electrified.veronika

Today I’m at the opening of the Matthew‘s Development Center in Vreden, Germany — kicking off the Energy Summit 2025. 🤩

Matthews Engineering brought together an amazing group of professionals from OEMs, battery cell makers, R&D, and academia. We’re here to talk technology and processes, see the machines in action, and exchange ideas.

I’m honored to give the keynote and guide the audience through two full days — with expert sessions, panel discussions, and a guided tour of the new machines and tools.

Today’s focus: battery cell manufacturing, specifically electrode production — the most energy- and cost-intensive step. Sessions ranging from powder processing and transfer coating to new architectures and smart current collectors. The red thread → how dry electrode processes can scale across chemistries to enable robust, high-quality battery cells.

Really looking forward to learning from the experts and continuing the discussions. And a big thank you to the Matthews team for creating a place where ideas can be tested and scaled — from lab to real production. 🔋

On our way back from this year’s International Battery Seminar – and wow, what a week.

This year felt different in the best way: the conversations were more intentional, more focused, and genuinely meaningful. Without the noise that sometimes comes with massive trade shows, the connections we made here were thoughtful, insightful, and full of substance. A big thank you to everyone we had the chance to speak with — familiar faces and so many new ones, too.

Three quick personal highlights:

1. My interview with Celina Mikolajczak

Chief Battery Technology Officer at Lyten.
Celina truly stood out as someone deeply committed to making the right kind of impact in the battery industry — no hype, just solid action. I can’t wait to share more from that interview soon!

2. A next-level VR/real-world experience at the IKA – Laboratory, Analytical and Process Technology and Dec Group booth.

Imagine walking virtually through a cell manufacturing line, seeing inside each machine, and understanding exactly what’s going on — while the actual mixers and equipment stand right there next to you. This was one of the moat impressive demonstrations of technology and accessibility I’ve seen at a show like this. It made the complex tangible.

3. A noticeable focus on battery recycling.

There was a clear emphasis on battery recycling this year-more than I have seen in past editions of the show. The conversations around it had a sense of urgency but also revealed hoch much unclarity exists: what’s happening in the market, when action is needed and how exactly we do it.

Next week, I’ll share a deeper dive into the trends, technologies, and takeaways from the show — especially around battery recycling and scouting innovations, as we gear up for the launch of Electrification Academy in just a few weeks.

Let’s keep the momentum going.

And all at a sudden I am the conference chair 😅🤩 Looking forward to this amazing battery conference in Barcelona and thanks to for their trust 🤩😍

Probably the most personal conversation I’ve had in public! 😱 Link in bio

I recently had the honor of joining , , and for a discussion on „The Role of Women in STEM“ during ‘ „From the Workbench“ series. We shared our unique paths, challenges, and successes in fields traditionally dominated by men.

I never expected to find so much in common with these amazing women! 🤩 We all discovered a love for science and technology early on, faced and overcame big challenges, and stayed resilient in pursuing our passions. We each had moments of inspiration from role models or pivotal experiences that pushed us to succeed.

Seeing others „like me“ has always been a big source of inspiration for me. This is why I want to be visible and inspire the next generations.

„Keep exploring and trying new things. You never know what you might end up loving or how you might impact the world.“ Remember, it’s okay to change your path and combine your talents in unique ways.

Thank you to Texas Instruments for hosting this enriching conversation. Let’s continue to support and inspire each other in STEM!

Aurelia Academy Your Tomorrow

A guy stopped by and thought I was “mechanically inclined” as he just saw the truck from behind and me “working on it”. He started laughing so hard when he saw what I really did 😂

New use case for the frunk, . Anybody else tried that yet? 😂 Extremely convenient!

One year with our F-150 Lightning deserves a thorough review. 😊🔋 Was it the right choice? Find the link to the article in bio.

Topics covered:

➡️ WHY we got an electric truck and what we are USING it for  
➡️ What RANGE we get with the truck here in the Midwest and how it matters to us
➡️ How we CHARGE our electric truck at home and at work, and how much it costs
➡️ ROAD TRIPS with the truck and DC fast charging cost and infrastructure in the Midwest
➡️ Performance of our truck in the Midwest WINTER
➡️ SUSTAINABILITY thoughts about electric trucks

Any more questions and we are happy to answer 😊

I love working in the battery and EV industry! 🔋❤️ Had such a great time last week at the EV battery reuse and recycle conference in Detroit ♻️

Sharing my thoughts, ideas, concerns and my vision with other colleagues from industry and research is what I am so passionate about - because I want to see this industry succeed in a way that it makes sense for our society, economy and the planet. This is possible if we keep being cautious, question the status quo and look for the right solutions.

Battery lifecycle management is one of my core consulting areas - developing business models and finding the right technology to create the “best life” of a battery from production throughout its use in EVs or stationary energy storage to recycling. Still a new developing field with lots of uncertainties and open questions - and this is what makes me so excited! ☺️🤩

Happy to be part of this community and to drive this field forward!

How can we ELECTRIFY huge machineries like excavators, construction equipment and agriculture machines? With a Kreisel BATTERY and IMMERSION cooling! 🔋💡

My highlight at CES 2023 was the all-electric battery-powered EXCAVATOR by John Deer. While the excavator is a prototype, the battery is a commercial product by an Austrian company called Kreisel. 🤩

Some battery tech specs:
➡️ 400V battery packs with 21700 cylindrical battery cells and NMC cathode chemistry
➡️ One pack is 63kWh and can be connected in series or parallel to achieve 400V and 800V systems, respectively. They can be stacked vertically or horizontally, allowing extremely flexible integration (a huge benefit)
➡️ The cells are immersion-cooled: a patented technology by Kreisel for highly efficient cooling and heating.
➡️ You can see in the third picture that each cylindrical cell is surrounded by a black "Hollowblock" that provides a direct interface between the cell's outer surface and a non-conducting fluid that either cools or heats the batteries. Impressive to me that this does not leak 😂
➡️ This efficient thermal management makes the battery have a longer life, charge faster and allow high performance over its lifetime.

My CONCLUSION:
➡️ When we talk about the latest and greatest EV and battery technology, it's usually about "better" battery CELL chemistry and higher ENERGY DENSITY. I believe that relevant innovations and significant improvements can also be made in integration, thermal management and all these seemingly "underrated" topics.
➡️ Another example where this seems to be true is the Qilin battery that CATL announced. In that case, the battery cell (chemistry) is less relevant than the overall integration/thermal concept.

By the way, Arnold Schwarzenegger uses a Kreisel battery in his custom all-electric Hummer! Did I mention that I am from Austria? 😅

Do we really need WIRELESS EV home CHARGING robots? 🔋🤖

➡️ CES 2023: Stellantis is the first automaker that announces its own wireless charging robot to charge the electric RAM truck INDUCTIVELY.
➡️ Don’t be misled by the word “WIRELESS” though. As the picture shows, the self-driving robot is connected to a stationary wall box base with a cable: so when the robot drives to get underneath the truck, it drags a cable along.
➡️ The robot can provide up to 7kW of power and can be programmed to charge on off-peak hours when the price of electricity is lower.

This technology is supposed to make home charging more EFFORTLESS and more CONVENIENT. Well, would it?

Thinking about our own home charging experience, I am skeptical:
➡️ We have a simple AC home charger from Emporia. The box is installed inside, and the charging cable is very long, reaching outside and into our other garage. We recently installed a mount on the outside for the charging handle and most of the times you will find the cable running underneath the garage door outside to this handle.
➡️ In the beginning, we parked inside, but now we park our EVs in front of the garage - in the mud and snow - since our garage is filled with the one or other EV conversion project. 😅
➡️ Plugging the charging cable into our EV takes a few seconds and has become a habit. So far, there was only one time we forgot to plug in, which was at the very beginning of our EV ownership. It is very flexible for us to park the truck wherever we want – with the only limiting factor being the length of the charging cable.
➡️ I also allows easy charging for our guests with different EV brands.

I can see how inductive charging in general could benefit public parking/charging as well as charging in an apartment complex - or taking it a bit into the future, maybe charging while driving on the road - BUT do we need a robot for home charging?

Will we find SOLID STATE batteries in EVs earlier than we thought? 🔋 I DON'T think so...

Stellantis unveiled their electric RAM truck at CES 2023 with a battery pack consisting of solid-state batteries by Factorial. How serious is this?

Some tech specs first:
➡️ 2 electric motors: one in the front, one in the back
➡️ 800V battery pack – skateboard design, no range info but pack looks extremely small – higher voltage means lower current at same power and reduced thermal losses and faster charging - the way to go
➡️ DC fast charging with up to 350kW – that’s faster than state of the art but definitely the trend, AC wireless home charging with an inductive charging robot up to 7kW

Solid-State Battery by FACTORIAL:
➡️ The concept showed very long solid-state pouch cells - I think they are arranged in 2 columns. You can also see small pads between the cells (not clear if thermal or mechanical purpose or both)
➡️ You may know that there are many types of solid-state batteries - and depending on these "details," the integration of the cells in real applications is very different (video coming soon!)
➡️ To my knowledge, Factorial is developing solid-state batteries with a lithium metal anode that requires very high mechanical pressure to function and also expands in volume upon charging (maybe by >10%?)
➡️ My conclusion: the pouch cells need to be mechanically compressed but also allow for volume change during charging and discharging – the shown concept does not seem to account for those integration steps

MY CONCLUSION: This concept is far from a real product and I would predict that the first electric RAMs will be launched with standard lithium-ion batteries with liquid electrolyte and an LFP cathode.

This is how a battery management looks like - several 100 chips! It’s such an important part of an electric car. 🔋🚗 Range prediction, state of charge determination, charging and safety - all of this is to a large extend controlled by the BMS - even wireless if you want. HOW? Learn the basics in our video on YouTube 😍 I had the best time together with the team from at .

I am at with for their new product launch - a high voltage battery management system! 🤩🔋 Here is some “behind the scenes” of our content production. Sooo much fun with the TI Studios production team - the video with all tech details will go live in a couple days on my YouTube channel. If you are at CES let me know! ☺️🙌