NMC
Also known as: NCM
Nickel manganese cobalt: more energy per kilogram, fewer cycles, and cobalt in a share that depends on the generation. In European residential storage it is giving way to LFP.
What changes for you
It is the lightest chemistry per unit of energy among those used in residential products, which is why it sits in compact products and in cars. The price is paid in lifespan: the Sandia lab measured between 200 and 2,500 equivalent cycles on NMC cells against 2,500–9,000 on LFP, and found that NMC ages faster by calendar time and suffers more from being left fully charged at rest and from depth of discharge. If the battery sits charged for weeks, this is the chemistry that pays for it.
In the cold it has the same limit as every cell with a graphite anode: it does not charge below zero, because the lithium deposits as metal on the anode instead of intercalating into it. Discharge goes down to −20 °C, with reduced capacity.
On cobalt the product sheet cannot tell you how much there is: the JRC describes the sequence of generations, from NMC111 to NMC811, as "ever less cobalt and more nickel", and the manufacturer of a storage unit rarely states which one it uses. From 2031 the EU regulation will impose minimum quotas of recycled cobalt, nickel and lithium on precisely these cells.
The data
| Contains lithium | yes |
|---|---|
| Contains cobalt | yes |
| UN number for transport | UN 3480 / 3481 |
What the products in the catalogue declare
No product in the catalogue uses this chemistry, today.
The cathode is an oxide of lithium, nickel, manganese and cobalt; the anode graphite. The proportions among the three metals give the generation its name (111, 622, 811) and change the energy, cost and thermal stability.
On safety, measurements from KIT Karlsruhe show that NMC and LFP start self-heating at the same temperature, around 90 °C, but NMC then reaches 731 °C at 7,577 °C per minute against LFP's 259 °C and 3 °C per minute, releasing three times the heat. The Technical University of Munich, on automotive NMC-811 cells, measures a reaction nine times faster than on LFP. It is not "dangerous": it is a chemistry that needs more electronics and more protection around it, and serious manufacturers put them there.
In Europe we have not reached a residential datasheet that declares it: manufacturers who use it tend not to write it down, and this entry records that as a silence, not as an absence. In portable power stations, first-generation products used it and the newer versions have moved to LFP.
Related entries
Frequently asked questions
How many products in the catalogue use NMC?
No product in the catalogue uses this chemistry, today.