A group of students from Tomsk University of Control Systems and Radio Electronics (TUSUR) has just won a prize at the Students’ Innovative Business Ideas contest and will also receive a $13+k grant as a winner of the national U.M.N.I.K. competition for young researchers that focus on innovation, portal Tomsk Innovation Forum reports.

The team led by Semyon Shkarupo, a third-year student from TUSUR’s radio design department, is working on a new high-efficiency battery. At the heart of the technology is a whole new approach to storing energy by absorbing ambient oxygen in battery discharge and oxygen release in battery charge.

Unlike the most widespread lithium-ion batteries the prospective battery has no chemically aggressive substances. To build one no costly materials like lithium are required, so the innovation will be very competitively priced.

An analog of such a battery was first developed back in the 1990s but is now only used as a non-rechargeable source of energy for hearing aids (thrown away after discharge).

The TUSUR project is believed to focus primarily on developing batteries for electric vehicles. “The batteries we’re working on take full advantage of their large capacity and low cost. With a price of today’s electric vehicle topping $30,000 such an auto can only run for a maximum of a hundred kilometers as it has a conventional battery. If we fine-tune and launch our new battery, this will halve the price of an electric vehicle while enabling a 300km run without recharge,” Mr. Shkarupo said.

Tomsk regional business is said to have expressed interest in TUSUR’s innovation and might provide additional financial support for the project team.