Batteries are essential to electrifying our global economy, powering growth and reducing greenhouse gas emissions. But the popular lithium batteries that charge everything from our phones and laptops to electric vehicles and renewable energy storage systems have been plagued by several challenges: They’re made from minerals that are rare and expensive, there is no good way to recycle them, and they run the risk of starting a fire.
The Center for Organic Battery Innovation (COBI), based at the University of Chicago’s Institute for Climate and Sustainable Growth, is pursuing a fundamentally different approach: batteries built from earth-abundant organic materials rather than scarce metals like lithium, cobalt, and nickel. By replacing critical minerals with carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, and nitrogen—the same elements found in air, water, and all living things—COBI is developing next-generation organic batteries that promise to be safer, cheaper, and recyclable. These improvements go beyond incremental gains and could unlock large new markets that are currently constrained by supply chains, cost and safety.
“We’re not just improving batteries. We’re redefining the basic architecture of energy storage,” said Center Director Shrayesh Patel, Associate Professor at UChicago’s Pritzker School of Molecular Engineering. “By using organic materials, we can build batteries that are inherently non-flammable, rely on earth-abundant, carbon-based molecular building blocks rather than critical metals, and can be potentially fully recycled back into new batteries. This is a significant opportunity in the global energy transition.”
Three forces are converging to make this the right moment for COBI’s efforts. First, global battery demand is projected to increase up to 14-fold by 2030, yet the critical minerals that power today’s batteries are concentrated in a handful of countries, subject to price volatility, and mined with significant environmental and human impact. These supply constraints are forcing automakers, utilities, and governments to seek immediate alternatives to lithium-ion. Second, breakthroughs in organic chemistry and artificial intelligence (AI) are allowing for new battery designs and testing at a quicker pace. Finally, significant capital is moving toward new energy solutions, with battery technology at the top of many investors’ agendas. These forces converge just as the world works to limit climate change while expanding economic growth. Batteries are essential to supporting the clean energy and electric vehicles needed to confront both challenges.
World-Class Science, Built to Commercialize
Patel’s team brings together scientists, engineers, and business strategists from UChicago and Argonne National Laboratory, including Rajeev Assary (Materials Science Division), Laura Gagliardi (Chemistry and Molecular Engineering), Pedro Lopes (Computer Science), Y. Shirley Meng (Molecular Engineering), and Anna Wuttig (Chemistry). Doug Weinberg, a UChicago alumnus and entrepreneur, serves as the Center’s co-director, leading commercial translation.
The team will operate out of new UChicago Pritzker School of Molecular Engineering laboratories built at Hyde Park Labs, equipped with dry rooms, high-throughput robotic synthesis, and integrated testing facilities. Combined with access to Argonne’s Advanced Photon Source and computational resources, COBI can iterate from molecular design to working prototypes with shorter development cycles.
“Traditional battery development could take decades because of the complexity of materials science,” explained Weinberg. “We’re combining AI-driven discovery with world-class facilities to compress the timeline to move breakthroughs from the lab to production.”
Graduate and undergraduate students and postdoctoral researchers work alongside faculty at every stage, from molecular design to prototype development, gaining experience that bridges research and commercialization. “Graduate students and postdoctoral researchers don’t just publish papers—they help build the technologies and companies that will power a sustainable future,” says Patel.
The Center for Organic Battery Innovation is supported by the Institute for Climate and Sustainable Growth’s Venture Fund.