So we were doing collaborative work and I was assigned to research on lithium.
Here's what I found out:
Lithium is a metal with a silvery appearance, though it turns black when it comes into contact with air. It is under Alkali metals and is ductile. The boiling point is 1347°C and the melting point is 180.54°C. Lithium is both a heat and electrical conductor and it's chemical symbol is "Li".
Lithium is used for various purposes like:
- Batteries
- Fireworks
- Coolants
- Nuclear fusion
- Making cellphones
- Combined with other metals to make airplane parts
- Air purifyers in submarines and spacecrafts
- Mood stabilizers
REAL LIFE CASE STUDY:
Recently I came across an article called "Dreamliner becoming a financial nightmare" in the Straits Times about lithium.
It talks about a Dreamliner having to do an emergency landing due to a battery fire. The Boeing 787 Dreamliner depends in part on lithium-ion batteries, which provide them with quick powerful charges, but can also overheat and catch fire.
A lithium-ion battery works like most other chemical batteries. A particle with an electric charge moves to one terminal when energy is applied, and the other terminal when energy is drawn. They have a higher energy density, which means they can store more kilowatt hours of work per unit of weight and volume than other chemistries.
But they have drawbacks.
One is that while all batteries get warm, which makes some of their parts expand, the chemical soup in which the ions in a lithium-ion battery swim - the electrolyte - expands more than the electrolytes of other chemistries, experts say. Because a lithium-ion battery is always sealed, it has to take the pressire of the expansion. Otherwise, it will break open or break internally.
All batteries generate heat on charging and discharging. No re-chargeable chemical batteries are 100% efficient. In other words, they never give back quite as much energy as was put into them. The energy that does not make the round trip ends up as heat.
When the lithium-ion batteries were first produced commercially, in the early 1990s, they were small, for hand-held devices. Now, though, as they move into cars and airplanes, they are much bigger. The ones on Boeing 787 are 50 to 100% larger than the lead-acid battery typical in car. The battery packs in electric cars are far bigger than that.
Here's what I found out:
Lithium is a metal with a silvery appearance, though it turns black when it comes into contact with air. It is under Alkali metals and is ductile. The boiling point is 1347°C and the melting point is 180.54°C. Lithium is both a heat and electrical conductor and it's chemical symbol is "Li".
Lithium is used for various purposes like:
- Batteries
- Fireworks
- Coolants
- Nuclear fusion
- Making cellphones
- Combined with other metals to make airplane parts
- Air purifyers in submarines and spacecrafts
- Mood stabilizers
REAL LIFE CASE STUDY:
Recently I came across an article called "Dreamliner becoming a financial nightmare" in the Straits Times about lithium.
It talks about a Dreamliner having to do an emergency landing due to a battery fire. The Boeing 787 Dreamliner depends in part on lithium-ion batteries, which provide them with quick powerful charges, but can also overheat and catch fire.
A lithium-ion battery works like most other chemical batteries. A particle with an electric charge moves to one terminal when energy is applied, and the other terminal when energy is drawn. They have a higher energy density, which means they can store more kilowatt hours of work per unit of weight and volume than other chemistries.
But they have drawbacks.
One is that while all batteries get warm, which makes some of their parts expand, the chemical soup in which the ions in a lithium-ion battery swim - the electrolyte - expands more than the electrolytes of other chemistries, experts say. Because a lithium-ion battery is always sealed, it has to take the pressire of the expansion. Otherwise, it will break open or break internally.
All batteries generate heat on charging and discharging. No re-chargeable chemical batteries are 100% efficient. In other words, they never give back quite as much energy as was put into them. The energy that does not make the round trip ends up as heat.
When the lithium-ion batteries were first produced commercially, in the early 1990s, they were small, for hand-held devices. Now, though, as they move into cars and airplanes, they are much bigger. The ones on Boeing 787 are 50 to 100% larger than the lead-acid battery typical in car. The battery packs in electric cars are far bigger than that.
Info taken from Straits Times, "Dreamliner bceoming a financial nightmare".
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