WMG researchers at the University of Warwick will be taking part in a new £65 million national battery research initiative.

The Faraday Institution (FI) — announced recently by Business Secretary Greg Clark — will drive fundamental research in developing battery technologies.

The FI is part of the coordinated activity to meet the Faraday Battery Challenge — announced by the Government in July — to deliver an integrated programme of research, innovation and the scale-up of novel battery technologies.

WMG has been working on battery technologies over the last decade, and it is now home to the National Battery Scale-Up Facility and the APC (Advanced Propulsion Centre) ‘spoke’ in Electrical Energy Storage.

It works in collaboration with industry on areas including electrochemistry, cell manufacturing, pack design and control, and recycling of materials.

Professor Pam Thomas, a founding board member and trustee of the FI, said: “This is an exciting opportunity for the UK’s research community.

This step change in energy storage research will be crucial for the UK’s transportation infrastructure, as policy makers and manufacturers plan for a rapid increase in our use of batteries.”

The first chairman of the Faraday Institution will be Peter Littlewood, who is Professor of Physics at the University of Chicago (and a former head of the Cavendish Laboratory in Cambridge).

He said: “Michael Faraday founded battery science and electrical engines in the 19th century, and the UK led the invention of Li-ion batteries for mobile electronics in the 20th.

“In the 21st, it should lead in the transition to the electrification of vehicles, and then in the convergence of the digital and electrified economy. This is the goal of the FI.”