Motorola

It's totally believable- they focused all their efforts on hydrogen fuel cells over battery tech to please the Japanese government. I'll bet they have more than a few regrets going down that path.

peteharvey

Back around about 2007-2008, Japan had a dispute with China over the ownership of the Sedanku Islands or whatever, and China restricted sales of rare earth metals to Japan.
Hydrogen is one of the necessary technologies to prevent reliance on China.
If you do some research, you will know more about this than me.

Nowadays, the Japanese have discovered huge deposits of rare earth metals under the Japanese ocean.
The Japanese have also began mining rare earth metals in Malaysia or something like that.
The Japanese must have access to rare earth metals, without reliance on China - in order to make full battery powered electric vehicles posssible.

Toys4RJill

There will always be room for both a battery electric car or a hydrogen electric. But at some point batteries have drawbacks for the environment as well as how do you produce electricity. Hydrogen has some advantages and vice versa so does a battery

peteharvey

https://www.usnews.com/news/technolo...ion-technology

Even Honda is quitting F1 to "focus" on electrification.

bitkahuna

iTrader: (20)

i just don't know, but what is the gigafactory in nevada for then?

Why is 'focus' bold and in quotes?

bitkahuna

iTrader: (20)

Back to lexus, i decided to read some about the UX300e.

Info here:
https://www.lexus.eu/car-models/ux-300e/

Battery info here:
https://www.lexus.eu/discover-lexus/...erless-quality

Specifically:

That battery's smaller than hyundai/kia's cuv - (niro/ioniq/etc) which is 64KWh i believe.

they emphasize 'fun city driving' a lot... fun not being something i associate with city driving, lol.

i wonder how this model is doing? I wonder what it's like. I wonder why they didn't release it in the U.S.? I'm going to go look for a review...

update: i could find NO review of this car (in English at least, there was a German and a Chinese one i found...)

Motorola

Gigafactory Nevada is a partnership between Tesla and Panasonic. Tesla is in charge of battery packaging, but the actual battery cells are still made by Panasonic. And until very recently, Tesla had battery supply issues too.

https://electrek.co/2020/06/17/tesla...attery-supply/

peteharvey

Let me really emphasize the word "FOCUS" by adding capitals and color.

peteharvey

By January 2021, the Lexus UX300e will be available for test drive in the UK.
Deliveries begin in March 2021.
Test drives and comparisons will be out in English soon.

https://www.lexus.co.uk/car-models/u...ww.bing.com%2F

gengar

... and it cost 5+ billion to build (and counting), is still not yet even operationally profitable, and is heavily taxpayer-funded. (Why Nevadans like myself are on the hook for a JV between companies with a market cap of close to half a trillion dollars boggles the mind, certainly.)

TMC sold nearly thirty times as many cars as Tesla in 2019 and Tesla production was still battery-constrained. The notion that some have espoused in this thread that TMC could just decide to become a player in the EV industry tomorrow is absurdly farfetched.

bitkahuna

iTrader: (20)

so the batteries are made there, or not and just packaged?

seems like a vast facility to be only packaging batteries.

EZZ

Panasonic makes the batteries there. Tesla packages the battery for use in the car. Tesla also has a prototype battery factory called Roadrunner in Fremont, where they developed their new 4680 cell. They say it's a prototype battery factory but it's huge. They will produce limited number of 4680 batteries for use in next year Plaid model until they can scale up another much larger factory for their Cybertruck

peteharvey

Getting a bit off track, but Panasonic owns a part of the gigafactory, especially the manufacturing equipment inside the factory.

Panasonic and Tesla Sign Agreement for the Gigafactory

July 30, 2014OSAKA, Japan / PALO ALTO, USA, July 31, 2014 – Panasonic Corporation and Tesla Motors, Inc. have signed an agreement that lays out their cooperation on the construction of a large-scale battery manufacturing plant in the United States, known as the Gigafactory.

According to the agreement, Tesla will prepare, provide and manage the land, buildings and utilities. Panasonic will manufacture and supply cylindrical lithium-ion cells and invest in the associated equipment, machinery, and other manufacturing tools based on their mutual approval. A network of supplier partners is planned to produce the required precursor materials. Tesla will take the cells and other components to assemble battery modules and packs. To meet the projected demand for cells, Tesla will continue to purchase battery cells produced in Panasonic's factories in Japan. Tesla and Panasonic will continue to discuss the details of implementation including sales, operations and investment.

The Gigafactory is being created to enable a continuous reduction in the cost of long range battery packs in parallel with manufacturing at the volumes required to enable Tesla to meet its goal of advancing mass market electric vehicles. The Gigafactory will be managed by Tesla with Panasonic joining as the principal partner responsible for lithium-ion battery cells and occupying approximately half of the planned manufacturing space; key suppliers combined with Tesla's module and pack assembly will comprise the other half of this fully integrated industrial complex.

JB Straubel, Chief Technical Officer and Co-founder of Tesla Motors said: "the Gigafactory represents a fundamental change in the way large scale battery production can be realized. Not only does the Gigafactory enable capacity needed for the Model 3 but it sets the path for a dramatic reduction in the cost of energy storage across a broad range of applications."

Yoshihiko Yamada, Executive Vice President of Panasonic, added, "We have already engaged in various collaborative projects with Tesla toward the popularization of electric vehicles. Panasonic's lithium-ion battery cells combine the required features for electric vehicles such as high capacity, durability and cost performance. And I believe that once we are able to manufacture lithium-ion battery cells at the Gigafactory, we will be able to accelerate the expansion of the electric vehicle market."

Cost reductions will be achieved through optimized manufacturing processes driven by economies of scale previously unobtainable in battery cell and pack production. Further price reductions are achieved by manufacturing cells that have been optimized for electric vehicle design, both in size and function, by co-locating suppliers on-site to eliminate packaging, transportation & duty costs and inventory carrying costs, and by manufacturing at a location with lower utility and operating expenses.

The Gigafactory will produce cells, modules and packs for Tesla's electric vehicles and for the stationary storage market. The Gigafactory is planned to produce 35GWh of cells and 50GWh of packs per year by 2020. Tesla projects that the Gigafactory will employ about 6,500 people by 2020.

bitkahuna

iTrader: (20)

ok thanks, that's an interesting arrangement. i wonder how well it works in practice, and what percentage of batteries tesla uses in its vehicles from the gigafactory, and which directly from panasonic.

gengar

I thought the NV Gigafactory produced all the 3/Y packs and Panasonic Japan produced all the S/X packs, so that's probably the best measurement.

Going by the cell production numbers (supposedly 20GWh/yr) at the NV Gigafactory probably won't make for good analysis because the NV Gigafactory also produces cells for Powercell applications, and I'm pretty sure the pack production also includes cells not produced at the Gigfactory.