The latest news from 16 ELBC, Vienna • September 4-7, 2018
A Batteries International publication
16ELBC Opens With a Rallying Call to Arms Full Technical Programme to Open New Business Vistas By Mike Halls Andy Bush, head of the ILA, gave the opening address on Wednesday morning to what may arguably be regarded as the most successful European Lead Battery Conference in its history. The technical programme is probably both the most comprehensive in its history and oddly, given the sea of challenges that the battery industry is facing, the most positive. Bush’s opening remarks quickly surveyed the new industry landscape the battery business is experiencing. “We are facing, right here in Europe — in fact right now during the Austrian presidency of the EU — the very real possibility of regulatory restrictions that could ultimately jeopardize our entire industry,”
he said. “We have to persuade the European Commission of just how much harm these restrictions would do and crucially not just for our own industries but also for the Commission’s very own aspirations to reduce harmful emissions and boost electrification.” Bush said the message
to European legislators is a straightforward one, that “we can help deliver the aspirations set out in Europe’s batteries action plan, that we are a key European industry supporting electrification and decarbonization and we absolutely deserve the right to compete on a level playing field with other technologies and there must not be any attempt to restrict EU lead battery manufacturing through the REACH regulations.” Bush then went on to outline the still evolving position of the ILA, which is working with EUROBAT and Battery Council International on what effectively will probably end as a worldwide campaign endorsing the lead Continued on page 7 >
Standardize Auxiliary Car Batteries — a Must For Lead Industry, Says Workshop Battery makers and OEMs at a special workshop on the eve of the 16ELBC agreed to work together in a joint effort to address technical issues with lead batteries including better testing, functional safety and standardizing auxiliary car batteries. Failure to do so could allow lithium batteries greater penetration of the lead battery market, attendees were told. Improvements are vital now that stop-start batteries have become the norm in new European cars and are becoming more
widely used in North America. The workshop, held on Tuesday before the official opening of the conference the following day, was chaired by Geoffrey May, Focus Consulting, and consultant to the Consortium for Battery Innovation, CBI (the association formerly known as ALABC). The workshop followed previous discussions held by OEMs and battery manufacturers in Spain earlier this year and in Germany in 2017 through the European Committee for Electrotechnical Standardization
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(CENELEC). Also on the panel were Eckhard Karden, technical expert with the Ford Research and Innovation Centre in Germany; Torsten Hildebrandt, who sits on the CENELEC; and Joern Albers, technical leader requirements and standards with Johnson Controls. The workshop also saw a prototype electronic gas analysis system, eGAS, being demonstrated for the first time. For more details of the workshop, turn to page 7.
What’s News n Good night Vienna! 16ELBC opened with a bang as the traditional cocktail reception attracted record figures and a packed conference hall attracted some of the finest in the industry. Excitement was very much the order of the day as anticipation for the conference built up. Pages 4, 5 n Round and about. Battery Street Journal spoke to exhibitors and delegates for news of what’s going on in parts of the conference and views on the industry. Featured here — Abertax, Bertola, Bitrode, EUROBAT, MAC Engineering, Microporous and Wirtz Manufacturing. Page 6, 8, 10 n Workshop review. Now a regular feature of ELBC meetings, the pre-conference workshop continues to focus on some of the more controversial challenges facing the lead battery industry. The subject matter — the need for standardization of the auxiliary batteries in EVs — is all the more important in that a wide range of automotive OEMs will need an industry standard to keep the lead battery business thriving in an often difficult future. The chair was Geoffrey May, FOCUS Consulting. The panel was: Eckhard Karden, Ford; Torsten Hildebrandt, Cenelec; Joern Albers, Johnson Controls. The facilitator was David Rand, CSIRO. Page 7 n The Last Word — Tales of darkness and distress as the debate over the change of name intensifies. Will the Community of Iowa Bankers really be taking the ILA to court? And will they win? The mystery over Maura’s daughter’s wedding continues. Where are the dead bodies being kept? Hmm… strange choice of venue here. Page 11
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THE BATTERY STREET JOURNAL • 16 ELBC, VIENNA • September 4-7, 2018
Traditional ELBC Cocktail Reception
GOOD NIGHT VIENNA “It’s probably the busiest cocktail reception we’ve ever hosted,” one of the conference organizers told the Battery Street Journal. And looking around the packed hall as some 800 delegates mingled with canapés and glasses of beer and wine, it was hard not to disagree, given the sea of faces. “It felt like a Who’s Who of the lead battery business,” said one delegate. “Anyone who is anyone seems to be here. What’s particularly impressive is the fact that the whole industry is represented, from academics to researchers to manufacturers and I’ve even spotted a couple of finance people in the crowd. “That said I do worry that we might run out of drinks!” But as the last drinks were being consumed, speculation was mounting about what would happen at the gala event on Thursday evening. “It’d be very hard to top the last dinner in Malta…. Sitting outside in the warm evening, listening to the opera in the grounds of a 16th century castle,” said another delegate.
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THE BATTERY STREET JOURNAL • 16 ELBC, VIENNA • September 4-7, 2018
Packed With Record Attendance
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THE BATTERY STREET JOURNAL • 16 ELBC, VIENNA • September 4-7, 2018
Abertax Does it Again With Two New Patents Not one but two exciting innovations are being displayed at this year’s ELBC from Abertax Technologies. The first is another advance in the development of GRS valves for VRLA batteries. The second is an improvement to battery monitoring. Both are patented by the Malta-based firm. “Continuous improvement is one of the things that underpin our research approach,” Jo Cilia, managing director of the firm, told Battery Street Journal. “And our two new patents are a result of that thinking.” Abertax, which has teamed up with Accumulux for the first project, has developed a system guaranteeing an equal gas release pressure for all cells within a battery. This eliminates any imbalance of excessive water
loss from particular cells — resulting in an improved battery performance. The second development is a refinement on a wireless communication technique between chargers and batteries. Working with charger manufacturer IEB, the Abertax R&D team has developed a system that identifies which battery is connected to the charging system and automatically transfers the battery information through radio frequency communication. “This wireless connection will simplify the careful control of the right charging regime to optimize quality performance and ensuring the expected lifetime of the battery,” says the firm. Abertax can be found at booth 79 in the exhibition hall.
Market Perspective Positive For Lead Acid, Says Bitrode The entire battery market — both lead and lithium — is on a roll, according to Craig Brunk, sales director for Bitrode Corporation. And oddly enough many in the market are unaware how positive the situation is. “Because Bitrode’s battery testing products are technology neutral, we have an outlook that not all companies involved in energy storage see,” says Brunk. “While 2017 was a hotbed for Indian lead acid battery producers, the 2018 Indian market is changing as they begin looking at the development of lithium cells. “Chinese cell manufacturers continue to grow and dominate in the global market. Chinese cell manufacturers are now expanding manufacturing into North America and Europe. Let’s not forget the push to 48V in the automotive sector and
the upcoming growth that will include the lead battery manufacturers.” Brunk says we are seeing a re-emergence this year from Europe and North American battery producers of large pack batteries seeking to develop batteries in excess of 1500V and 1000A using cells from Asia. “2018 is turning out to be a great year for the energy storage industry, no matter where you play!” Brunk said he was again pleased to attend ELBC. “There is a lot of talk that lead acid batteries are extinct and their manufacturers are going in the same direction, but those of us in the industry know that this isn’t true and it’s good to be here to learn from each other about how new technologies and applications will sustain and grow our industry.”
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THE BATTERY STREET JOURNAL • 16 ELBC, VIENNA • September 4-7, 2018
ELBC Workshop Urges Collaborative Testing, Standardization One of the most important areas to work on for the lead battery industry was standardizing auxiliary batteries, Geoffrey May told Battery Street Journal on the side lines of the workshop.
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ne of the most important areas to work on for the lead battery industry was standardizing auxiliary batteries, Geoffrey May told Battery Street Journal on the side lines of the workshop. The threat that lithium batteries could replace them as auxiliary batteries was a real one, he said. Currently all auxiliary batteries — which operate the electrical systems in cars — are lead, but this is an area the lithium battery industry could well move into. “We want to make sure that going forward, auxiliary batteries used in various forms of hybrid or electric vehicle are always lead,” he said. “For us to ensure this they have to become standardized across the industry, at a lower cost and much higher reliability.” As more electric functions are added to new vehicles, batteries needed to be better and better, said May, and this included their functional safety. “They have to be totally reliable over time,” said May. “As the number of functions increases the level of reliability needed goes up. The battery will become the responsibility of the car manufacturer, and they will have to know that the battery supporting these safety systems is completely reliable.” May said that accurate testing was an issue that needs to be addressed across the industry. On the question of higher water loss in EFBs, May said: “We have discovered that the present high temperature tests do not accurately reflect what happens in actual service. The tests provide the basis for comparing different technologies,
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designs and battery suppliers but real-world conditions and testing are needed to strengthen — and validate — the role of lead-acid batteries in the automotive industry.” Trials have been carried out in Las Vegas, he said, where it has been discovered that water loss rates are lower in practice than in the laboratory. “We need new methods of testing to create a measure of battery durability,” said May. EFBs are used for smaller, high-volume cars and AGM batteries for larger vehicles with more complex electrical systems. Li-ion batteries offer high dynamic charge acceptance — another issue the workshop reiterated was in urgent need of improvement in lead batteries. Lithium batteries are improving in terms of low temperature performance, but still have limitations with operating temperature and a significant cost premium. Immediately after the workshop, Eckhard Karden demonstrated an eGAS prototype, a testing system by measX, for the first time. The system is an electronic gas system that allows online, in-situ measurement and analysis of gas flows emitted by lead batteries. It is being developed under contract to the ALABC.
> Continued from front page
16ELBC Opens With a Rallying Call to Arms battery business. In North America, for example, the US Essential Energy Everyday campaign has been launched and a wider European communication campaign s steadily advancing. It would be wrong to argue, he said, that we are in a simple binary situation of lead versus lithium. There will be room for both chemistries in a variety of markets. “In the future we hear that everything will be connected, everything will be smart, everything will be powered by clean and green energy… everything will be sustainable. And there is a growing recognition that delivering this vision means a huge increase in sustainable energy storage. “But we’re far from the only technology with that vision. Lithium, flow batteries and a host of other technologies are already vying to be the sustainable energy storage technology. “And yes, these other technologies will for sure have a very important role to play. But the sheer scale of battery energy storage demand in the near future – let alone in 20 years’ time – is so great that no single technology will be able to meet it.” Bush’s opening speech was followed, as is usual for the opening morning of the ELBC meetings, by a detailed overview of the lead battery market. David Shaffer, head of EnerSys in the US, gave the keynote presentation ‘Predicting the Future for Lead Acid Batteries’. Delegates’ reaction to this was fascinating. “It was a strange and disturbing vision of what we know already and what we probably wouldn’t have even dreamed about,” said one attendee. “It showed the real need for us to be realistic about the future.”
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THE BATTERY STREET JOURNAL • 16 ELBC, VIENNA • September 4-7, 2018
Continuity as Theme as MAC Engineering Outlines New Senior Management Line-Up The senior line-up at MAC Engineering has changed, as new president Doug Bornas told Batteries Street Journal on the first day of the conference. Julia McClure moves up from being president to take over as chairman after Mike Tole retired last week. Bornas was previously executive vice president. Bornas, who has been with MAC since 1997, says he anticipates
Julie McClure
that there will be a seamless transition for the company. “We’ve all worked together for a long time, there’s a team culture about MAC. It’s always been a family business that looks after its employees and their families, as our own family,” he says. Tole will act as an occasional consultant for the next two years. Bornas says that the firm will be introducing various new
Dan Duffield
is as important as locating it.” MAC Engineering will also be introducing an XY parter for multipanel grids some time in the next six to nine months. Other promotions include Dan Duffield, who becomes executive vice president. He has been with the firm even longer than Bornas, joining the company in 1984. Thomas Isbrecht becomes senior director of sales.
Tom Isbacht
Gert Meylemans Appointed Head of PR at EUROBAT Gert Meylemans, former head of PR and corporate communications at the tyre company Bridgestone Europe, has been appointed senior manager of communications at EUROBAT, the European battery manufacturers’ association. Since leaving Bridgestone in 2016, Meylemans worked as a communications consultant for CLEPA, the European automotive suppliers’ association, and before that Propel RC, a drone manufacturer which makes, among other machines, Star Wars battle drones. “There’s a lot of stuff coming our way, with legislation, and there’s lots of work to be done in the near future so I am going to be spreading the message, getting the industry on the map,” Meylemans told Battery Street Journal.
products to the market in the coming months. “Typically some 50% of our engineering time is spent on research and development. We should be revealing a new flash dry oven in the next two to three months. We’ll be launching an automated inline plate reject system before the end of the year, we’re pleased with this because the ability to reject a faulty plate
“There will be a lot of focus and attention on batteries, it’s a natural revolution and we need the resources and manpower to meet the need.”
Doug Bornas speaking to Battery Street Journal editor Mike Halls on Tuesday
Bertola Appoints New President and CEO Battery equipment manufacturing firm Bertola has appointed Gianni Montaldi as president and CEO, stepping in beside Vittorio Bertola, who remains as president. Bertola, which makes rectifiers and formation equipment and lab testing equipment, has also moved its administration operations to Kilkenny, Ireland, while production facilities are remaining in Italy.
“We’re glad the younger generation is coming in and continuing our line of products, which we have had for the past 75 years,” said sales director Claudio Gaeta. “Philip Larkin has also stepped in to help with sales.” The company says younger staff have been added to the Italy-based team to help develop new advanced products ‘to better meet market expectations and emerging technologies’.
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THE BATTERY STREET JOURNAL • 16 ELBC, VIENNA • September 4-7, 2018
Microporous Reveals New DuroForce Separator Microporous announced at !6ELBC yesterday (Wednesday) the introduction of DuroForce ULR, a new Ultra Low Resistance battery separator designed specifically to increase the power of EFB batteries for start-stop applications. “We’re using a blend of highly engineered silica and Ultra high molecular weight polyethylene ULR with a backweb of 250 microns, which has an electrical resistance that is industry leading at only 40 milli-ohm cm2,” George Brilmyer, a director of
R&D at Microporous, told Battery Street Journal. “In creating DuroForce ULR, Microporous has succeeded in matching the electrical resistance of thinner, 150 micron separator products without compromising the mechanical or chemical properties. “The tensile strength, elongation and puncture resistance of ULR is designed for high speed battery manufacturing, as well as exemplary performance under the demanding conditions of EFB operation.”
Wirtz Introduces Thin Gauge Strip Caster Wirtz Manufacturing Company announced on Wednesday that it was launching a new product line called the Thin Gauge Strip Caster. This casts strip at a thickness of 5mm. This strip is then reduced through two rolling mills to its final thickness for punched grids. The strip is cast using a completely enclosed lead delivery system and a patent-pending feed nozzle, which guarantees dross-free strip of the highest quality. ‘The Wirtz strip caster main-
tains complete control through each stage in the casting process, thereby providing a flexible platform that can be optimized to handle casting parameters for both common and exotic grid alloys,” said John Wirtz, the company head. “It is designed to be easily serviced without the use of heavy equipment, with the casting drums measuring less than 40cm in diameter.” The strip caster is similar in size to the Wirtz Continuous Caster.
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The last word
THE BATTERY STREET JOURNAL • 15 ELBC, Malta • September 13-16, 2016
Home o the RE f AL CBI
Community Bankers of Iowa to Sue ILA over branding The Community Bankers of Iowa are up in arms over the recent name change of the ALABC. “We understand that ALABC is a bit of a mouthful, but those ILA fellows — International Literary Association — can’t steal our branding like that. Be warned the Community Bankers of Iowa are made of stern stuff. We will sue.” Separately the Caribbean Basin Initiative is taking legal advice on the name change.
Wedding bell blues… but where in Ireland? Maura McDermott, best-known for being the key figure in protecting the location of the next ELBC venue until the very last moment, is up to her old tricks again. “Not even if I were being tortured on a rack would I reveal where the next ELBC will be held,” she has been quoted as saying. So, up to her old tricks again? Yes, a week after we finish ELBC, she’ll be attending her daughter Efa’s wedding to Antony in Ireland. Our question about the location of the festivities received a chilling rebuke. “I’m not even telling the guests,” she glared. “So why should I tell you?” The ILA insider who told Battery Street Journal that the secret location might be Markree Castle near Sligo disappeared on Tuesday. No body has yet been discovered.
16ELBC: LOCATION UNcertaiN You wouldn’t think it was that difficult to recognise the word ‘Vienna’ or ‘Austria’ but when our designer told a friend he was going to a conference in Vienna, the friend replied: “Oh it’s really nice there. Make sure you take a trip on a gondola!” Later our roving reporter told a friend she was going to Austria and she was advised to watch out for the kangaroos.
16ELBC Please, driver! Overheard outside the confusingly coincidental shop opposite Messe Wien: “Are you sure this is the place? Seems a bit small this year!”
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