A constant pursuit for electric vehicles are long-lasting and possibly cheaper batteries. World¡¯s largest maker of EV batteries now seems to have made an industry-first advancement in this aspect, one that can readily be deployed in electric vehicles prevalent today.
Contemporary Amperex Technology Co Ltd (CATL), the Chinese major that makes electric car batteries for Tesla and Volkswagen, has come up with a new battery that lasts more than a million miles. If proven to be true, this would be the first of its kind energy pack in the whole EV industry.
To put this into perspective, the current batteries used in electric cars comes with a warranty cover of about 150,000 miles or eight years, whichever is achieved first.
The new pack by CATL plans to raise that to 1.24 million miles or 2 million kilometres and 16 years, as confirmed by the company chairman Zeng Yuqun in an interview with Bloomberg NEF at company headquarters in Ningde, in southeast China¡¯s Fujian province.
Zeng even stresses that the company is ready to make the million mile battery for anyone that orders them. ¡°If someone places an order, we are ready to produce,¡± said Zeng. He did not, however, reveal if the company has already received such orders or not.
As per Zeng, these batteries would cost only about 10 percent more than the prevalent EV batteries.
Batteries are practically the costliest part inside of an EV. Any technology capable of bringing their cost down will eventually lead to cheaper electric vehicles and an increased adoption.
Extending the lifespan of batteries is one major way of doing so. Batteries with more than a million mile of life can be used in multiple EVs even as their peak efficiency drops overtime. Such a reuse of batteries in a second vehicle would ultimately lower the cost of ownership of both the vehicles served by the battery.
This is also why majors like Tesla and General Motors are also pursuing the landmark. Now that CATL claims to have achieved it, it is possible that its existing clients will reap the benefits first. CATL¡¯s existing clients include BMW, Volkswagen for its Audi unit and most recently, Tesla for its Model 3.