Gas 2.0

Leo Motors, a parts supply company with its roots in Korea, has an outspoken CEO with an interesting eye for the future and a grasp of where we’ve come from. For instance, after speaking with him it became apparent that Dr. Robert Kang has come to the conclusion that most of the electric vehicle technology we see today is based on technology developed for electric toys combining a simple motor, battery and ampere controller.

I don’t know if this is a fully accurate representation of electric car design, but it’s certainly true that electric cars are relatively simple systems. Read the rest of this entry »

Ford Motor Company and Azure Dynamics have teamed up to introduce a battery electric commercial van called the Transit Connect. The electric van will be available in America and Canada beginning in 2010 and is the first vehicle to be produced as part of Ford’s accelerated electric vehicle strategy. Azure will integrate its Force Drive battery electric drive train into the van and Johnson Control-Saft has been selected as the lithium ion battery cells and battery packs supplier. The Transit Connect van is being marketed for fleet and retail use.

What Ford has not brought to market is their Ford Escape Flex-Fuel Hybrid which they have been working on for close to a decade. I actually drove one in a car rally in upstate New York two years ago (it was a great car) but the company discontinued its work claiming that there was no demand. How quickly times change. Read the rest of this entry »

At this point, most of us have heard of Better Place and their battery swap station idea, but they aren’t the only ones who’ve though of such a thing. NuTech, a company I recently discovered at the Alt Car Expo in Santa Monica, CA, has developed their own take on the concept of drive-thru battery swap stations… only theirs is portable.

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Less than a week after switchable EV battery pioneer Better Place announced a newly expanded agreement with French car maker Renault, the company’s founder and CEO, Shai Agassi appeared as a guest on Comedy Central’s Colbert Report in hopes of getting that sought-after ‘Colbert Bump’.

The Colbert Bump, as it is known, is a phenomenon wherein people (places, companies, ideas) that appear on the Colbert Report receive a sudden boost in popularity for their cause.

The deal announced by Agassi in Frankfurt builds on an agreement reached between the two companies in August and will be to install the Better Place battery system (and build-out the charging network) for the Renault Fluence ZE for sale in Israel and Denmark. The Fluence ZE was one of four models in Renault’s new line of electric cars unveiled last week at the Frankfurt Auto Show. Read the rest of this entry »

As much as I love the coming onslaught of electric cars, they use lots of materials that currently have almost no recycling infrastructure — especially when it comes to their batteries. The numbers vary by the type of lithium-ion battery used, but on average, for every 100 miles of pure-electric range, a lithium-ion battery needs to contain about 15 pounds of lithium.

Although the developed world has had robust systems in place for a long time to deal with the recycling of lead-acid batteries (in the U.S. more than 95% of battery lead gets recycled), the lithium-ion battery has a long way to go to catch up. Granted, lithium-ion batteries are not nearly as toxic as lead-acid batteries and so the urgency of developing a recycling infrastructure is virtually non-existent. In fact, lithium-ion batteries are classified by the U.S. government as non-toxic and “safe” to throw away in the regular trash.

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Panasonic Corporation just announced that it will sponsor Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s (MIT) Solar Electric Vehicle Team (SEVT). The team will be competing in the upcoming Global Green Challenge (GCG) to be held in October of this year in Australia. As part of the sponsorship, Panasonic will provide the team with its a high-capacity (2.9 Ah) lithium-ion batteries.

The MIT SEVT student team will compete in the World Solar Challenge with a solar powered car using Panasonic lithium-ion batteries to store its solar generated power. Separately, Panasonic will provide the same high-capacity, lithium-ion batteries to a team from Japan’s Tokai University which is also competing in the same category.

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This past weekend while I was at the Syracuse Nationals auto show, my digital camera chewed through my extended-life rechargeable batteries. More than once I found myself without enough energy to get that last, important shot. The recharger I used took 3 hours to recharge them as well, so if I hadn’t have had eight of the batteries I would have been poop outta luck.

But a new idea for rechargable batteries might change all that. Need some power? Just shake your battery and it recharges itself! Or at least that is the concept behind the ShakEnergy from Mintpass.

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Nissan Motor Co., Ltd., within the Renault-Nissan Alliance, announced today that it will be building two European plants to manufacture its advanced lithium-ion batteries - each plant manufacturing a projected annual capacity of 60,000 units. With agreements between Nissan and Portugal and the United Kingdoms, the Renault-Nissan Alliance makes significant steps towards producing batteries for its European Zero Emission Mobility Program.

Nissan will receive financial assistance from both countries’ respective governments, as well as other forms of support, in order to ensure that the plants will be located within the countries. The hope is that the two plants will have both immediate and long-term effects on the health of both national and regional economies by boosting jobs, pioneering the manufacture and sale of zero emission vehicles in Europe and contributing to the automotive industry.

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“To my knowledge, at this point, ExxonMobil has no interest in putting charging stations at retailer locations,” said Pat Brant, Chief Polymer Scientist with ExxonMobil Chemical Company. I just had to ascertain if ExxonMobil was really in the car business after they announced their partnership in launching the Maya 300 and it appears that the answer is no. However, ExxonMobil Chemical Company, a subsidiary of ExxonMobil that was built from scratch 18 years ago, is is in the business of developing technologies to improve technologies with battery applications.

So here is how the partnership works. ExxonMobil Chemical Company developed the pioneering lithium ion battery separation technology. They then partnered with Electrovaya, to integrate the technology into their batteries and then manufacture the batteries. The batteries are then given to Electrovaya subsidiary Maya, who then manufactures the Maya 300. So there, ExxonMobil is not in the car business.

Speaking of the car business, one of the burning questions is how is the Maya 300 different than other electric vehicles. There are three main reasons.

1. The Maya 300 is powered by a Lithium-Ion SuperPolymer® battery (made by Electrovaya). The lithium-ion polymer technology platform enables lithium to be moved faster and more efficiently, allowing more energy to be stored in a smaller space. Most other hybrid and electric vehicles are using nickel-metal-hybrid batteries that take up more space and are heavier.
2. Smaller battery. Smaller space. A conventional lead acid battery pack on average takes over five times the space and weight of the Electrovaya battery pack.
3. Style. The Maya 300 looks like a traditional four-door car with a hatchback. On the road, aesthetically speaking, you’d be hard pressed to tell it was an electric vehicle.

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Editor’s Note: This is a guest contribution by Richard Lowenthal, CEO of electric vehicle ChargePoint manufacturer Coulomb Technologies. See his last post here: Henrik Fisker Debuts Karma Plug-in Hybrid in San Jose. This is part of our ongoing series on EV Charging Infrastructure, which was initiated by Mayors Gavin Newsom and Sam Adams.

This week, Coulomb Technologies announced that Walnut Creek, California has become the third Bay Area city (along with San Jose and San Francisco) to deploy Coulomb’s ChargePoint™ Networked Charging Stations for electric vehicles.

Coulomb’s charging stations were officially welcomed in a ribbon cutting ceremony in downtown Walnut Creek.  We were joined by the city managers of Walnut Creek and Orinda as well as Walnut Creek city officials.  As many California readers know, Walnut Creek is considered one of the top destinations in the Bay Area, known for its outdoor festivals, performing arts scene and superb shopping and dining.  EV owners across the Bay Area now have a premier destination where they can recharge while enjoying downtown Walnut Creek.

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When it comes to electric vehicles, critics have referred time and again to the fact that the death and replacement of batteries nullifies any savings made at the pump. With a battery’s limited lifespan, and battery prices still high, drivers may not be saving much. However, recent tests by battery provider Southern California Edison (SCE) show 

Over the past two and a half years, SCE has been testing a lithium-ion battery sub-pack. And the results are incredible.  The lithium-ion battery has displayed remarkable longevity, surviving 180, 000 miles with no significant deterioration. With the average family vehicle traveling less than 15,000 miles per year, this test holds great significance. This dramatic increase in the life expectancy of an EV battery pulls the cost equation more convincingly on the EV’s side.

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The BMW mini coups took the U.S. by storm in part, due to its great gas mileage. Well, now BMW has launched the MINI E, an all electric, zero emissions car. Peter Trepp of Pacific Palisades has become the first consumer in the country to drive the car. He will have it for one year as part of a one-year field study. Additional consumers in New York, LA and New Jersey will also be taking ownership of their MINI E by the end of June.

I’m only slightly miffed that I wasn’t selected to test-drive the car for a year but I’ll get over it. In the meantime, the rest of us can follow Peter through his blog “Plugged-In With Peter’s MINI E,” which can be viewed at http://www.petersminie.blogspot.com/. Yes, his blog is a marketing tool but I can’t resist and I will be following him. Maybe we’ll even be able to get him to write a special piece for us at Gas 2.0. Read the rest of this entry »

Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) have developed battery cells capable of charging in under a minute, an astonishing 100 times faster than a regular rechargable battery.

The breakthrough could revolutionize electric car battery technology and pave the way for ultra-fast charging electric vehicles in as little as two years.

The discovery came when MIT researchers Byoungwoo Kang and Gerbrand Ceder found out how to get a common lithium compound to release and take up lithium ions in a matter of seconds. According to Ceder, the compound, known as lithium iron phosphate (LiFePO4), has a crystal structure that creates “perfectly sized tunnels for lithium to move through,” allowing the team to reach “ridiculously fast charging rates.”

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Nissan and the Portuguese Government have signed an agreement to study whether or not to invest €300 to €400 million euros in an electric car battery plant in Portugal.

As I’ve reported before, although Nissan was a little late to the electric car party, they have recently been investing heavily in electrification including several major deals with local and state governments around the US and the world to roll out an electric car charging infrastructure.

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Since the late 1800s, the primary impediment to the adoption of electric vehicles has been battery technology. And while the technology has advanced by leaps and bounds in the last decade or two (compare your cell phone with one from the early 90s), with a threefold improvement in energy density and more than an order of magnitude improvement in power density, it still lags behind gasoline.

Some have argued that current technology is sufficient — that the ability to drive 1 1/2 hours to 3 hours nonstop is good enough for the overwhelming majority of trips, and that paired with a range extender, rapid chargers, or battery swapping, you have a viable means of replacing the gasoline car. However, there still is a great deal of pressure to get electric vehicle range up to that of gasoline.

Enter Yi Cui. Again.

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