As part of $14 million in continuation grants, the California Energy Commission is awarding $450,000 in additional funding to Sepion Technologies, an Emeryville-based company developing battery membrane materials capable of supporting batteries that can power electric vehicles for 400 miles.

Sepion has developed a composite membrane to replace the expensive and resistive ceramic incumbent. In addition to providing high-flux and ion-selective transport, Sepion’s composite membranes are processable in large area formats at a fraction of the cost of ceramics, giving them the potential to deliver energy-dense, high-power Li-metal anodes at a competitive cost.

The goal of the project funded by the Energy Commission is to scale a prototype battery membrane that enables drop-in, roll-to-roll manufacturing of lithium-metal anode batteries with significantly greater energy density compared to traditional graphite anode lithium-ion batteries.

This technology maintains the necessary safety characteristics and competitive costs of traditional lithium-ion batteries by avoiding the need for large scale reconfiguration of existing manufacturing lines.

In the Concept Award, Sepion demonstrated its membrane’s ability to support stable cycling with lithium-metal anode batteries—outperforming the current commercial separators.

During this Prototype Award, the team will scale up to 100 kg batches with roll-to-roll manufacturing while demonstrating that the enhanced performance demonstrated at a small scale is maintained.