MIPT: Ultralight Battery

2024: Development of an ultralight bataria

Specialists from the Institute of Electric Propulsion of the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology have developed a battery for the Oryol manned transport ship. The project is being implemented under an agreement between the university and the rocket and space corporation Energia. The battery is in the ultralight class and weighs only 30 kg. For comparison: similar in power and design energy storage devices have a mass of about 43 kg. The university announced this on June 18, 2024.

The Oryol CAS is designed to deliver people and cargo to space stations to Earth orbit, and is also one of the key elements of the existing Russian lunar program. It should replace the manned ships of the Soyuz series. According to RSC Energia, the spacecraft will be able to be part of the orbital station in low Earth orbit (LEO) for up to a year, as well as up to 180 days as part of the near-moon station. In autonomous flight, a modification for LEO is able to stay up to 30 days, and lunar - up to 10.

In the process of implementing the project, a prototype of the Oryol CAS battery was created at the Institute of Electric Propulsion of MIPT. To determine the appearance of the energy storage, engineers used computer modeling technologies with the development of a digital product twin. The use of this technology has significantly reduced the time and cost of laboratory working tests.

source = MIPT

A total of 48 parallel connected high energy lithium-ion batteries, which have been specifically designed for use in the battery, are installed inside the battery. These batteries are resistant to external influencing factors of outer space - vacuum and temperature differences. In addition to the battery unit, an electronics unit is located inside the battery. The external case provides resistance to mechanical loads, - added Oleg Arkhipenkov, chief designer of the product.

The energy storage created at MIPT is 10% higher in terms of capacity to mass ratio than foreign analogues of SpaceX. Despite this, the MIPT team of engineers does not intend to stop there - it is planned to bring this indicator in terms of specific energy to about 30% compared to similar batteries for Elon Musk's Dragon V2 device.

The developers emphasize: the decrease in mass did not in any way affect the strength and energy efficiency of the battery, while contributing to the overall decrease in the mass of the spacecraft. The energy storage is designed for at least 4 flights into space, with recharging after each of them.

When we compared the characteristics of our battery with the technical characteristics of a similar battery from SpaceX, then in terms of specific energy we still exceed them by 10%, but as part of the phased work on the project for this indicator, we will overtake them by almost a third. Specific energy is the ratio of energy that is stored in a battery to its mass. It is measured in Watt hours divided by kilograms. The battery for the spacecraft developed by our Institute stores 4930 Watt hours. Therefore, with a mass of 30 kg, its specific energy is 164 Watt-hours per kilogram, - said Oleg Arkhipenkov.

In 2024, MIPT employees plan to complete the cycle of ground development of the battery. After that, the prototypes will be handed over to the customer for comprehensive tests as part of the model of the manned transport ship "Eagle."

For preparatory and verification operations, including servicing the battery between flights at the Vostochny cosmodrome, control and testing equipment has been developed and manufactured, which also allows simulating batteries for long-term inspections of the entire spacecraft.