small size of lithium, the Li-ion batteries can have a high voltage and storage of charge per unit mass and volume.  
• During the time when a lithium-ion battery is providing electric current, the anode releases the lithium ions to cathode which ultimately, generates an electron flow from one side to the other.  
• Li-ion batteries can use several materials as an electrode. The most common combination is that of a lithium cobalt oxide, i.e., the cathode and graphite, the anode. Li-ion batteries typically use an organic compound such as an ether as an electrolyte. 

The Advantages of Li-ion Batteries

After gaining an in-depth understanding of what a lithium-ion battery is, here are some of its advantages you can look at. 

• Li-ion battery cells hold the capacity to deliver 3.6 volts which is thrice the voltage of Ni-MH and Ni-Cd. This indicates that they can deliver a large amount of current for high-power applications.  
• Li-ion batteries are also comparatively low maintenance and function with high efficiency sans the requirement of scheduled cycling to maintain the battery life.  

• Finally, the lithium-ion batteries have no memory effect. Memory effect is a determinantal process, wherein, the repeated partial charge and discharge cycles cause a Li-ion battery to remember a lower capacity.  
• These batteries don’t contain toxic substances like cadmium and can be disposed of with much more ease.  

 
Having answered the question what a lithium-ion battery is, you must have realized that getting Li-ion batteries is the right choice. The Li-ion batteries today, have found an ever-rising use in terms of power backups by using inverters with built-in Li-ion batteries.  

The research areas for Li-ion batteries include extending the lifetime, improving the energy density, safety and reducing the cost while increasing the speed of charging. Research is also underway to improve safety based on the volatility and flammability of the organic solvent in a typical Li-ion battery electrolyte.  

The Li-ion 1250 inverter by Luminous, the pioneer in power solutions, comes with a built-in lithium battery and is the new-age sine wave inverter that comes with the widest range of benefits for your household.