Applications of nickel metal hydride batteries keep paces with Ni-MH battery technology development and its market capacity change.
Ni-MH battery was firstly become industrialization. Ni-MH battery in early stage was mostly used on laptops and mobile phones. However, since commercialization of lithium-ion battery in the 1990s, lithium battery has gradually occupied the market of portable electric devices, even the communication field.
Yet, current ni-mh battery price is lower than li-ion battery and safety performance is better than lithium battery. Therefore, some laptops start to reuse nimh battery. For these two advantages, nickel metal hydride battery is partly re-used on power tools, digital cameras, electric vehicles, mobile phone and UPS.
In terms of applicability, excellent low-temperature performance makes Ni-MH battery suitable for high-current discharge. Accordingly, Ni-MH battery pack equipped has been used on portable electric devices with application fields covering portable printer, mobile tool, digital product, medical device, remote communication device, LCD TV, communication equipment, laser equipment, meter, power tool, etc.
Due to high energy density, high power, no pollution, ni-mh battery is also applicable to be used as power battery. Some manufacturers have developed Ni-MH batteries for electric vehicle, electric motorcycle and electric bicycle. These features have expanded to military field and applied on communication backup power, space technology, robot and submarine.
In China, Ni-MH battery has fast developed. In 2066, China produced 1.3 billion Ni-MH batteries and became world No 1 manufacturer instead of Japan. This is because our country possesses world’s 70% rare earth reserves, which is main raw material for cathode hydrogen storage alloy of nimh battery.