Dan Steingart, Assistant Professor of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering and the Andlinger Center for Energy and the Environment, was awarded a grant through the Department of Energy’s Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E). Together with collaborators at Brookhaven National Laboratory, Georgia Institute of Technology, and the University of California, San Diego, Steingart will develop unique alkaline battery chemistry for use in electric vehicles (EV). This new technology uses abundant and inexpensive materials structured to enable longer battery cycle life. If successful, the new alkaline chemistry could result in low-cost EV batteries that require minimal shielding and packaging. The grant provides approximately $1 million for one year of research.

The project is funded through ARPA-E’s new program, Robust Affordable Next Generation Energy Storage Systems (RANGE). This program aims to accelerate widespread EV adoption by dramatically improving driving range and reliability, and by providing low-cost, low-carbon alternatives to today’s vehicles. See the full ARPA-E press release for more information.