High Capacity Materials and Advanced Engineering for Thermal Batteries

Thermal batteries are mission critical components which provide power to military weapon systems for electronics, fusing, sensing and actuation. Current and future thermal battery packaging and performance requirements are being pushed to the limits, demanding a substantial increase in potential and energy density over current state-of-the-art. Critical changes being implemented in next generation missile systems include requirements of higher power levels over longer operating times (hence, higher usable energy output) in smaller, lighter packages. These increases are required to power guidance systems and other on-board electronics. In order to meet these demands, ENSER proposes to develop and demonstrate significant increases in energy density, power density and operational lifetime over state-of-the-art LiSi/CoS2 chemistry. Potential new anode and cathode materials have been identified and evaluated in single cell tests and prototype batteries. Theoretical cell level parameters include operating voltages of ~2.6 V. With the optimization of the electrochemistries and manufacturing processes, theoretical voltages are very probable.