Toyota Motor Corp, Japan’s biggest automaker, has plans to begin sales of Electric Vehicles (EVs) in Japan by 2022. The cars are to be built with environmental-friendly all-solid batteries.
Toyota embraced the hydrogen fuel-cell vehicles and Plug-in Hybrid Electric Vehicles (PHEV) as the most sensible technology to make cars greener in 2016 when an in-house unit headed by its president, Aiko Toyoda, was set up to look into adding long range EVs to its line up.
According to Reuters, planning to begin mass-producing EVs in China, the world’s biggest auto market, as early as in 2019. And that the model would be based on the existing C-HR sports utility vehicle and use lithium-ion batteries. Chunichi Shimbun daily of Tokyo noted that the new electric car will be built on an all-new platform, having an increased driving range and less charging time compared to other EVs.
Where other electric cars using the lithium-ion batteries have a driving range of just 300-400 kilometres and a charging time of about 20-30 minutes, the all-solid batteries would have a significantly longer driving range with a charging time of only a few minutes.
In reality, 2022 is ages away. As was rightly analysed by Christopher Richter, CLSA auto analyst, there is a long distance between the lab bench and the manufacturing; a lot can happen between now and 2022.
He also said that the cost of such batteries is another factor in determining the market’s reception. All these factors determine if the new Toyota product will help it compete effectively with or surpass EV leaders like Nissan Motor Co and Tesla Inc.
Toyota plans to begin mass production of EVs in China, the world’s largest automaker but is not the only automaker working ion all-solid-state batteries. BMW also has ongoing research with plans to mass produce in the next 10 years.
Battery powered cars are a viable emission free alternative to conventional cars.Solid state batteries use solid electrolytes rather than liquid and are environmentally safer than the more popular lithium ion batteries in the market.
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