Prieto battery develops fast-charge lithium battery

FORT COLLINS — Concerned about having to wait while your car battery recharges when making the cross-country vacation trip? Those days may soon be over.

A Fort Collins battery development company has unveiled a prototype lithium-ion battery that recharges in three minutes in both low and high temperatures.

Prieto Battery Inc., founded by Amy Prieto, released information about the battery this morning. In addition to the fast charge, it operates in both extremely low (minus 22 degrees Fahrenheit) and high (212 degrees fahrenheit) as well as being nonflammable.

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The attributes of the new battery were tested and validated by a third party accredited battery testing lab, the company said in a press statement.

“Prieto’s battery will charge faster than you can fill your car’s gas tank,” Mike Rosenberg, Prieto CEO, said in a written statement. “When you charge your car faster than gassing up, range is no longer a hindrance and everyone becomes a potential EV buyer.

“A three-minute charge fundamentally changes how companies can design their products and how consumers use them,” he said.

“Prieto’s battery is the only battery that we are aware of that will not only operate, but will also charge at -30 degrees Celsius,” said Rosenberg. “As we learned this past winter when extreme cold weather hit North America, many people were left stranded with dead EVs. Our battery would have allowed these EVs to continue to operate and charge, instilling confidence in drivers to rely on their EVs even in extreme temperatures.”

The company said that unlike most traditional lithium-ion batteries that can catch on fire, the battery is not flammable or combustible. A third-party lab conducted the “nail penetration test” on Prieto’s battery that resulted in no fire or explosion, and the battery continued to operate.

“Our founder, Dr. Amy Prieto, reimagined the entire architecture of a conventional battery and developed the first 3D interdigitated battery,” said Rosenberg. “We’re introducing a better architecture and a better process, which results in a better battery and a superior consumer experience. This is truly the next evolution that will redefine the way we power our lives.”

The company said most batteries today use “decades-old 2D architecture that must always compromise between energy storage and fast charging. In 2D batteries, energy can flow only in one direction across a two-dimensional plane. To charge, lithium ions must flow from one surface to the other. Thicker 2D batteries store more energy, but the long ion pathways result in slow charging. Thinner 2D batteries can charge faster but cannot store much energy.”

“We’ve dramatically shortened the diffusion length in any direction, which takes charging to hyper-speed and delivers more power and energy storage than 2D batteries,” Prieto, who in addition to being founder of the company also is chief technology officer, said in a written statement. “The core of our battery looks like a thin copper sponge, and the ions have to travel only from one strand to the next, a fraction of the distance in traditional 2D batteries.”

The battery can be customized to use with electric vehicles, power tools, medical devices or mobile phones.

Prieto is in discussions for manufacturing and applications with potential partners, the company said.Three years ago, Prieto signed a deal to develop batteries for a new generation of pickup trucks.