A solid state battery increases the capacity of the EV batteries. It not only charges faster, but also has higher energy density compared to a Li-ion battery using an electrolyte, is more space efficient and doesn’t pose any risk of explosion or fire hence no additional requirement of safety components. Although they cost heavy due to the need of vacuum deposition equipment.
Market research suggests that EV batteries will replace the IC engines soon and might become a mainstream for the automotive industries. In order to compete against the IC engines, it should have the same mileage as those and to do that, there is a need to increase the number of batteries.
Samsung SDI has been working on mid to long term solid state battery technologies since 2013. The Samsung Advanced Institute of Technology showed the practical result of an experiment that the solid state battery gives a mileage of 800 km in a single charge while it can be charged and discharged over a 1000 times. According to them, there may be a huge number of unknown obstacles lying their way but they are sure to overcome them and do their best to develop the unbelievable technology.
BMW, Toyota and Volkswagen have indicated that they might adopt to solid-state batteries soon. Volkswagen working with QuantumScape doesn’t expect to put their plan in use until half a decade. Toyota on the other hand has made claims that they were quite close to unveiling a prototype and a production launch soon after that. BMW also has announced plans for a prototype solid-state battery by 2025 with a production-ready model by the end of 2030. BMW just introduced its fifth gen EV propulsion components using, cells with liquid electrolyte chemistry.
By: Mitali P.