EDITORIAL Mike Halls • editor@batteriesinternational.com
16ELBC: the place to be For the past three decades each new wave of energy storage technology has predicted that the lead battery would be defunct within a generation. Yet, as this pre-conference guide for ELBC shows, the lead acid battery industry refuses to go away. It’s not just that the world can’t let it fade into nothingness — there is, after all, no feasible replacement to it from the point of view of price, safety and recycleability. The alternatives presented over the last generation now seem so old fashioned nickel, fuel cells, supercaps. Once pointed to as the Next Big Thing in the market they have remained on the sidelines. And perhaps, equally interestingly, have not gone away. There is room at the table for all. The only real challenger in all this has been the rise and rise of lithium ion battery technology which, despite the lead market’s fervent wishes — let’s shut our eyes and perhaps it’ll go away — now looks to be a real challenger in the market place. In the long run at least. The chemistry, despite a huge number of hiccups, from exploding cars and laptops, to grounded airliners to $4 billion recalls of mobile phones, has, nevertheless gone from strength to strength.
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But at last we’re starting to see a more balanced approach to its place in the world of energy storage. The recent policy position by the ILA underlines a new theme in the marketplace. Put simply lithium ion batteries will have a place — as will lead — in the future energy storage universe that is rapidly coming towards us. It’s not longer a dismissal by either side of the industry that lead/lithium will be irrelevant. Both will have important roles to play in the drive to integrate renewable energy into the electric grids and transport of the future. The question that ELBC will be debating this year is probably a very simple one — how important a role will each play in the future? The recent rebranding — or should it be called repurposing? — of the ALABC suggests that there are research projects ahead that could reshape the lead battery business in as little as five years. And this is why we at Batteries International have been so enthusiastic in supporting this, the 16th ELBC in Vienna this September. Mike Halls, Editor, Batteries International
Batteries International • 16 ELBC Show Guide • Summer 2018 • 3