Toshiba wants EV battery business, 3M lithium cells/month in 2010
It's looking increasingly likely that plug-in vehicles will not entirely bring America energy independence, at least not in terms of energy storage. The fact that American business over the last couple of years seems to have largely given up on manufacturing in favor of being a service economy means that we will continue to depend on the likes of Japan and China for our battery needs. The latest company to chase the potential bonanza represented by plug-in vehicles is Toshiba. The consumer electronics company plans to spend $194 million to expand production of its super charge ion batteries (SCiB) to 3 million cells per month in 2010. That's an increase from the current 150,000 cells per month. The goal is to capture a significant chunk of the market for electric and plug-in hybrid batteries. Toshiba's SCiB cells use a lithium titanate chemistry similar to those from American company Altairnano, although it's not known if the Japanese company uses a similar nano-particle construction technique. The titanate batteries are more stable than the metal oxide batteries used in most consumer electronics making them safer and able to withstand higher charge rates. However, they have a lower energy density, reducing potential range. Charge rates are also limited by the charging infrastructure, meaning most users won't be able to achieve the fast charge capabilities of the battery.
[Source: Automotive News - Sub. req'd]
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Shane Schofield 8:43PM (10/21/2008)
Importing batteries is different from importing oil. The energy will be generated locally. If they decide to cut off supply of batteries, we have the option to start producing them ourselves.
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jeremie 10:44PM (10/21/2008)
Very well said...
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ziv 9:01AM (10/22/2008)
Shane nailed it. Being able to produce our own energy via coal, nuclear, wind, solar, hydro, tidal, etc... is huge. $700,000,000,000 a year is leaving the US for imported oil. The vast majority of oil use is for transport. If we can cut oil imports in half within a few decades it changes the global trade balance in a fundamental fashion. If we begin to cut our oil imports even slightly, freeing up global oil supplies even a bit, it will send a price signal to commodities traders dampening oil futures speculation.
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Rave Dome 11:14AM (10/22/2008)
The real question in my head is the question of sustainability. Are these batteries recyclable into useful lithium batteries once they die? Or are we dealing with another scarce resource that will quickly disappear. Lead Acid batteries are a real success story in terms of being a source of recyclable energy storage. Are Lithium batteries going to be sustainable in this way? There is only so much lithium in the world.
Electric cars do at lease gives us flexibility to generate the mobility with any energy source that we have. Instead of being locked into petroleum. But its not more efficient, or less polluting (if coal is used).
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ziv 2:13PM (10/22/2008)
Lithium is recycleable, but that isn't as important as the fact that A123 batteries will last years as the battery in your car, then will be used for years as a back up power source in your garage, or you can sell them to someone else if your car lasts longer than your battery pack. If my 16kWh battery pack is only giving me 30 miles all electric range in 2021, I will probably put it in my garage and let my home wind generator top it off during the day while me and the Volt (with its new, lighter, higher capacity 24 kWh battery pack) are at work. That way, when I get home, if there has been a power failure, I will have days worth of electricity that can be used to power my appliances. If and when the original pack finally wears out, I can get paid to have it recycled.
Lithium will never be the only solution to BEV battery packs, it will be a part of a range of battery types we will be able to choose from.
And there is plenty of lithium _The total amount of lithium recoverable from global reserves has been estimated at 35 million tonnes, which includes 15 million tonnes of the known global lithium reserve base_
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithium
Rave Dome 2:35PM (10/22/2008)
That sounds like a lot of lithium. Thanks for the reply. its good to find a blog like this. I have trouble with some of your ideas though. Allow me to be skeptical without being negative and with the highest hopes of getting myself off of oil. My questions are below;
Where are you seeing that lithium batteries are being recycled into new batteries? NiCd and NiMh batteries are gathered and sent to Canada to be crushed and made into engineered steel alloys. What makes you say that Li-ion batteries are being remade into batteries?
There's no evidence of a rechargeable battery that can last more than a decade. Is there, maybe i've missed it?
As far as i know no one is paying to take a dead battery pack. is there some way to get paid to have it recycled, like you state? Are they doing this already with the Prius batt pack? i'm curious, and not being sarcastic here.
thanks again for the reply, and again its great to have a board to learn the latest on these topics.
ziv 3:45PM (10/22/2008)
The first link looks like it might not be live, but a123 announced they had a 10+ year life expectancy for their batteries used in PHEV's.
http://www.greencarcongress.com/2007/05/a123systems_int.html
And recycle.net has links to recycling centers that will pay you for your used batteries.
http://www.recycle.net/battery/class_b7/xv020700.html
Most of this is stuff I have heard referred to many times but I have to admit, I have never owned a Li-ion battery for my car so I can't tell you that I recycled one. But I do think it is doable.
It sounds like EREV's and BEV's are going to living amongst us in noticeable numbers within a year or two, and it can't happen soon enough.
Joe B. 11:32AM (10/22/2008)
Ener1 will be producing batteries at in Indiana as well as in Korea. Their recent acquisition of a Korean company will help them ramp up production world wide. The Korean engineers will also be tapped to help them more efficiently design their facility in Indiana.
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Richard 6:50PM (10/22/2008)
I agree, I just read that the extractable amount of Li-ion is directly proportional to how much one is willing to pay for it. It is a very abundant mineral found, of all places, in salt. Extreamly recoverable. So, despite earlier predictions of scarcity of Li-ion, it's not the case. I, believe that reliability of batteries is the number one priority of battery makers as the market for EV and hybrids is huge and battery makers are eager to get as great of a share of the pie as they can get. These are really exciting times ahead for EV's. Range is no longer an issue, as I believe that small generators that fit in the trunk of cars are easily purchased, EV no longer need to fear running out of energy, and long trips are now again possible. http://www.electricgeneratorsdirect.com/grade/recreational-small.php.
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Jbob 8:54AM (10/23/2008)
I was under the impression that component material like platinum was the issue as far as scarcity and limited resources.
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Chris M 6:35PM (10/23/2008)
Lithium batteries don't use platinum (except possibly some very rare and exotic high end cells).
You've got it confused with hydrogen fuel cells. Low temperature fuel cells, such as PEM fuel cells, require platinum for the catalyst, and that accounts for the main portion of the million dollar price tag on H2 fuel cell vehicles.
Jbob 6:45PM (10/23/2008)
Actually that was my point Chris
Jbob 7:01PM (10/23/2008)
I was referring to platinum in the context of hydrogen and that lithium did not share the same level of scarcity that platinum does