Revolutionizing the Way We Charge Our Lives: Graphene Boosts Batteries To New Heights

When it comes to battery life, it is all about conserving energy. And, thanks to graphene, someday soon this may no longer be an issue due to graphene’s high surface area, impressive conductivity, and compact size. Some of the new applications that are anticipated to revolutionize battery storage and usage are smaller capacitors, flexible devices, transparent batteries and fast-charging services at a high-quality capacity.

Lithium of Former Life

In the past, we have relied on lithium ion batteries as a major source of power and energy by moving around the atoms between the two electrodes in a battery. Although the dense material has proven itself over the years a major contender, the problem with it lies in the way it’s placed and moved. When the material is shifted around, the electrode can shrink causing a misalignment that ends up shorting out the battery altogether. However, with graphene, the electrodes stay in place as the lithium is not moved around. So not only will graphene keep the battery from shorting out, it is estimated that its function can provide two times as much energy as a lithium ion battery.

Although researchers and scientists have thought about how to increase the amount of lithium used in the process, the current material is still far less reactive than graphene’s capabilities. Another reason that lithium is losing in ‘the battle of the batteries’ that one cannot choose where the placement of the ion battery goes to re-form the metal as it inevitably forms spokes that lead to its eventual shortage of the battery. In comparison to the properties that graphene brings to the equation, there is no better choice.

Graphene of the Future

These incredible and capable conductivity characteristics allow for smooth charges unlike lithium’s inevitable downfall of shorting out. Another reason, that we touched briefly on before, is the material’s miraculous compact size with the width of 1/80,000^th human hair. This stealth-like structure of the material could prove to be life changing considering the amount of space that it will save while still maintaining its “200 times stronger than steel” core.

Graphene has already been making major strides in the form of wearable technology around our wrists, counting our steps, breathing the new life of exercise, music, and health into our bodies through repetition in the form of watches and wristbands. Think what this technology could do for batteries in terms of wear ability and functionality. Batteries so flexible and light that they can be stitched into clothing.

Beyond wearable technology, think of how quickly our phones will charge: we’re talking seconds-to -minutes. And, our cars. According to I Love Science, “it is hoped the supercapacitor will be developed to store more energy than a Li-Ion battery while retaining the ability to release its energy up to 10 times faster – meaning the car could be entirely powered by the supercapacitors in its body panels.”

The future of technology looks bright with the life changing product of graphene; our devices, our cars, and our lives will be supercharged like never before. Look out, lithium.