Batteries

Exactly a year ago, Tesla Motors CEO Elon Musk presided over a flashy demonstration in which the battery pack of a Tesla Model S electric car was apparently swapped from underneath within 90 seconds and replaced with a fresh pack. The event generated a huge amount of press, and subsequent coverage...

The Nissan Leaf is by far the world's best-selling electric car, but one of the ways Nissan has kept its cost down is by eliminating an active-cooling system for its lithium-ion battery pack. Now, however, its second mass-produced electric vehicle--the Nissan e-NV200 small commercial van--turns out...

It's a statement of the obvious, but solar panels do their best work during the day, specifically noon and early afternoon when the sun is at its strongest. The trouble is, this rarely tallies with when energy use is at its highest--typically in the evening, when everyone gets home from work. The...

Electrification is becoming an increasingly important factor in improving the fuel efficiency of vehicles. Cars like the Toyota Prius hybrid made it mainstream, but there are varying degrees to which batteries can be used for saving fuel. MUST SEE: Elio 84-MPG Three-Wheel Prototype: Driven In...

As demand for electric cars grows, supply of batteries must grow to meet it. That much is obvious. But just how much is battery demand expected to grow by over the coming years? According to an Electric Vehicle Batteries report by Navigant Research, existing capacity for lithium-ion battery...

Elon Musk has probably been given a lot of advice during his time at Tesla--some good, and some bad. Bond manager Jeffrey Gundlach is the latest to offer his own take on the business to Musk though--and it isn't what you might be expecting. According to Bloomberg, Gundlach has suggested the Tesla...

The Chevrolet Spark EV has been on the market for only a year, but already it's being updated. And in this case, the update is major: The 2015 Chevy Spark EV will have an entirely new battery pack. General Motors announced yesterday that it will bring assembly of the electric Spark's battery...

In the search for better electric-car batteries, lots of lab research has to happen before anything can be announced. Today, a company called Power Japan Plus came out of stealth mode to unveil a new battery chemistry, with both electrodes--anode and cathode--made of carbon. The new cell, known as...

It's hard to keep track of all the future battery technology candidates, but lithium-air battery technology is among the most widely-researched. Its biggest draw is the potential to store three times the energy in batteries the same size and weight of today's electric vehicles--providing huge...

The remarkable scope, overwhelming ambition, and epic failure of the Better Place electric-car service in Israel is worthy of a book, or several. But until one appears, Fast Company magazine has produced the most comprehensive article yet on the founding--and foundering--of the great Better Place...

Every electric-car owner wants more range; it's practically an immutable law. Now Nissan executive Andy Palmer has come close to confirming that a longer-range Nissan Leaf is in the cards, though likely not until 2016 or even 2017. In an interview at last week's New York Auto Show with Palmer, who...

There is no such thing as a truly green car. All cars require raw materials and energy to produce, use energy during their time as transport, and require energy to recycle--the components that can be recycled, at least. To mitigate such pollution issues and increase supply chain transparency, Tesla...

When I first heard last week that Tesla was offering Model S owners a free retrofit that would install its new underbody shield and deflector plates, I called my local Tesla Motors service center almost immediately. It seemed like a no-brainer. The titanium shield and two aluminum deflector plates...

It was one of the thorniest issues facing the powerful California Air Resource Board: Did the ability to swap electric-car battery packs qualify for "fast fueling" incentives meant to prod carmakers to build zero-emission vehicles that could add 300 miles of range in no more time than filling the...

Many among the Detroit auto media were skeptical of Tesla Motors for years, correctly noting just how hard it is to start a car company and build a genuinely appealing product--electric car or not. But as Tesla continues to sell Model S electric luxury sedans, expanding into Europe and China as...

The modern car is just about unrecognizable against its counterpart of a few decades ago. Not in terms of shape or performance, but emissions. The whole industry, pushed hard by legislation, has drastically reduced exhaust pollutants. Hybrids, plug-in hybrids and electric cars do their bit to...

Scientists found that charging disrupts the structure of lithium-ion cathode material, degrading performance.

Standardized batteries are one of the great consumer goods: Who hasn't bought a pack of AA or AAA cells for some consumer-electronics device by now? The idea that standardized high-capacity lithium-ion battery packs are an inevitable next step in the evolution of electric cars crops up repeatedly...

Tucson wants to be the home of Tesla Motors' massive lithium-ion battery cell factory.

Fossil fuels may not be the cleanest way of powering us between two points on a map, but there's little doubt they offer convenience. So far, scientists have struggled to find batteries for electric cars that match the huge amounts of energy stored in a gallon of gasoline or diesel. As a result we...