Toyota has been coy with the idea of battery-powered cars, avoiding discussion of their presence in the world for several years, and now springing dual surprises in solid-state and aluminum cells.
For several years, Toyota had been promoting a hydrogen fuel system, even developing a hydrogen-based trucking program from its San Diego docks. and at an Ontario, California location. They’ve been campaigning a sub-compact Yaris sedan which burns H2 directly, rather than using a fuel-cell electric approach. Those efforts seem ongoing, perhaps camouflaging their very real battery efforts, which must have been underway for at least a few years. Proof of that, Toyota has over 8,000 patents for solid-state energy storage.
Toyota has been working, “With Japanese petroleum company Idemitsu Kosan to mass produce solid-state batteries. The collaboration will focus on sulfide solid electrolytes, a promising material for EV batteries.” This partnership has been ongoing since 2013.
The chart below, though, shows a renewed and current (no pun intended) interest in exploring actual commercial realities with battery power. Note the references to a “Next Generation” chemistry moving from monopolar to bipolar technology and retaining liquid electrolytes, and a move to solid-state batteries by 2027. Note that the roadmap does not include any reference to aluminum batteries.
Solid State
OilandEnergyOnline.com reports, “[Toyota’s] new Performance lithium-ion batteries will achieve about a 491-mile range, and their future High-Performance lithium-ion batteries will reach about a 621-mile range. Both have about a 20-minute 10-to-80 percent fast charge capability.” This is notable, the website reports, because “The company had been resisting its transition to electric vehicles (EVs), focusing instead on hybrids and vehicles powered by hydrogen fuel cells.”
This blog reported on Toyota’s solid-state work a decade ago, then witnessed a fading away of reports until early last year, when the company again began promoting the idea. At least a half dozen videos exist on YouTube, similar to the one below, all with the same melifluous male voiceover and randomly edited images. None seem to contain any hard numbers and a few seem to conflate solid-state and aluminum batteries.
A few text resources provide some generic information on both toyota’s solid-state and aluminum batteres.
Oilandenergyonline.com reports, “[Toyota] say they have developed a highly flexible, adhesive, and crack-resistant solid electrolyte. “Beyond that, most reports stick with general advantages of such batteries. These include reselience under heat or cold, long life, short charging times, and safety- including fire resistance.
The same source add,s “According to Toyota’s own news releases, they have made a significant breakthrough in solid-state battery technology and are aiming for mass production by 2027-2028. Here’s what Toyota’s solid-state batteries are expected to deliver:
- “A 20% increase in cruising range compared to their upcoming “Performance” lithium-ion batteries, which are already targeting a range of over 800km (around 500 miles). This could mean a future range of nearly 1000km (over 600 miles).
- “A rapid charging time of 10 minutes or less (from 10-80% state of charge).
- “Improved safety due to the use of a solid electrolyte instead of a liquid one, which reduces the risk of fires.”
These advantages would be of interest in aeronautical applications. That Toyota has invested heavily in Joby Aviation is of special interest here, regardless of the batteries to be adapted to aerial transport.
At a generic level, Dave Borlace provides an overview of the technology and its benefits. One big disadvantage, as least early in production, will be significantly higher prices for these desirable cells.
Aluminum/Air
Several major firms have attempted to store energy in aluminum. As early as 2012, IBM took part in a Battery 500 program, with hoped-for rechargeable hunks of aluminum powering cars for up to 500 miles per charge.
India has few resources to support a strong battery industry, even though it has 35 of the 50 most polluted cities in the world. It does have an abundance of bauxite deposits, though, essential to aluminum production. That may be a factor in its turning to Israeli firm Phinergy, which a decade ago had created battery-swapping program that traded depleted blocks of aluminum from electric Ronault-built versions of the Nissan Leaf and replaced them with fully-charged aluminmum batteries good for extended drives.
Videos about Toyota’s aluminum-ion battery draw from the same stock footage and tend to confuse the issue with solid-state cells. We don’t really get a picture as to whether such cells appear like conventional lithium-ion cells or they are more like the blocks of metal plates Phinergy uses. Until we know more from Toyota, this will be a murky area in our crystal ball. Besides, Toyota hasn’t seen fit to provide numbers for their performance, making it difficult to know how close they are to a breakthrough as significant as that for their solid-state battery.