Japan's largest battery maker says lithium-ion will be hybrid battery standard of the future
JAMES B. TREECE | Automotive News
Posted Date: 10/28/05
TOKYO -- Japan's largest maker of nickel-metal hydride batteries, used by Ford Motor Co. and other carmakers in hybrid vehicles, says the future belongs to lithium-ion batteries.
Sanyo Electric Co. predicts that by 2010, the majority of hybrid vehicles will use lithium-ion batteries. Currently, all hybrids use nickel-metal hydride batteries.
Toyota Motor Corp., General Motors and Ford Motor Co. executives endorsed his prediction.
"Lithium-ion batteries will be the main" batteries for hybrid vehicles, said Mitsuru Homma, president of Sanyo's Mobile Energy Co.
Although lithium-ion batteries are more expensive, their advantages over nickel-metal hydride batteries include higher voltage, power density and energy density.
Most cell phones use lithium-ion batteries.
But the batteries still have a number of problems.
Early lithium-ion batteries had a tendency to short-circuit internally, sometimes melting cell-phone cases. More testing is needed to ensure that the short-circuit problem has been solved. In addition, the batteries have yet to be proved crashworthy.
Homma says his company supplies 50 percent of the world's nickel-metal hydride batteries, which are used in PCs, cell phones and digital cameras.
Sanyo has a 35-percent share of the world's market for lithium-ion and lithium-polymer batteries, Homma says.
source:http://www.autoweek.com/news.cms?newsId=103453
JAMES B. TREECE | Automotive News
Posted Date: 10/28/05
TOKYO -- Japan's largest maker of nickel-metal hydride batteries, used by Ford Motor Co. and other carmakers in hybrid vehicles, says the future belongs to lithium-ion batteries.
Sanyo Electric Co. predicts that by 2010, the majority of hybrid vehicles will use lithium-ion batteries. Currently, all hybrids use nickel-metal hydride batteries.
Toyota Motor Corp., General Motors and Ford Motor Co. executives endorsed his prediction.
"Lithium-ion batteries will be the main" batteries for hybrid vehicles, said Mitsuru Homma, president of Sanyo's Mobile Energy Co.
Although lithium-ion batteries are more expensive, their advantages over nickel-metal hydride batteries include higher voltage, power density and energy density.
Most cell phones use lithium-ion batteries.
But the batteries still have a number of problems.
Early lithium-ion batteries had a tendency to short-circuit internally, sometimes melting cell-phone cases. More testing is needed to ensure that the short-circuit problem has been solved. In addition, the batteries have yet to be proved crashworthy.
Homma says his company supplies 50 percent of the world's nickel-metal hydride batteries, which are used in PCs, cell phones and digital cameras.
Sanyo has a 35-percent share of the world's market for lithium-ion and lithium-polymer batteries, Homma says.
source:http://www.autoweek.com/news.cms?newsId=103453