Pardon me if I’m a bit skeptical on this, but considering the tremendous claims and 5 year lead time, I would venture to say they might as well not leak any new battery technology until its further along in development.
Word is that Hitachi has a new lithium-ion battery that has a high W/kg ratio and can last 10 years in EREV applications.
I’m tempted to not even write about it since such so little is known about the battery, other than percentage improvements. Thats not really a substantial yardstick to gauge how well the batteries would work in an automotive context (spec sheets are a little better, but sometimes lack necessary information as well).
They state that the batteries can produce 4,500W/kg, which is outstanding considering other batteries today have pulse power ratings around 1000-1500W/kg. But again, other batteries have about 6-7 years to catch up to this hypothetical future battery. For reference, a Volt’s motor would need 120kW peak, and that H3 Electric Hummer was 200kW, each necessitating only 27kg and 45kg of batteries. The problem wont be pulse power at this point, rather power density, volume and recharge cycles – but even at a futuristic sounding 250W/kg, for a 40 mile plug-in like the Volt, you’ll need 40kg at least for 10kWh of energy storage.
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