When will lithium-ion battery prices reach the price point of $100 per kWh that so many in the media are calling the “magic number?” According to Winfried Hoffmann, an analyst at the consulting firm ASE, the glad day will dawn sometime around 2030. Hoffmann, the former CTO of Applied Materials, is a well-known figure in… Read more »
Search Results Found For: "Volt Carbon"
US plug-in sales break 250,000 as National Drive Electric Week kicks off
US plug-in vehicle sales have surpassed the quarter-million mark, just in time for National Drive Electric Week, September 15-21. Sales have increased by a healthy percentage every year since the Volt and LEAF went on the market at the end of 2010. 2014 sales total 76,799 so far, on track to handily beat 2013’s figure… Read more »
A closer look at how batteries fail
A lot of research has been done to improve lithium-ion battery safety, cycle life and power output over a range of high and low temperatures, yet understanding the fundamental processes and degradation mechanisms in Li-ion batteries remains a challenge. To understand the degradation processes of lithium-ion batteries, it is important to understand how they operate…. Read more »
Phinergy CEO on aluminum-air batteries and 1,000-mile range-extended EVs
Along with its industry giant partner Alcoa, Israeli startup Phinergy says it has aluminum-air batteries for EVs in the can. More than 550 feet over the National Mall in Washington, DC, the single most significant piece of American aluminum triangulates a point between the White House, the US Capitol, and the Lincoln Memorial. It is… Read more »
DOE-supported research projects seek to commercialize silicon-based anodes
The DOE is supporting six applied battery research projects, with the objective of developing cells that provide energy density of more than 200 Wh/kg, along with long cycle life and excellent abuse tolerance. All six projects are using some form of silicon-based material for the anode. A team led by the Argonne National Laboratory is… Read more »
US/Chinese/Korean research team details the challenges of Li-air battery research
Lithium-air batteries are widely expected to be the next big thing – more than 300 research papers have been published on the topic in the past 3 years. Li-air has the potential to deliver far more energy density than current lithium-ion technology. A new review in the ACS journal Chemical Reviews sums up the current… Read more »
Report: The effects of fuel economy and emissions regulations on the automotive sector
By Jeffrey Wishart, a Senior Project Engineer at Intertek, conducts research and development on products and services in the areas of energy, the environment, and advanced transportation. In addition to his supervisory position at Intertek, Dr. Wishart worked for several years at ETEC LABS (the research and consulting division of ECOtality) and at a utility company… Read more »
DOE announces $50 million for vehicle R&D funding, releases plug-in progress report
The DOE will award $49.4 million in new funding for projects that accelerate research and development of new vehicle technologies. The announcement identifies 13 areas of interest, of which 7 are described as “critical technologies” to meet the EV Everywhere Grand Challenge, which has a goal of making EVs more affordable and convenient to own… Read more »
European safety agency gives BMW i3 four stars
The European New Car Assessment Programme (NCAP) has published the results of its crash test of the 2014 BMW i3, in which the new EV Bimmer scored four out of five possible stars. While that might not sound so bad, it does compare unfavorably with other popular plug-ins such as the Volt, LEAF and Model… Read more »
EVSE: the low-hanging fruit of smart city buildout
How installing a few charging stations is more of a long-term solution than meets the eye. We often hear about the need for smart cities, smart grids, and sustainability in general, but what does it really mean? How can we ever hope to build a smart and sustainable global ecosystem, considering the energy-consuming path that… Read more »