High Voltage: Lithium metal batteries may be better than ion; if they only stopped exploding

Each week our High Voltage column wraps all the news driving ASX battery metals stocks with exposure to lithium, cobalt, graphite, manganese and vanadium.

INDUSTRY FOCUS

“The capacity of conventional lithium-ion batteries has been developed almost as far as it can go,” Stanford PhD student David Mackanic said.

The industry’s solution? Lithium metal batteries. But there’s one problem, they keep exploding into fiery blazes in lab testing just as raw lithium metal does.

Researchers are looking into ways to solve this. One solution is coating, which reduces chemical buildup on anodes — the positively charged end of the battery.

Beyond this, a lithium metal battery could be more efficient. It is lighter yet holds at least a third more power per pound than lithium-ion.

The sector continues to look hot long-term, but short-term isn’t so pretty thanks to oversupply.

According to Mineral Intelligence, only $US34m ($50.6m) was raised by battery metals players across the major exchanges in Q2 2019. This was less than 5 per cent then the $US801m raised in Q2 2018.

SMALL CAP SPOTLIGHT

In the last week in the batteries metals sector, 34 stocks gained, 72 stocks lost ground and 44 were unchanged.

Alloy Resources (ASX:AYR) has a cobalt project in New South Wales, but it was an updated resource update at its WA gold project that gave it a boost.

Michael Schwarz has departed cobalt explorer Northern Cobalt (ASX:N27) and remaining directors agreed to a 50 per cent pay cut. It’s 43 per cent higher than last week.

Hannans (ASX:HNR) announced the next phase of drilling at its lithium project had begun. Its project lies directly adjacent to Earl Gray, one of the most significant hard rock lithium deposits globally.

Other winners, albeit without news, included Pepinnini Lithium (ASX:PNN), Jindalee Resources (ASX:JRL) and Walkabout Resources (ASX:WKT).

Here’s a table of ASX battery metal stocks with exposure to lithium, cobalt, graphite, manganese and vanadium>>>

Scroll or swipe to reveal table. Click headings to sort. Best viewed on a laptop: