AMBER Researchers in Trinity College Dublin awarded funding to research the next generation of sustainable batteries

27 March 2025

AMBER Researchers Professor Jonathan Coleman and Professor Valeria Nicolosi, both of Trinity College Dublin, have been awarded funding by the Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland (SEAI) under the ‘National Energy RD&D Funding Programme’. The programme funds accelerating transformative research to deliver Ireland’s clean energy and climate ambitions. Their project named ‘SegNetBatt’ involves the development of segregated networks for the next generation of high-performance batteries beyond lithium.

Lithium-ion (Li-ion) batteries are increasingly used in many products such as household electronics, toys, wireless headphones, handheld power tools, electric vehicles and electrical energy storage systems including data centres. Four countries account for 90% of the production of Lithium, Australia, China, Chile and Argentina with limited mining of the resource taking place within Europe, Portugal’s production accounting for just .21% in 2023. The demand for lithium is projected to reach over 3 million tonnes by 2030, with the world producing 540,000 tonnes in 2021, this would be a nearly six-fold increase.

Sodium and potassium ion batteries (SIBs and KIBs) are promising alternatives, sharing similar chemistries to that of lithium. Currently Canada, Russia and Belarus dominate potassium production, accounting for 65.9% in 2023. As industry seeks more sustainable alternatives to Lithium it is anticipated that more countries will engage in Sodium and Potassium production driven by increasing demand.

Speaking on the successful awarding of his project Erasmus Smith’s Professor of Natural and Experimental Philosophy (1724) in the School of Physics Jonathan Coleman said: “The relentless growth in demand for electrical energy has driven the widespread adoption of Lithium-ion batteries as the primary portable energy storage device over the last three decades. However, the limitations of lithium and cobalt resources, including their low abundance, uneven distribution, and associated costs, have created a pressing need to explore alternative battery chemistries based on other elements beyond lithium.2

Currently Sodium ion and Potassium ion batteries demonstrate reduced energy density compared to lithium ion. To overcome these challenges, project ‘SegNetBatt’ will leverage the unique properties of hierarchical structures based on advanced ion storing nanostructured materials combined with carbon nanotubes to achieve high-capacity and high-power performance in battery technologies beyond lithium. This 3-year project with a budget of approximately €750,00 aims to make a groundbreaking leap forward in the development of the next generation of high-performance batteries, going beyond the limitations of lithium-based technologies.