I signalled this news some days ago because, owning a number of Toyotas, all small 3-door RAV4s, over the years, I had a conversation with one franchised dealer in Edinburgh where I expressed disappointment that Toyota is so slow in producing full electric cars.
These last years has seen the company produce hybrids, but none will be allowed in Zero Emmisions city centres. The carmaker has been seen as something of a laggard compared with rivals in the electric vehicle market. Without mincing their words, they claim their battery solution will revolution modern propulsion: a solid-state battery with a range of ‘745 miles that charges in 10 minutes‘. If that turns out not to be an exaggeration it will catapult Toyota into the First League of electric car mass manufacturers, but it is leaving the move damn late.
Toyota said it believed it can simplify the production process, potentially making solid-state batteries easier to produce than lithium-ion ones.Toyota says it has made a technological breakthrough that will allow it to halve the weight, size and cost of batteries, in what could herald a major advance for electric vehicles. Cheer on the day!
Car makers in the UK have been hinting they will get there first, but so far nothing has reached reality. British manufacturers believe the UK could become a significant exporter of solid-state batteries that could pave the way for lighter, longer-range electric cars within a decade, as a group of companies teamed up to develop prototypes. The FTSE 100 chemicals company Johnson Matthey, the battery startup Britishvolt, which is backed by Glencore, and Oxford University are among the seven institutions that have signed a memorandum of understanding promising to work together on the technology.
Solid-state batteries are considered by many analysts to be the most likely technology to offer significant improvements in range and charging times for electric vehicles. Almost all electric vehicles in production use variations on lithium ion batteries.
Toyota, the world’s second largest carmaker, was already pursuing a plan to roll out cars with advanced solid-state batteries, which offer benefits compared with liquid-based batteries, by 2025. This week the Japanese company said it had simplified production of the material used to make them, hailing the discovery as a significant leap forward that could dramatically cut charging times and increase driving range.
“For both our liquid and our solid-state batteries, we are aiming to drastically change the situation where current batteries are too big, heavy and expensive,” said Keiji Kaita, president of the Japanese auto firm’s research and development centre for carbon neutrality. “In terms of potential, we will aim to halve all of these factors.”
David Bailey, a professor of business economics at the University of Birmingham, said that if Toyota’s claims were founded, it could be a landmark moment for the future of electric cars. “Often there are breakthroughs at the prototype stage but then scaling it up is difficult,” he said. “If it is a genuine breakthrough it could be a gamechanger, very much the holy grail of battery vehicles.”
Kaita said the company had developed ways to make batteries more durable and believed it could now make a solid-state battery with a range of 1,200km (745 miles) that could charge in 10 minutes or less. The company expects to be able to manufacture solid-state batteries for use in electric vehicles as soon as 2027, according to the Financial Times, which first reported on Toyota’s claimed breakthrough.
The automotive lithium ion battery industry is now dominated by large Asian companies such as Japan’s Panasonic, China’s BYD and CATL, and Korea’s LG and Samsung. Europe and the US are attempting to catch up, while in the UK Britishvolt and Nissan have outlined plans to build so-called gigafactories – large battery factories – to serve British automotive plants. Solid-state batteries would improve on the existing technology by swapping a liquid electrolyte, in which lithium ions carry an electric current, for a solid ceramic material. That could raise the batteries’ energy density and make them lighter and smaller. While some prototypes exist, UK companies have struggled to commercialise a durable solid-state battery.
Solid-state batteries are the Holy Grail of battery solution, They have been widely seen as a potential revolution for electric vehicles, promising to reduce charging times, increase capacity and reduce the fire risk associated with lithium-ion batteries, which use a liquid electrolyte.
However, solid-state batteries have typically been harder and costlier to make, limiting their commercial application. The race is on as to which nation will provide the breakthrough and benefit from selling and sharing the innovation. Watch this space….
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Grouse Beater 
Hello,
As it happens, there’s a derelict factory in Granton (Edinburgh) that would be admirably suited to battery production.
I have a feeling that it’s listed, as it was the world’s first purpose-built car factory (citation needed, as the phrase goes); also, the cars that it was built to produce were electric. There were more electric cars than internal combustion ones for a while; the graphs probably crossed in the 1890s at a guess.
As you come off Granton Square heading up/right for Crewe Toll / Drylaw / Civil Service Strollers, go past the scrapyard and, as the road swings left the factory’s off down a street on the right.
I’ve no idea who owns it, but I daresay they want to build flats on it!
Regards,
Derek Coghill,
Edinburgh.