Yoshino Akira: Lithium Battery Redefines the Future | People

Light gray shirt with dark striped tie, tailored black suit, sitting in front of the first financial reporter is the Japanese scientist Yoshino Akira, he is thin and polite.

If you haven't seen his resume, you can't detect it. This is a "father of lithium batteries". He never talked about his honors and talked about the understanding of lithium battery technology. There are some questions that will stop and think for a long time and then give an answer. When it comes to rise, he will also raise his neck and laugh.

After a lapse of four years, at the invitation of the 2017 “First Financial Technology and Innovation Conference”, he visited Shanghai again, feeling the rapid development of lithium batteries for vehicles and new energy vehicles, and also the evaluation of Chinese lithium battery manufacturers. Very high. He said with a smile, with the help of Japanese technology, lithium batteries have made major breakthroughs in research and development, and Chinese companies are working with companies around the world to redefine the future of lithium batteries. "Although the technology is ever-changing, the science corresponding to it Research is not a day's work. Seeking balance and breakthrough between speed is the real essence of technology."

Choose a special life

In 2013, Russian President Vladimir Putin awarded the “The Global Energy Prize” to the people who have made outstanding achievements in the field of dynamic research and scientific creation. Two global technical experts were selected, and Yoshino Akira of the Asahi Kasei, the Russian Academy of Sciences Academician Fortov.

At the award ceremony, Igor Sheqin, the president of Russian Petroleum, who was commissioned by Putin himself, commented that this award is a gratitude expression of human scientific research and practical achievements. The value created by Yoshino Akira is hard to estimate. Since the 1980s, he has been engaged in research on energy storage. The lithium battery developed has brought about a complete technological revolution. With it, the volume and weight of recorders, mobile phones and tablets are becoming smaller and smaller, while pure electric and hybrid. Lithium batteries have also begun to be used in vehicles such as power.

"I am very excited to receive a call from Moscow," Yoshino said. "In March 2011, the tragedy of Fukushima in Japan brought about tremendous damage. The disaster of the nuclear power plant once again told the world that the solution to the power problem needs to be The scientific collection of national borders."

Similar to the experience of many Japanese science and technology scholars, Yoshino Akira only served a company - Asahi Kasei. The development of this technology was also completed with the full support of this famous Japanese chemical company. In March 1970, Yoshino was graduated from the Department of Petroleum Chemistry of the Faculty of Engineering of Kyoto University. In the following two years, he continued to study engineering studies at the same school and successfully entered Asahi Kasei Corporation in April 1972.

In 1980, Asahi Kasei established Miyazaki Electronics Co., Ltd. (now Asahi Kasei Electronics Co., Ltd.), and officially cut into the electronic component industry. This is also a great encounter for Yoshino Akira, who has been in the business for eight years. "And now the lithium battery The shape was invented five years later, in 1985, and various product technologies were developed."

He told the First Financial reporter that the one he felt the most was the year when the demand for lithium batteries from the camera was suddenly amplified. The world can sell about 1 million units per month. "It is hard to imagine that today's cameras use The battery market can only account for 1% of all lithium battery demand, which means that in the past 30 years, this technology has developed at a speed of 100 times. From smart phones, computers to electric cars, due to the production of lithium batteries, these The technology industry also has the opportunity to achieve amazing growth."

After 1985, a number of patents such as explosion-proof secondary batteries and secondary batteries with safety components were acquired by Yoshino, and he became famous.

Lithium battery is a kind of battery . It is more forward-looking than other batteries. It is mainly because of its high safety, small size and high energy density. In the 1980s, it was also the dawn of mobile equipment development. Lithium battery The emergence of the just happened to conform to the development of the times. “In the daily life, we constantly explore the needs of our customers and this society. How do we use science and technology to meet these needs? This is what scientific researchers have to do. Compared with a serious thinking, there are new discoveries, some adjustments and no purpose. Think about it, sometimes inspiration will naturally emerge." Yoshino said.

He said that the electrolyte of the battery (the solution containing ions) was water. When a voltage of 1.5 V or more is applied to water, the water is decomposed into hydrogen and oxygen. Therefore, it is impossible to obtain an electromotive force exceeding 1.5V in the past. By replacing the water with an organic solvent and using carbon at the negative electrode, an electromotive force of 4 V or more can be obtained.

In addition, lithium cobaltate (a metal oxide containing lithium ions) is used for the positive electrode, and Asahi Kasei is the first to propose a prototype of a lithium battery in the world. This small battery can be used in various electronic devices such as mobile phones, notebook computers, digital cameras and camcorders, portable music players, etc., so its appearance is heavyweight.

Lithium battery era

Subsequently, in 1991, the world officially launched a commercial lithium battery. One year later, with the help of the company, Yoshino was the head of the product development group of the Ion Secondary Battery Business Promotion Division. In August 1994, I became the A&T Battery Technology Development Division.

At that time, the lithium battery developed by Asahi Kasei was not good to sell, and almost no one was interested in it for a while. Suddenly one day the sales were opened. It was 1995. "It is also a very important year for us because the world has entered the mobile. In the IT era, mobile phones and tablet computers have to use lithium batteries in large quantities, and the whole world has moved toward mobile internet, so lithium batteries have also experienced geometric growth."

In 1995, Microsoft released the epoch-making Windows 95 operating system. It carried out a series of inventions such as "My Computer" and "IE Browser", and it was invincible. The global technology industry was shocked by the emergence of Windows 95. Screaming, and this is too deep for the scientist Yoshino Akira on the other side of the ocean.

"We are in the IT community. This IT revolution originated in 1995. It was in that year that Microsoft released Windows 95. After that, lithium batteries led the global buying trend," he said. The new achievements of Yoshino Akira and a group of scientists have also resonated with the experts and experts from all over the world.

Due to his outstanding technology, numerous awards have been won by him since 1999: the "Zi Zizhang" of the Japanese government, and the "IEEE Medal for Environmental and Safety Technologies" (Environment and Safety Technology Medal) of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE). ), the highest award of the National Institute of Technology "The Charles Stark Draper Prize" (Charles Stark Draper Prize).

Driven by advances in science and technology, Asahi Kasei's electronic business has also achieved amazing results.

Established in 1922, Asahi Kasei Co., Ltd. is a well-known Japanese chemical company. In 2016, its sales of chemicals were 8.449 billion US dollars, and global chemical companies ranked 39. The Japanese giant is leading the world in engineering plastics, fireproof and shockproof building materials, medical supplies, medical devices and electronics.

The research and development of lithium battery in Yoshino Akira belongs to the field of Asahi Kasei Materials, and the company attaches great importance to it.

As far as commercial products are concerned, Asahi Kasei's influence in the global lithium battery industry is reflected in the first voice of diaphragm materials, with the world's highest market share. With the February 2015 investment of 2.2 billion US dollars to acquire the world's third largest battery insulator manufacturer Polypore International, the move became the leading manufacturer of wet and dry diaphragm.

In March 2017, Asahi Kasei announced an investment of 15 billion yen for the separator for lithium ion secondary batteries (LIB) in Shouyama City, Shiga Prefecture, to achieve a capacity of 200 million square meters per year for lithium battery separators, and is expected to be in 2020. Achieve a production capacity of 1.1 billion square meters / year.

Because the technical barriers of the diaphragm are not low in the production process, there are high requirements for equipment and design, product batch stability and worker proficiency. Therefore, this field is made by Asahi Kasei, Korea SKI, Toray-BSF and Celard. Waiting for the monopoly of the four major companies, the market share is as high as 70%. However, with the increasing demand for lithium batteries, Chinese companies such as Zhangzhou Pearl and Xingyuan Materials are also seeking development as soon as possible to catch up with the rapid development of lithium batteries.

Multi-technology route

More than 20 years ago, when Windows 95 arrived, Yoshino was unable to sleep at night. Today, he is still full of expectations for the development of lithium batteries.

"As far as the lithium battery itself is concerned, it is mainly used in two major fields: one is mobile products, such as mobile phones and computers, which account for about 2/3 of the lithium battery usage; the second largest area is the car battery. The world is changing. The speed is too fast. According to the statistics we have in 2010, the lithium battery for vehicles at that time was almost zero, but now it will reach more than 30%. In the future, this ratio may increase. The emergence of electric vehicles is equal to lithium. The battery opens up a new direction of application and is a new business opportunity."

He does not deny that there are still some weaknesses in the current car battery, but this cannot be attributed to the technical difficulties of the lithium battery itself, and there are some objective reasons. After all, laptop batteries have been in operation for more than 20 years, but the battery life of the car has been used for a short time since it was used. The automotive industry is developing and manufacturing lithium batteries while exploring new models.

On the other hand, a car has been on the market for a long time. It usually takes 5 years from design to offline. A new electric car in 2017 may be designed in 2012, including lithium batteries and other related products. the design of.

On the other hand, this new car is actually an old battery. However, the speed of technology research and development is very fast, and it needs to be updated once in three months. Lithium batteries also have to face this technical problem.

"So, some people think that the cruising range of electric vehicles is still too short, and should be solved as soon as possible. I think lithium batteries do have room for improvement, but you need to understand the development of the car and the periodic characteristics of the battery, give it some time to solve. For example, in 2015, people saw an electric car with a cruising range of about 200 kilometers. By 2020, you may see a model with a battery life of about 400 kilometers. Of course, it is not excluded that individual car companies are better than others in design, R&D and production. Running faster, this is also a staged breakthrough.” Yoshino said that the cruising range will change, and the extent of the change will really be difficult.

There are various types of LIB, and there are various technical routes such as lithium iron phosphate, ternary lithium and lithium titanate.

Yoshino Akira believes that from the endurance distance, the ternary lithium battery still has great advantages, but if the owner and passengers don't care how far the daily distance is, but consider the safety and temperature resistance, then the lithium phosphate battery And lithium titanate battery is indeed a good choice. "You can't say which technology is the strongest, or depends on your performance, safety and other needs for the car, so I feel that the development of lithium batteries is still a multi-technology route for a while."

To make him even more surprised, there is the breakout of the Chinese lithium battery legion. "BYD, CATL and other companies have very strong momentum, and the technical level is also very optimistic," Yoshino said, Japan and China also have some differences in the manufacture of lithium batteries, "the biggest difference is in materials.

Japan's research and development time on materials is longer, because it has accumulated experience in the past, so it is not the same as the recent rise of Chinese manufacturers. Conversely, production assembly, new machines, etc., there is no big difference between the two companies. Another point is more critical, which country and market the lithium battery is used in, what is the local demand, how to catch it. ”

He said that at present, lithium batteries mainly compete in three countries, such as Japan, China and South Korea. It is not excluded that the United States and Europe will also produce. "I think the future needs to be concerned with the European market, and it will have great opportunities."

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