So basically what you are hinting at is that all these are more credible or somehow a threat to Tesla? That somehow some automaker is going to place an order that equals even Tesla's current usage before 2020? That even one automaker will actually make in volumes > Model S, a car with a range >= minimum range of Model S before 2020? That someone will put chargers in the middle of nowhere to enable long distance travel and make sure they are functional? tftf - you have too much hope in the current automakers or your bias against Tesla has blinded you from reality. It is just not going to happen no matter how many links you post until a few automakers start posting massive losses. All these things should have been happening the day the Model S launched to have any impact in this decade.
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Battery for EV capacity developments
- Thread starter daniel Ox9EFD
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So basically what you are hinting at is that all these are more credible or somehow a threat to Tesla? That somehow some automaker is going to place an order that equals even Tesla's current usage before 2020? That even one automaker will actually make in volumes > Model S, a car with a range >= minimum range of Model S before 2020? That someone will put chargers in the middle of nowhere to enable long distance travel and make sure they are functional? tftf - you have too much hope in the current automakers or your bias against Tesla has blinded you from reality. It is just not going to happen no matter how many links you post until a few automakers start posting massive losses. All these things should have been happening the day the Model S launched to have any impact in this decade.
I'm stating that there will be several battery supply options by around 2020 with the same capacity as Tesla (if Tesla sticks to its original plan). For example BYD alone plans to match Tesla's cell output by 2020:
Compared to a daily barrage of articles/mentions Tesla gets for its "Gigafactory" plans, BYD or others get little to no coverage (at least not in Western media).
BYD and Samsung (I would need to verify Samsung's 35 GWh by 2020 plan from additional sources) alone will each match Tesla's cell output by 2020 according to their PR.
Meanwhile Tesla keeps comparing its 2020 output to (old) 2013 output levels from the competition. That's a crummy comparison that doesn't hold up.
Same for charging networks, e.g. CCS networks coming at 150 kW by the same time in Europe and NA - everybody except Tesla seems to stick to either CCS or Chademo.
If you think this is all just PR and the rest of the (car and battery) industry is in collective deep sleep when it comes to PHEVs/BEVs and networks, go ahead and buy more TSLA shares.
We will see in a few years how margins and sales turn out. You seem to be overconfident in everything that has the "Musk" name attached to it - TSLA shares can go the way of SCTY as soon as competition heats up and/or Tesla encounters even more delays ramping up.
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BYD total production capacity so far is for LiFePO4. They use that outdated chemistry for their vehicles. It is an easy chemistry for them to make and to deal with inside the car, but you can't build a Model S much less a Model 3 or even a Bolt with it. China will soak up a tremendous amount of lithium ion battery production, but a lot of that is for domestic use in products that cannot be sold in North America or Europe. I don't think it effects Tesla in the slightest for there to be 34 GWh of LiFePO4 production for the Chinese market and a few fleet sales outside. It doesn't affect Tesla in the slightest... it's a bit like comparing Apple iPhones with flip phones and point to the quantity of flip phones sold in various markets with very low ASP and claim anything about Apple. It doesn't apply.
Again, if you delve deeper than the claimed numbers, there are substantial qualitative and quantitative differences.
Again, if you delve deeper than the claimed numbers, there are substantial qualitative and quantitative differences.
What about LG Chem and Samsung? Do you also think they are behind Tesla in terms of pricing and/or energy density by 2016-2020?
Why did so many (especially Western) car makers sign supply contracts for LG cells lately? Renault, VW Group, Volvo, GM etc. etc.
Samsung doesn't seem to be sleeping either. To reiterate again this source states they aim to have the same cell output capacity as Tesla by 2020:
Hello, Gigafactory! Samsung Moves To Compete With Tesla - Asia Stocks to Watch - Barrons.com
150kW is like printing flowers on toilet paper unless it will be US wide or Europe wide in remote locations to enable long distance travel and somebody guarantees that it will work when you need it. As usual you believe everyone elses word without any doubt more than Tesla's word even though nobody has yet to mass produce even one car with a range >= the Model S. Just one car. Nor has anybody ever charged any production car at 150kW on that 150kW hypothetical future network. Repetition is not proof. Until somebody actually produces and ships a car with a range >= minimum range of the Model S I take everything with a grain of salt. Until then Tesla is the only one I can or any sane person should believe.
There are inherent reasons why pouch and prismatic cells cost more than cylindrical. It goes into waste and quality control. If Tesla felt that prismatic or pouch cells were the way to go, they would do that for the Gigafactory. Again, I've posted this before, you need to view all of the Tesla Energy presentation given by JB Straubel last year at an energy conference. He also delves into the cells in the Q&A.
Further, the chemistries we know that are viable to ship in 2016/2017/2018 are pretty well known. You can follow this with the DoE and ARPA-E reports. If they choose NMC, that will guarantee that the specific energy is lower than Tesla's solution. If they choose NCA, as Audi has claimed with the R8 e-tron, then they have to deal with a much more complicated BMS and pack design. It isn't an issue of them doing it, it's an issue of testing and time. You can deal with the overhead of moving to NCA either in really expensive products like the R8 e-tron, which is likely well over $200,000 equivalent in Europe and won't come to the U.S. If you choose something else, good luck shipping before 2020.
The biggest reason why they sign with LG is because LG is both quite good and has lots of capacity, as it relates to the general battery industry. The problem becomes the comparison to Tesla and Panasonic. Panasonic is every bit as good as LG if not better. That's why there are so many Panasonic fakes on Alibaba and the like. Further, LG has lots of unused capacity, but the "lots" amount is a really big number for the number of BEVs being sold today ex-Tesla, but a really small number relative to Tesla and especially if you factor in the Model 3. Remember, in 2013, the Ochang factory was something like 20% utilized and then it went even further down as the Holland MI plant ramped to 0.7 GWh.
Counting in PHEVs and BEVs, Panasonic is 2.9 GWh so far this year according to ev-sales.blogspot.com:
EV Sales: Batteries - September 2015
That's 38% of the market. Even though Nissan ships more vehicles, the battery packs are small, so they only have 1 GWh so far this year. LG Chem is in 3rd place, even though they have nominally somewhere between 5 and 6 GWh of capacity.
If you plan on shipping a small quantity of BEVs... say with 30 kWh of battery capacity and, say, 20,000 units a year. That's 0.6 GWh.That's the entire current production level of the Holland, MI plant - the one that was built with huge amounts of U.S. government money and sat idle for quite a while, then ran at 1/3 capacity for quite a while. You can't source that from very many places other than LG, or you basically have to help fund the expansion of someone else. An idle plant is very bad on the balance sheet. If you follow the battery industry, a number of big manufacturers built out capacity in the 2009 to 2011 timeframe in anticipation of coming EVs only to discover that the market wasn't going to happen. Huge write-offs came and a very tepid outlook on EVs came as a result. This was a big issue for Tesla in 2013, as Panasonic was still spilling tons of red ink and here was a piss ant automaker that kept asking for batteries. Panasonic had shuttered plants and stopped the expansion in Suminoe. We are still in the midst of what amounts to be a negotiation between the consumers, the automakers, and the battery manufacturers. The battery manufacturers would rather see demand before expanding again. The automakers are pretty tepid too. The consumers want better, more affordable EVs. As usual, Tesla takes on the chicken and the egg problems and just says, well, we'll do it all if no one else is willing to do it.
Therefore, signing up LG to supply cells is not a big deal. What matters is how much money these automakers put down in order to aggressively fund the expansion of the battery plants. So far, we've heard precious little on significant money actually put down... instead, we see a public negotiation - basically the battery companies asking the automakers to show us the money.
Therefore, the problem becomes trying to build 100,000 BEVs per year that can go 200 EPA 5 cycle miles. That's at least a 55 kWh battery, or 5.5 GWh per year. That's basically all of LG's current capacity. That's roughly Gigafactory phase 1. I estimate that is about 85% of Panasonic's current nominal capacity. You can't get there without putting up some significant cash. Then it takes time to build it out. Therefore, if VW/Audi/Porsche/GM/Ford and others all order from LG, they are divvying up 100,000 possible total. That's not even counting anything going to PHEVs, which is a huge slice. So on the BEV side, we're talking less than 50,000. At least BMW is going with Samsung SDI. So you have a strange conundrum... right now LG Chem has lots of extra capacity that the automakers aren't using. But it doesn't have enough to compete against Tesla's 2017/2018 projection. LG Chem certainly would want firm commitments of orders in order to expand, but even headliner projects like the Bolt is only 30,000 a year, or 1.8 GWh at a full 60 kWh (unlikely). Why would LG Chem expand at that order level? Therefore, what we are really seeing is that the big automakers are looking to ship token quantities of BEVs in the 2017-2019 time period, waiting to see market demand. Tesla isn't waiting, they already see market demand.
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*eats popcorn*
This thread is very interesting and I am learning a lot, and I don't want to derail it.
But... my question is so.freaking.what. If LG and BYD and American Apparel all have secret 50GW battery plants they are building or have hidden away in a moonbase, so what? They will sell batteries to automakers, who will make EV's. Tesla too will buy batteries, probably from Panasonic but maybe from other magic suppliers if necessary. The EV market is tiny and the demand is huge. Tesla and it's fellow ev builders can grow unchecked for 20 years building 40-50k car >200 mile EV's before saturating the market.
Is the question stock valuation? Is the idea that TM's current valuation hangs on some notion of an EV monopoly? If so, the development of other significant battery supply DOES affect that. Tesla will no longer be the only maker making GOOD EVs. Is the Bear thesis here that once the secret factories become real, or are generally understood to rival the GF that valuation will go away because GM will make a similar number of Bolts as TM makes Model 3s? Is it the Bear thesis that there is a small and fixed market for 40-50k EV's and as soon as Bolts come out TM will starve, unable to sell their model 3's being second to the market?
I just don't understand sweating it. I do think the emerging battery market is interesting and worth watching because I want the market to grow. But how, how is this any sort of threat to TM? My feeling is the Bolt could come out, with similar specs, price and appeal as the model 3, and each would sell as fast as they could be made for decades.
The competition isn't other EV makers, its ALL auto makers. Explain? Even if TFTF was proving that other companies were outperforming TM in battery capacity buildout (which I am not seeing), why should that concern me?
If TFTF is just saying the media is skewed toward a narrative where TM is the only one working on battery capacity, that might be true. Just not terribly interesting.
This thread is very interesting and I am learning a lot, and I don't want to derail it.
But... my question is so.freaking.what. If LG and BYD and American Apparel all have secret 50GW battery plants they are building or have hidden away in a moonbase, so what? They will sell batteries to automakers, who will make EV's. Tesla too will buy batteries, probably from Panasonic but maybe from other magic suppliers if necessary. The EV market is tiny and the demand is huge. Tesla and it's fellow ev builders can grow unchecked for 20 years building 40-50k car >200 mile EV's before saturating the market.
Is the question stock valuation? Is the idea that TM's current valuation hangs on some notion of an EV monopoly? If so, the development of other significant battery supply DOES affect that. Tesla will no longer be the only maker making GOOD EVs. Is the Bear thesis here that once the secret factories become real, or are generally understood to rival the GF that valuation will go away because GM will make a similar number of Bolts as TM makes Model 3s? Is it the Bear thesis that there is a small and fixed market for 40-50k EV's and as soon as Bolts come out TM will starve, unable to sell their model 3's being second to the market?
I just don't understand sweating it. I do think the emerging battery market is interesting and worth watching because I want the market to grow. But how, how is this any sort of threat to TM? My feeling is the Bolt could come out, with similar specs, price and appeal as the model 3, and each would sell as fast as they could be made for decades.
The competition isn't other EV makers, its ALL auto makers. Explain? Even if TFTF was proving that other companies were outperforming TM in battery capacity buildout (which I am not seeing), why should that concern me?
If TFTF is just saying the media is skewed toward a narrative where TM is the only one working on battery capacity, that might be true. Just not terribly interesting.
I think you are dismissing third party networks a little quickly there. For example, FastNed is a Dutch startup in the charging network that has 55 sites all over the Netherlands (much, much denser than Tesla network). They are extremely reliable (at least as reliable as the superchargers) and they are committed to providing the fastest charging tech possible (Tesla denied their request to provide supercharging technology, unfortunately). They will have 100kW in 2016 when Chademo equipment for those speeds is available. They still need to prove their business model, but they clearly show that it is technically possible.
It is technically possible obviously. Tesla has done it. Here is the Tesla 2016 map:
http://www.teslamotors.com/sites/default/files/images/supercharger/maps/2016-europe.jpg?20151119
But until some automaker makes a car that can use the network or someone comes up with a global expansion plan, it is not going to be viable for EVs to reliably travel long distances except in limited markets. If you think that is going to happen before 2020, you have some high hopes.
--Update--
I'll be happy with some fast charging in the US other than Tesla so there is some choice. Right now I'm feeling it is a given that my only viable option for a decent EV that can help me go all EV is going to be Tesla, at least in this decade.
CHAdeMO equipment for 100 kW is available already, however, no CHAdeMO vehicles can actually charge at 100 kW or anywhere near 100 kW. About 75-80 kW is the max.
What dalalsid was talking about is that it matters what the standard actually contains... the headline kW number is potentially meaningless.
The Tesla Superchargers being deployed today can handle 135 kW which is shared between two plugs. Each Model S tops out at 120 kW. So going to 150 kW won't make a Model S charge any faster, but will help if there are two Model S's charging at the same time. If/when a Model S ships with battery chemistry or a size of pack that can handle > 135 kW, then the next step to 150 kW has meaning for a single vehicle too.
It is likely that there isn't a business case for DC fast charging at all... at least, in the U.S., it is likely that there isn't a viable business model. FastNed may have access to enough capital to make a go at it, but I haven't seen anything from them that indicates that they have anything special from a technology or business perspective. I hope they do.
So if the CCS revision sports 150 kW, we need to see the amperage and whether or not any vehicles can take advantage of it. It is likely that a Bolt can't handle more than 120 kW (2C on a 60 kWh battery). The Leaf v2 is likely to ship with a smaller pack and same with the i3 v2. We're left with limited quantity vehicles like the R8 e-tron and the Audi Q6 e-tron 4 seater. So while the 150 kW spec is important, the 2017-2018 vehicles are unlikely to be able to use it. We'll see if 150 kW EVSE's are actually installed even if the spec supports it, just like the CHAdeMO and CCS specs are currently 100 kW but almost every EVSE actually installed is 20 kW to 62.5 kW, with 50kW being the practical max.
RobStark
Well-Known Member
They have to be when serving BEVs with ~85 EPA mile ranges. They also have to be much much slower.
Great if you only want to drive in the Netherlands.
I hope their business model works out.
Just a clarification, AESC is not an external supplier. It's a long-running JV between Nissan and NEC:
President’s Message｜Automotive Energy Supply Corporation
Given all the money Nissan poured into battery plants in Japan and NA (and to a lesser extent Euorpe, 3 plants in total), they might decide to continue with integrated production but for example replace NEC with another partner (say license battery tech from LG).
There were rumors in late 2014 to close down internal production:
Could Nissan's battery plant be running out of juice?
Maybe someone has additional info, I didn't follow AESC production logistics in 2015 in detail.
More info on battery sourcing decisions will likely become available when the Leaf 2 is presented.
In any case, AESC have a lot of dark capacity to increase future production if needed, see for example this 2013 plant overview:
Nissans New US Battery Plant Shows Major Dedication To EVs
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Tesla's CHAdeMo adapter was supposed to be rated at 100 kW. Has anyone tried it with one of the 100 kW Chademo chargers yet? I think there is one available to the public in Norway. Maybe Björn will test it for us.
GSP
LargeHamCollider
Battery cells != scalable
Couldn't find a better thread to put this in but some quick numbers on the Bolt's battery.
Gravimetric Energy Density: 137.5Wh/kg. (Tesla at 150Wh/kg)
Gravimetric Power Density: .37W/kg. (Tesla at .67W/kg)
I suspect Tesla has a significant volumetric advantage but don't know the volume of Tesla's battery.
Gravimetric Energy Density: 137.5Wh/kg. (Tesla at 150Wh/kg)
Gravimetric Power Density: .37W/kg. (Tesla at .67W/kg)
I suspect Tesla has a significant volumetric advantage but don't know the volume of Tesla's battery.
Bangor Bob
Member
Given that Tesla's US connector and CHAdeMO use the same size (and treatment - silver plated) power pins, it seems likely that CHAdeMO could physically handle 135kW on the existing connector. Car-side wiring would likely need upsizing.
Part of the reason no CHAdeMO vehicles go above 50kW is their batteries just aren't big enough to take it. 50kW is a 2C charge rate on a '15 Leaf, and 1.5C on a '16 SL or SV. That's fairly aggressive, particularly on the older chemistry packs.
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