TEST & ANALYSIS
With its roots dating back to 2009, University College
London’s Electrochemical Innovation Lab (EIL), has
grown to become one of the largest academic
electrochemical research groups in the world, and is
home to more than 70 researchers. The EIL has
recently opened a new lab on the theme of forensic and diagnostic
examination of electrochemical power systems and it is about to launch
the Advanced Propulsion Lab (APL) to tackle the challenges of
electrifying the transport sector.
Despite the electrifi cation movement seemingly evolving at a dizzying
pace, the progress of electrochemical power systems has been relatively
slow compared with other industries. Professor Paul Shearing, codirector
of the EIL, contrasts this progress to the famously rapid growth
of the semiconductor industry and describes how it could serve as a
model for electrochemical power sources.
“In 1965, Intel co-founder Gordon E. Moore observed that the number
of components in integrated circuits grows at an exponential rate with
time. ‘Moore’s law’ was subsequently coined to describe the
phenomenon that the number of transistors doubles approximately
every two years. To achieve these sustained rates of improvement, the
www.electrichybridvehicletechnology.com // July 2019 // 129
/www.electrichybridvehicletechnology.com