Mario So Funny

Are today's lithium batteries already obsolete?

Or is the battery space full of disruptive potential?

For many years now Toyota has been working on a number of advanced battery technologies. Yesterday, Toyota announced that they are going to try to commercialize one of these new technologies — a solid state lithium battery capable of 621 miles of range — sometime between 2015 to 2020.

So, what does commercialize really mean? Did everything about the hybrid and plug-in space just change?

In 2015, for example, Toyota aims to begin commercializing fuel cell vehicles, but that doesn’t mean that fuel cell vehicles are going to take over the auto industry. So, commercialization is just a step towards mainstreaming.

In terms of Toyota’s new solid state battery, just a prototype is now available, and there have been some reports, unconfirmed by Toyota, that the battery hasn’t even gone through legitimate automotive charge/discharge cycles. In fact, the new battery probably isn’t even yet ready for such testing.

Moreover, the new battery contains Germanium, which is pretty expensive. Consequently, until Germanium can be replaced, such a battery might forever be cost-prohibitive.

So, nothing has really changed, although this announcement does seem to confirm that an important step forward has been taken, at least regarding solid state lithium technologies. But, scaling such a battery into a mainstream automotive solution appears many years, even decades, away. A reality, unfortunately, that many battery researchers have suggested might be required for any next gen battery to achieve mainstream automotive scale.

Of course, an unexpected breakthrough could rewrite the book on battery — or fuel cell — forecasts at any time.

Anyway you carve it up, the battery space is going to be extremely disruptive for the foreseeable future. That seems to suggest that automakers will have to take a somewhat tempered approach towards any battery technology. You just can’t bet the farm on a technology that could quickly become obsolete.

That’s why I believe that Toyota is not rushing into lithium. With the success of the Toyota Prius and millions of hybrid sales behind them, no automaker knows how to leverage battery investments better than Toyota. And, today’s lithium technologies are still just too disruptive, especially when their costs and limited performance capabilities are factored into the equation.

Source: GreenCarCongress