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Background

Silicon anodes have very high capacity and hence policy and markets are driving the present 5-10 wt% of silicon in anodes to 20 wt% by 2030 and even higher in the future. Currently used silicon has low cyclability due to rapid degradation.

• Porous silicon helps avoid degradation.
• Current methods cannot produce porous silicon at scale.
• This results in high production costs, problematic scale-up, unsafe manufacturing processes and low-performance products. 

Magnesiothermic reduction has recently emerged as a bulk method for producing porous silicon at scale and it can help meet future demands. 

However, magnesiothermic reduction requires high temperatures. It can result in multiple problems such as high production costs and low-performance products.

Technology

We have discovered an ultralow temperature magnesiothermic process based on a specific composition of feedstock that will react at temperatures far lower than previously reported.

Advantages

• Operates at 200°C lower than current processes.
• The process produces yields similar or greater than those achieved at higher temperatures.
• Production cost is 50% lower than the current market price for anode-grade silicon.
• Porous silicon made by our process outperforms those made by conventional magnesiothermic reduction, with future scope for optimisation to improve the performance.
• It offers ease of scale-up and operation using established processing equipment.
• Low temperature and no need for hydrofluoric acid significantly improves process safety.
• Tunable structures and porosity for desired anode formulations.
• There is supply chain independence due to flexibility with the silicon source.