Rechargeable paper battery is cheaper, safer & as powerful as lithium

A battery that's safer and cheaper than lithium-ion while offering comparable energy density?

By C.C. Weiss

A battery that's safer and cheaper than lithium-ion while offering comparable energy density? That sounds like a pipe dream. But such a battery is in fact in the works, using a chemistry of renewables to store over 220 Wh/kg. Singaporean startup Flint believes it has the formula for the most sustainable battery the world has ever seen, capable of replacing lithium for applications like EV power and grid storage. Maybe that is a dream. Or maybe it's the revolutionary eco-optimized battery of the near-future.

A fully sustainable paper battery that can be recycled and dropped in compost at the end of its life cycle sounds too good to be true. It kicks off a major cynicism alert, and the questions flow like water through a burst dam.

Does it offer such low capacity as to be useless for anything outside a laboratory? No, Flint estimates energy density at 226 Wh/kg, which falls comfortably within the range of existing lithium tech.

Does it have a life cycle measured in hours rather than years? Nope, Flint says the rechargeable batteries will have a life cycle comparable to traditional battery technologies, unlike other single-use paper battery designs.

Will it prove impossible to scale from lab to mass production? Flint has conceived the battery with mass manufacturing in mind and is developing it from the ground up to work within existing lithium manufacturing systems and processes.

Does it seem like Flint has meticulously crafted answers to every pointed question a skeptic might make? Yes, we suppose it does. But that doesn't mean we're not hopeful its paper battery can materialize into a commercialized reality, even if it's in some lesser form than what's being proposed today.

Founded by a "team of scientists, technologists, designers and innovators," Flint aims to take a direct shot at climate change with practical, scalable solutions. In fact, the company wasn't initiated as a battery startup at all but developed organically from the innate desire to answer the question, "Why are the tools we depend on to power our lives so harmful to the planet?" Predictably, the focus on batteries came not long after digging for answers.

Company founder and CEO Carlo Charles and his team believe that the best solution won't ever come from merely tweaking existing battery tech but from rethinking the entire system. And Flint's battery chemistry reflects that – instead of just replacing an element or two, Flint is writing a completely new formula out of renewable and readily recyclable ingredients.

The company's proprietary battery chemistry relies on cellulose, the structural plant material used to make paper, as the medium for ion transfer between the anode and cathode. Flint then replaces problematic non-renewables like cobalt and lithium with less environmentally impactful, easily recycled metals like zinc and manganese.

The cellulose also underpins a more versatile, pliable battery structure, allowing Flint to make batteries in different forms. Rather than having to design a vehicle or device around a battery brick, builders could theoretically structure the battery to fit into the optimal space in the vehicle or gadget.

We've seen over the years that declaring the next great battery technology on paper and backing the claim up with a few lab milestones is the easy part. The big lifting comes in wresting that next great technology from the white coats and putting it on production lines, and doing so in a time period measured in units smaller than decades. That's why Flint has been working to create its battery in a form that can be built via the same manufacturing processes currently in use for lithium batteries.

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