Carmakers power up to lithium-ion
By John Reed in London and Jonathan Soble in Tokyo
Published: May 20 2008 03:00 | Last updated: May 20 2008 03:00
Nissan's plans to bring an electric car to market by 2010 came a step closer yesterday when it unveiled plans to build a Y12bn ($115m) facility to produce lithium-ion automotive batteries.
The Japanese carmaker and NEC, the electronics group with which it is a partner in rechargeablebattery development, will jointly invest in a production line for batteries at a Nissan factory near Tokyo.
The plant, which will begin production next year, will produce enough batteries for 13,000 vehicles a year initially. Capacity could be expanded later to 65,000 units. An NEC subsidiary, NEC Tokin, will spend a further Y11bn to build a new facility to supply lithium-manganese electrodes used in them.
Lithium-ion batteries, common in laptop computers and mobile phones, are only now being developed for cars. Nissan and NEC said their batteries delivered twice the electric power of the nickel-metal hydride batteries, which Toyota currently uses in its top-selling Prius hybrid.
Several carmakers are testing vehicles equipped with the batteries. Germany's Daimler will be first next year to have a commercially available car equipped with them, the Mercedes-Benz S400 BlueHybrid luxury sedan.
GM plans to use the batteries in the Chevrolet Volt, a plug-in car that it says will have enough battery power to get most Americans to work and back, with longer trips fuelled by a petrol or other "range extender." Drivers will be able to recharge the car overnight.
The US carmaker has asked rival consortia headed by Germany's Continental and South Korea's LG Chem to develop the batteries, which it recently began testing in vehicles. GM has also said it will instal lithium-ion batteries supplied by a subsidiary of Japan's Hitachi in North America in 2010 in its Saturn and Chevrolet Malibu hybrids.
Toyota has said it will eventually switch to lithium-ion batteries for the Prius, sales of which topped the 1m mark this year. The carmaker is also developing a plug-in hybrid car.
Unlike GM however, Toyota controls its own battery supplier through Panasonic EVE, the joint venture it majority owns with Matsushita. Mitsubishi, which plans to introduce an electric car in Japan next year, is also investing in the technology through its lithium-ion joint venture with GS Yuasa.
Manufacturers are still working through safety and reliability issues, including batteries' ability to maintain their recharging power through the decade or so a car is typically in service.
Lithium-ion battery cells have shown a tendency to overheat and catch fire in smaller appliances such as laptops. The Nissan-NEC JV said their batteries had been validated to be safe on average runs of more than 100,000 km.
GM is designing the Volt and testing its new electric technology in tandem - unusual for a new-vehicle project - in an all-out drive to meet the car's planned 2010 commercial launch. Toyota executives have privately expressed concerns over reliability issues surrounding electric cars. The company has pledged only to have its plug-in hybrid car in test fleets by 2010.
Takeo Fukui, president of Japan's Honda, has also expressed doubts about battery-powered cars. However, Japan's second-largest carmaker is also expected to use lithium-ion batteries in a new dedicated hybrid model due for launch next year.
The batteries are still expensive, with prices only expected to come down once demand for electric and next-generation hybrid cars surges. This presents manufacturers with a chicken-and-egg problem.
Some have complained about the large investments needed in lithium-ion manufacturing capacity. Alex Molinaroli, head of power solutions at US supplier group Johnson Controls, recently told the Financial Times it cost his company ten times as much to capitalise a lithium production line as for lead-acid technology.
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2008 |
