Battery storage is becoming an increasingly popular addition to solar energy systems. Two of the most common battery chemistry types are lithium-ion and lead acid. As their names imply, lithium-ion batteries are made with the metal lithium, while lead-acid batteries are made with lead. How do lithium-ion and lead acid batteries work?
Flow batteries are heavier than lithium ion batteries and they also take up more space due to their considerably sized tanks. In comparison, lithium ion batteries are more portable and won’t take up as much of your space.
The LIB outperform the lead-acid batteries. Specifically, the NCA battery chemistry has the lowest climate change potential. The main reasons for this are that the LIB has a higher energy density and a longer lifetime, which means that fewer battery cells are required for the same energy demand as lead-acid batteries. Fig. 4.
In general, lead-acid batteries generate more impact due to their lower energy density, which means a higher number of lead-acid batteries are required than LIB when they supply the same demand. Among the LIB, the LFP chemistry performs worse in all impact categories except minerals and metals resource use.
Finally, for the minerals and metals resource use category, the lithium iron phosphate battery (LFP) is the best performer, 94% less than lead-acid. So, in general, the LIB are determined to be superior to the lead-acid batteries in terms of the chosen cradle-to-grave environmental impact categories.
Lithium-ion batteries are lighter and more compact than lead-acid batteries for the same energy storage capacity. For example, a lead-acid battery might weigh 20-30 kilograms (kg) per kWh, while a lithium-ion battery could weigh only 5-10 kg per kWh.