Volkswagen could have solid-state batteries in its EVs (such as the ID.3 pictured) as soon as 2024, … [+]
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The Volkswagen Group’s $300 million investment into US solid-state battery startup QuantumScape could pay off with a 50-percent jump in EV range and coffee-stop recharging as soon as 2024.
Despite spending billions of euros to launch a fully-fledged instant range of EVs, Volkswagen still lags behind Tesla
TSLA
But its shortfall could be switched to an insurmountable advantage by 2024, even before QuantumScape’s second phase of solid-state battery industrialization reaches its critical step.
The result could be Volkswagens, Audis, Porsches and Bentleys fitted with 450-500-mile batteries that are safer and lighter than any current lithium-ion battery and can be fully recharged in 15 minutes.
QuantumScape estimates the energy density of its cells at 50 percent more than conventional EV batteries, or close to 1000 Watt-hours per liter.
QuantumScape co-founder and CEO Jagdeep Singh presented the company’s rollout earlier this month, insisting there would be a lower-volume 1gWh prototype factory in 2024, before a 20gWh full production plant came on stream in 2026.
The industrialization of solid-state batteries could be another huge win for recently embattled Volkswagen Group CEO Dr Herbert Diess, who yesterday triumphed in a year-long battle with the automaker’s unions.
The win yesterday, at the cost of relatively minor compromises on EV manufacturing and development in Germany, leave Dr Diess with an unprecedented platform to implement his costly global EV push.
Full capacity for solid-state batteries could be achieved in 2028, or just in time for the Volkswagen Group’s wholesale switch to electrified powertrains.
Volkswagen tipped $100 million into QuantumScape in 2018 before adding $200 million more in the middle of this year to take its stake in the company to 20 percent. It has been working with QuantumScape, a Stanford University spin-off, since 2012.
“Volkswagen is the world’s largest automotive manufacturer and leads the industry in its commitment to electrification of its fleet,” Singh said when Volkswagen confirmed its initial investment in 2018.
“We are thrilled to be chosen by Volkswagen to power this transition. We think the higher range, faster charge times, and inherent safety of QuantumScape’s solid-state technology will be a key enabler for the next generation of electrified powertrains.”
The QuantumScape’s ideas move the game on from the liquid electrolyte and graphite anodes of today’s lithium-ion batteries in favor of a solid electrolyte and lithium metal anodes.
The theoretical result is far higher range, faster charging, longer life and greater reliability.
Solid-state batteries have long been considered the Holy Grail of EV powertrains.
Volkswagen has already successfully tested QuantumScape cells at its center of excellence in Salzgitter, Germany, with what its head of the Volkswagen Group Components battery-cell group’s Frank Blome called “very promising” results.
The tests, though, were not conducted in a vehicle, but rather in a lab at cell level, rather than as a full battery.
