Recently, the National Development and Reform Commission approved the program “2014 Annual National-local Joint Engineering Research Center (Engineering Laboratory)” under the policy NDRC high-tech [2015] No. 581. Under this program, Xiamen University has been approved to construct a laboratory named "New Automotive Energy Power Supply National-local Joint Engineering Laboratory "(for short as “laboratory" in the following context) led by the Xiamen researcher, Prof. Jin-bao Zhao. The laboratory will provide a foundation for innovation research in the field of new automotive energy.
The laboratory is developing on the foundation of “Fujian New Automotive Energy Battery and Key Materials of Energy Storage Engineering Laboratory” issued by Fujian Province Development and Reform Commission. It is worth mentioning that this engineering laboratory, which established at 2011, cooperated closely with a dozen of well-known companies at home and abroad, which includes China Aviation Industry Group, General Motors and TDK. Undertaking over 20 projects with the support from the Nation 973 Project, the National 863 Program, the Natural Science Foundation of China, Fujian government and Xiamen government and developed a number of world-class scientific and technological achievements contributing to the development of energy storage technology in Fujian Province and in China.
Besides the solid foundation of the engineering laboratory mentioned above, the laboratory also receives academic support from Chemistry and Chemical Engineering College, Energy Engineering College, Physics and Mechanical College, Electrical Engineering College in Xiamen University, and technical support from State Key Laboratory of Physical Chemistry of Solid Surfaces of Xiamen University and Electrochemical Engineering Research Center of Ministry of Education. The laboratory will concentrate in developing new automotive energy power supply as the main goal and strengthen cooperation among schools, research institutes and companies.
To improve the safety of lithium-ion batteries (LIBs), a functional ceramic-coated separator (FCC separator) is developed by a research group. This great development has been achieved with the support of National 863 Program and in co-operation with China Aviation Lithium Battery Co., Ltd. (Luoyang, CALB). The representative achievement is technically accepted by Ministry of Science and Technology High-tech center on April 10, 2015.
The technical performances of related products have reached top level in the world. The success of the project plays a significant role in completing and supplementing the missing key link of power-type lithium-ion battery industries in China, and improving the security of the production and application of the battery system. The successful development of functional ceramic separator establishes the technology base for further development of domestic power battery industries, and demonstrates that China has mastered the key technologies in this field which were highly controlled by Japan and South Korea for a long time. This achievement has successfully realized the target of large-scale production in CALB, and applied in all of its products. Results show that the application of lithium-ion batteries (LIBs) in electric vehicles has improved the safety performance of LIBs greatly. Moreover, Lithium-ion power batteries with FCC separators have passed the overcharge, over discharge, nail puncture, extrusion, short circuit and other safety tests from the official certification organization, which makes LIBs, especially lithium-ion power batteries used at ease. Now, it has become an industrial consensus to use functional ceramic separator in LIBs.
The energy issue is a world-concerning problem. The laboratory is targeted at developing new automotive energy industry to alleviate the problem. Considering the national status of new automotive energy industry, the laboratory will mainly focus on the actual needs to develop possible strategies in the near future, continuing the basic research about new automotive energy, developing innovative technology, cooperating with companies to get over the industrial bottlenecks problems. The laboratory is turning into a “Technical Institute”, “Energy reserve”, “Demonstration line”, “Supportive stage” and “Renowned School”. A platform associated with academic investigation and industrial application is under construction to fulfill the goal of the laboratory, which requires the laboratory to take the full advantage of the resource from government, industry and school. As a public service platform, the laboratory will integrate the support from different resources and provide technical support for the new automotive energy industry development in Xiamen city, Fujian province and even all around the country.
