Focus: Volkswagen and rivals plug away at solid-state battery puzzle
16/01/2024 06:00
By Eric Onstad and Paul Lienert
LONDON/DETROIT, Jan 16 (Reuters) - Volkswagen, whose
drive to develop a "solid-state" electric car battery with U.S.
startup QuantumScape has been dogged by delays, is casting its
net wider in pursuit of the potentially game-changing
technology.
The German auto giant is holding talks with France's Blue
Solutions, which already produces solid-state batteries for
Daimler electric buses, about adapting the design for cars, a
source with direct knowledge of the discussions told Reuters.
VW VOWG.DE and Blue Solutions aim to reach a joint
development agreement in the coming months, according to the
source who asked not to be identified as the talks are private.
Volkswagen's move to widen its options in the field points
to the array of technical hurdles holding back wider development
of solid-state technology, seen by its backers as the "holy
grail" of EV batteries, promising longer driving ranges and
shorter charging times than traditional lithium-ion packs.
VW said its venture with QuantumScape QS.N was on track
and declined to comment when asked about any discussions with
Blue Solutions.
A spokesperson for Blue Solutions, a unit of French
conglomerate Bollore BOLL.PA , confirmed that it was working on
a battery for passenger cars and said it had signed development
deals with BMW BMWG.DE and another company, and was in talks
with a third, but declined to identify the others.
VW, Toyota 7203.T , BMW and other global automakers are
vying to crack the conundrum of solid-state batteries, which
remain technically elusive despite decades of research and
billions of dollars of investment.
"A lot of promises haven't been delivered and several
automakers and investors have been burnt," said Rory McNulty at
consultancy Benchmark Mineral Intelligence. "There's loads of
really good verified data and technology, but can they (the
industry) do it reliably, at scale?"
Blue Solutions, for its part, faces stiff challenges to
radically bring down the four-hour charging time required by its
current batteries, which is feasible for buses parked overnight
in depots. The company's spokesperson told Reuters it was
working on a passenger car battery with a charging time of 20
minutes, and aimed to construct a "gigafactory" for it by 2029.
The sector's lack of commercial success has dampened market
enthusiasm; the amount of global venture capital deal activity
in solid-state battery companies fell 72% last year to $146
million, according to data from PitchBook.
"Investor interest in solid state batteries has waned. They
are questioning whether the risk of solid state is worth it,"
Ibex Investors partner Jeff Peters said.
QUANTUMSCAPE: STILL A LOT OF WORK
Solid state ideally envisions replacing the liquid
electrolyte though which the electrical charge passes in
lithium-ion EV batteries with a solid substitute, thus reducing
a fire hazard and shrinking the size of battery packs, and using
lithium metal for its negative terminal to boost performance.
Gauging precisely the right combination of chemicals and
materials so they don't react adversely with each other is a
minefield, though.
QuantumScape's venture with its top shareholder VW, which
has invested $300 million in the startup, is an example how
solid-state technology has failed to live up to its initial
promise.
The development deal signed in 2018 envisaged solid-state
powering Volkswagen EVs by 2025, enabling the e-Golf to more
than double its range to 750 km. When QuantumScape subsequently
went public via a reverse merger with a special purpose
acquisition company in New York in 2020, it said it was aiming
for commercial battery production in 2024.
Yet mass commercial production remains a distant prospect,
even after QuantumScape shipped its first prototypes to VW and
other prospective customers in late 2022, the start of what is
typically a multi-year process of testing and certification.
Furthermore, the battery isn't pure solid state since it
uses a liquid electrolyte though uses ceramic to separate the
positive and negative terminals.
"We still have a lot of work to do," QuantumScape's CEO
Jagdeep Singh told Reuters. "The prototype is meant to show the
core functionality is there, not that the cell is fully ironed
out in terms of all the different defects that can be introduced
during the production process."
QuantumScape's shares, which hit a peak of $132.70 in
December 2020, have since sunk to $7.37, giving the company a
market value of about $3.6 billion. It has not said when it
expects high-volume commercial production. Goldman Sachs said
this was likely in the latter part of the decade.
QuantumScape said in a regulatory filing to the U.S.
Securities and Exchange Commission last October that it had
missed commercialization timeline milestones envisaged in the
2018 deal with VW, and that the German automaker thus had the
right to terminate the joint venture should it choose to.
TOYOTA FLAGS BREAKTHROUGH
Volkswagen and QuantumScape aren't the only players that
have pared their ambitions as they grapple with the technical
complexities of solid state.
Toyota, the world's biggest automaker ahead of VW, had
targeted a 2025 production startup date for its solid-state
batteries, but said in June it now does not expect to produce
the cells at scale before 2027 or 2028.
The Japanese company nonetheless said it had achieved a
technical breakthrough, without providing details beyond a
projected driving range of 750 miles or more and charging time
of 10 minutes.
Several other companies have plans to roll out solid-state
batteries including Chinese battery leader CATL 300750.SZ , LG
Energy Solution, Solid Power SLDP.O , ProLogium, Honda 7267.T
and Nissan 7201.T . (see accompanying FACTBOX)
EV market leader Tesla TSLA.O is an industry outlier in
not having detailed any solid-state battery development plans.
A key issue solid-state scientists have been grappling with
is the impact of introducing lithium metal for the anode.
Lithium metal can dramatically lift performance, but often
sparks reactions with the solid compounds, including creating
dendrites, spiky formations that create cracks and imperfections
and can ultimately short-circuit a battery.
Battery makers, automakers and researchers have tried using
a variety of substances for the solid electrolyte in three main
categories: polymers, sulfides and oxides.
Some companies have already rolled out partial versions of
solid-state batteries that offer some benefits of the
technology. China's EV firms Nio 9866.HK and Seres have both
launched EV models with "semi-solid-state" batteries which have
both solid and gel-like electrolyte components but do not use
lithium metal anodes.
<^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Investment in solid-state battery start-ups plunges in 2023 https://tmsnrt.rs/3ROmOTs
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^>
(Reporting by Eric Onstad in Lodnon and Paul Lienert in
Detroit; Additional reporting by Ben Klayman in Detroit and Zoey
Zhang in Shanghai; Editing by Veronica Brown and Pravin Char)
((eric.onstad@thomsonreuters.com; +44 20 7542 7093; Twitter https://twitter.com/reutersEricO;
Reuters Messaging: eric.onstad.thomsonreuters.com@reuters.net))