Reinvention: Tour of GM’s New Electric Vehicle Battery Testing Facility [+pictures]
-Thermal test unit for individual lithium-ion battery cells.
GM made it clear it has no interest in producing the component battery cells (shown above), preferring to let companies like LG Chem worry about the details of sourcing lithium and preparing the cells. But the way the cells are assembled into a battery pack will remain top secret for now. Each completed battery pack contains 150 parts, 142 of which were engineered in-house. GM will quality test each pack before plugging it into the Chevy Volt chassis.
In addition to testing individual cell chemistry, the 33,000 sq. ft. battery facility (that’s 7 basketball courts) is capable of simulating and a whole slew of real-world conditions that an assembled battery pack might face.
-Chevy Volt battery packs.
42 thermal chambers are available to test the packs at a range of temperatures, while battery cyclers are continuously depleting and charging them. Using these cyclers, engineers can simulate a decade of real-world driving in just 24 months. The lab also features a gigantic “shaker” table used to test structural integrity of battery packs (which, unfortunately, was not running during the tour).
-Testing the battery cooling system components.
GM’s new lab is impressive, and it gives the company a range of capabilities to rapidly advance their own battery technology. Testing is already underway on future versions of the Volt battery pack, and GM has a joint deal with Compact Power and LG Chem to continue developing the technology. They’ve already built 100 Volt battery packs and expect to have 300 packs finished by the end of August 2009.
GM will also be building a battery factory somewhere in Michigan in 2010 to start mass-producing the packs for the new Volt.
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Photo Credits: Clayton B. Cornell. Sorry about the grainy pictures. Tell my boss to buy me a real camera.
[...] the Chevy Volt. See also: 1. LiveBlogging from the opening of GM’s New Battery Lab and 3. Tour of GM’s New Battery Lab. Disclaimer: GM flew me out for this [...]
The battery lab is great, but the question of securing supplies of Lithium has been left to LG. China and Japan see it as a strategic national priority, and that’s a huge difference in approach. No secure Lithium supplies make Li-Ion powered electric cars eventually dependent on supplies controlled by other nations. That’s worse than the current problem with oil.
@Graham: You bring up an extremely good point.
There’s an excellent chapter on this in David Sandalow’s new book “Plug-in Electric Vehicles.” From Chapter 6:
“Although shifting to HEVs, PHEVs, and AEVs will reduce U.S. demand for gasoline (and thus oil imports), it will not necessarily reduce U.S. import dependence. The strategic materials and rare earth elements critical to current designs for advanced vehicles are neither mined nor refined in the United States today; they too will have to be imported, in increasing volumes. Depending on which battery chemistries and power train configurations achieve substantial market penetration, this new import dependence may be quite extreme. In the case of certain materials–for example, cobalt and neodymium–rapid penetration of the U.S. light-duty vehicle market by HEVs, PHEVs, and AEVs could lead to extensive reliance on supplier countries whose governments are fragile and unstable or overtly hostile to the United States.”
bolivia owns 1/2 world lithium; learn spanish and occupy it now.
[...] several colleges and universities, as well as major corporations, including, Johnson Controls, General Motors, Honeywell, BASF, Smith Electric Vehicles, Ford and [...]
@Clayton B. Cornwell Thanks for the reference, it makes the point really well. I went on to write an article over at evworld.com, called ‘The Return Of The Electric Car,’ which looks at some more of the practical problems EV’s will face.