In this article we’ll see who is using the most advanced battery chemistries and what’s coming soon. Currently, most important advancements are being made at the cathode level, by increasing the nickel while reducing the cobalt content it’s possible to get cheaper and higher density battery cells. LG Chem Interview with LG Chem CFO Chung Ho-Young (translated by Google): Q) This is a question about medium and large batteries. I am wondering how the NCM811 next generation battery development is proceeding. A) Batteries using NCM 811 cathode materials are mass-produced for electric buses. Third-generation batteries are a major direction of development to increase energy density, reduce cost, and improve charging performance. For this purpose, the nickel content is basically increased, the specific gravity of cobalt is reduced from the viewpoint of cost, and the artificial graphite is applied for rapid charging.

Batteries are part of our lives. They are present in everyday devices such as electric cars, smartphones, tablets or laptops. For this reason it’s important to know how to treat them right. We already know that TMS (Thermal Management Systems) are important to keep batteries at recommended temperatures, but what about charging behavior? What can we do to reduce battery capacity degradation? Is it better to cycle batteries with partial or full charges? And at lower or higher SoC (State-of-Charge)?

Be warned, this is going to be a long article. Nonetheless if you’re interested in battery technology or have a BMW i3, you’ll like reading it. Later this year, the BMW i3 will get its battery upgraded with NCM 622 cells and the capacity will increase from 94 to 120 Ah. With 120 Ah battery cells, the BMW i3 will have a total battery capacity around 42,62 kWh (96 x 120 Ah x 3,7 V).

There are two major battery cell makers that promised NCM 811 EV battery cells for 2018. They are SK Innovation and LG Chem. Let’s recapture what we already know about it. As you already know, currently most EV batteries have NCM 622 cathodes, which means that besides lithium the cathode contains nickel, cobalt and manganese in a composition ratio of 6:2:2.

In a recent study 283 Nissan Leafs manufactured between 2011 and 2017, had their SoH (State of Health) measured 1.382 times. The data is from 82 Nissan Leafs with 30 kWh batteries and 201 with the 24 kWh variants. The measurements were made by using a OBD2 scanner with the Leaf Spy app. The study has some interesting conclusions and I recommend you to read it (only 14 pages), but in this article I’ll focus on one:

China’s 13th Five-year Plan (2016 to 2020) sets the goals for EV battery cells of reaching an energy density higher than 300 Wh/kg and cost lower than 100 €/kWh. Currently battery cell makers are working to reach or even surpass these objectives. While Chinese battery cell makers are free to decide how they are going to achieve the goals set by the Chinese Government, NCM 811 battery cells are clearly the way to go. This cathode chemistry allows to reach high energy densities with the use of larger quantities of nickel, while keeping costs low by reducing the amount of cobalt present.

The 2018 Nissan Leaf battery - like all previous versions - uses a 96s2p cell configuration, this means that in total there are 192 cells in the battery pack. However, the battery cells now have a much higher energy density. In the Nissan Leaf, each battery pack has 24 modules and each module has 8 cells. Originally, the Nissan Leaf was launched with double the modules. The 24 kWh battery in the 2011 Nissan Leaf had 48 modules, each module with 4 cells. However, when Nissan released the 30 kWh battery, the number of modules was reduced to half - to further increase the energy density of the battery pack. If you look at the new battery module below you’ll see that it seems 2 old modules stuck together…

Online range calculators are very useful tools, especially to understand the impact of speed, temperature and heat pumps on electric cars range. The online range calculator for the Volkswagen e-Golf isn’t the first. We already have available identical calculators for other electric cars, such as the Renault Zoe and the Opel Ampera-e. Anyway, while it isn’t a surprise that temperature and speed influence the range of electric cars, the importance of heat pumps isn’t something that everybody knows.

What I like the most about prismatic battery cells is that they are like LEGO bricks and make easier the task of building battery packs. For this reason they are perfect for DIY (Do it yourself) EV projects and for automakers that plan to effortlessly upgrade the battery packs of their electric cars. However, the improvement of EV prismatic battery cells has been painfully slow when compared to cylindrical or pouch types.

We all remember the Volkswagen e-Golf improved by Kreisel Electric with a 55,7 kWh battery and able to charge from 0 to 80 % in 20 minutes (via 150 kW CCS). Now Scuderia-E gives a similar treatment to the Fiat 500e. Carlos Noya from the Spanish website FCE wrote an interesting article about the Fiat 500e improved by Scuderia-E and it’s worth reading. Scuderia-E is a company dedicated to electric car conversions created by Gianfranco Pizzuto (co-founder of Fisker Automotive).

I’ve always seen the mandatory battery rental as something close to a scam, making electric cars more expensive to run than diesel alternatives. Furthermore the existence of a battery lease indicates that the automaker isn’t confident in the quality of its batteries and scares away potential customers - by stating that batteries are more prone to failure than other components. This is why we’ll never see battery rentals in automakers that are proud to build good quality electric cars, such as Tesla or even BMW - that don’t see batteries as problems.

Few days ago SK Innovation announced that the start of production of improved NCM 811 battery cells is near, now it’s time for its main competitor - LG Chem - to do the same. President of LG Chem’s battery business, Lee Ung Beom, just announced that: “We will first produce the (NCM 811 battery), and you can see it next year”. We might see those 60 kWh batteries next year, in the 2019 Nissan Leaf. According to Nissan’s global sales and marketing division, Daniele Schillaci, the 2019 Nissan Leaf will get more than 225 miles (362 km) EPA range from those…