Austrian project targets higher-energy LMFP batteries for stationary storage

An Austrian consortium is set to further develop lithium manganese iron phosphate (LMFP) cathodes for stationary lithium-ion battery storage. Named PHOENICS, the 36-month project aims to improve LMFP’s energy density by 20% and service life by 40%.

“A successful result considers a small LMFP prototype cell including a scaled electrode production process that confirms scalability and industrial feasibility and fulfills the defined project targets,” explained Philip Kargl, PHOENICS Project leader, to ESS News. “The PHOENICS project is an industrial research project with an intended TRL4 at the project end (technology basic validation in a laboratory environment).”

The consortium – which includes Virtual Vehicle Research, Materials Center Leoben Forschung, Varta Innovation, and AVL List – has €2.9 million (USD 3.36 million) in funding. The project partners are expected to analyze the new cathode material throughout its entire lifecycle through material characterization methods, high-resolution imaging technologies, and AI-supported evaluation techniques.

In addition, physics-based and data-driven models are being developed to map battery cell behavior, while another focus is on validating the safety properties of LMFP-based cells.

“The main challenges in scaling LMFP from laboratory-scale material development to industrial cell production are ensuring consistent material quality at large scale (morphology, particle size distribution, etc),” explained Kargl. “The electrode manufacturing process must be optimized and robustly controlled, especially during mixing, coating, drying, and calendering, to achieve homogeneous electrodes while maintaining electrochemical performance and ensuring a reproducible manufacturing process.”

LMFP is an evolution of established lithium iron phosphate (LFP) technology that retains LFP’s high safety and robustness while avoiding critical raw materials such as cobalt and nickel, but can offer up to 20% higher specific energy density. This could enable more energy to be stored in the same volume and improve the economics of stationary storage.