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Technology Stocks : VALENCE TECHNOLOGY (VLNC) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Pallisard who wrote (13420)	7/27/1999 4:51:00 AM
From: steve	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 27311

If this has already been posted, my apologies. Got tired of reading every post. The article is dated Monday, July 26, 1999. New Batteries Help Electric Cars Building an electric car was the easy part. Building the battery to power it was the hard part. After more than a decade of trial and error -- mostly error -- by automotive and chemical researchers and engineers, the 3M company claims to have broken through the battery barrier, with a powerful, lightweight, long-lasting cell that can propel an automobile about 150 miles in one charge. That's not all it can do: 3M sees uses for its ``lithium polymer battery' -- which has cost $88 million in public and private funds to develop -- in future aerospace, medical and consumer electronics applications that require compact, lightweight, affordable power. But it's the electric car that has long been the battery-operated dream with enormous implications: less polluting, more fuel-efficient, cleaner and quieter than gas or diesel power plants. Two problems have stymied the idea's marketability so far: the batteries have been too bulky and heavy to fit in anything resembling a conventional auto; and the lighter, more efficient batteries have been far too expensive to mass-market. Scientists at 3M say they've broken through the cost and weight barriers with their high-powered lithium polymer battery. 3M, in partnership with two other labs and working with sponsors that include Ford, General Motors and the U.S. Department of Energy, has focused its efforts on a rechargeable power source made of lithium, the lightest known metal on Earth. Previous batteries have used heavier, less efficient lead acid or nickel-metal hydride. sfgate.com steve