Tesla is known to be the leader in the electric vehicle market across the globe. A large part of it is credited to the company¡¯s battery technology that results in more range than the competing EVs. Panasonic, Tesla¡¯s partner in the development of these batteries, now hints at a further increase in their potential.
Panasonic has said that Tesla¡¯s ¡®2170¡¯ batteries which are produced at Gigafactory Nevada are going to get a 20% increase in energy density over the next five years. The increase can further result in a significant performance improvement in Tesla cars.
The update comes from Yasuaki Takamoto, Panasonic executive heading the Tesla battery business in the US. In an interview with Reuter, Takamoto confirmed the battery advancements in the near future.
¡°Panasonic Corp plans to boost the energy density of ¡°2170¡± battery cells it supplies to Tesla Inc by 20% in five years,¡± Takamoto said. As per him, Panasonic will update its battery cell production lines at Nevada Gigafactory in September to start increasing the energy density.
¡°From September, the firm will start converting lines at its factory in Nevada that it operates with Tesla as it prepares to further boost the energy density of the cells,¡± he said.
Another interesting revelation by Takamoto was that the company is also eyeing a ¡°cobalt-free version¡± of the batteries and aims to commercialise it ¡°in two to three years.¡±
An increase in energy density of the battery packs can result in two types of enhancements for Tesla electric cars.
In one, and the most likely case, Tesla can simply opt to use the new, more potent batteries and replace the older ones. This would result in an immediate and considerable increase in range of its existing cars.
This is because with the increase in energy density in the existing size, no bigger battery or corresponding adjustment to the cars are needed. Meaning more power (range) from the existing size of batteries.
Another way to use the more potent batteries is to build a smaller size battery that will churn out the same performance as the existing one. In this case, a range of 400 km on a Tesla car will remain the same with the new battery. But the car will become lighter due to the reduced battery size and hence more efficient. It can possibly also offer more leg room inside.
A big plus for the latter on the production lines for Tesla would be an increased overall output. With less number of cells, Tesla will be able to produce more battery packs and hence equip more Tesla cars with them. Basically, an increased production capacity.
Considerable savings are expected in both the scenarios nonetheless. The company, however, might not opt for the latter.
That is because it is likely that by the time Tesla and Panasonic are able to bring this enhanced battery pack to reality, other EVs in the market will offer a considerable range. If not more, this range is expected to be at par with what Tesla models offer now.
As and when the situation arises, Tesla will have to rank up the range on its own cars to keep its lead in the industry intact. That is when it will use the better battery packs to offer more range on the cars.
If the increased energy density in the batteries is completely utilised to increase the range of Tesla cars, we might be looking at some industry leading numbers on some of the models.
Model 3, for instance, promises a range of 250 miles (402 km) on a single charge. Assuming a 20 percent increase resulting from the enhanced batteries, this range would bump up to 300 miles or 482 km.
Model S will have a whopping 480 mile or more than 770 km of range.
All this, however, can only be confirmed once the new batteries are in use.
The even bigger advancement, however, would be the elimination of Cobalt from the batteries which would address a really big issue with the battery supply chain once out. But we will have to wait to see when and how this takes place.