“SeNSE”: Better Batteries for Electric Cars
In the four-year EU project SeNSE, batteries for electric vehicles were significantly improved. The main goal was to develope new materials and technologies for direct transfer to European industry.
17 March 2025 – From 2035, no new cars with combustion engines are to be sold in Europe. To achieve this ambitious goal, powerful batteries are needed – so that electric cars can charge faster, travel greater distances and leave a smaller ecological footprint. A significant step in this direction was taken during the four-year “SeNSE” project, part of the EU's “Horizon 2020” funding programme. The project researched and presented new materials and technologies for next-generation batteries. Until 2024, scientists at Helmholtz Institute Münster (HI MS) of Forschungszentrum Jülich worked together with ten other teams from research and industry on this forward-looking project.
Improvement of core components
In order to develop technologies that can be installed in market-ready electric cars within a few years, the project partners had to cover almost the entire value chain of a lithium-ion battery: from the development of new materials to their incorporation into battery cells.
The electrolyte – the liquid that transports ions between the electrodes in the battery cell – is one of the main areas of expertise of Helmholtz Institute in Münster and the Swiss Empa laboratories. “Conventional electrolytes are flammable,” explains Empa researcher Dr Ruben-Simon Kühnel. “We were able to greatly reduce flammability by adding certain substances without impairing conductivity, which is essential for fast charging and discharging.”
The other key components of a battery were also further developed in the project. The cathode contains only half as much of the critical raw material cobalt as conventional lithium-ion batteries. In the anode, the project teams were able to replace some of the graphite, which is also classified as critical due to its use in battery production, with silicon. It is one of the most abundant elements in the earth's crust.
The cells, which are about the size of a smartphone, were manufactured by the Austrian Institute of Technology (AIT). FPT Motorenforschung AG was then able to integrate them into a finished module, as would be installed in an electric vehicle – including the associated electronics and software.
To further improve the fast-charging capability, the British Coventry University also developed a sophisticated temperature management system for the pilot module together with FPT Motorenforschung AG.
Scalability and transfer
The new developments were successfully scaled up from the laboratory to the pilot scale and several patents have been applied for. The industrial partners were able to build pilot production plants and secure investor funds, and the knowledge acquired is being incorporated into further battery technologies.
The four-year EU project, with a total budget of over 10 million euros, was initiated and led by researchers from the Swiss Empa laboratory “Materials for Energy Conversion”. In addition to Helmholtz Institute Münster, MEET Battery Research Center at the University of Münster, Coventry University in the UK, the AIT Austrian Institute of Technology and the Centre for Solar Energy and Hydrogen Research Baden-Württemberg (ZSW) were involved, as well as several industrial partners: the Swedish battery manufacturer Northvolt, the Swiss innovation center of FPT Industrial, FPT Motorenforschung AG, the French start-ups Solvionic and Enwires, and the chemical company Huntsman with a research site in Basel.