A
Toyota Prius shortage, caused by lithium?
Thursday, February 21, 2008
How
could Toyota let there be a shortage of hybrids?
If hybrid
cars are the future, one would assume selling as many
hybrids as soon as possible would be smart because it's
the quickest path to economies of scale. Some even argue
it's the best path to lithium and plug-in
hybrids as well.
So, why is Toyota claiming that a Toyota
Prius shortage is possible?
Could it be lithium? Is lithium forcing NiMH
battery manufacturers to scale back their NiMH
manufacturing in favor of lithium-ion research and
development? Believe it or not, but has Toyota actually
perfected the lithium battery for the third
generation Toyota Prius and the third generation
Hybrid Synergy Drive?
Sound too far-fetched?
Last year, Toyota CEO Katsuaki Watanabe, stated, "We
will change the battery from nickel hydride to the lithium
battery" on the third generation Prius and all third
generation Toyota hybrids.
Then a few more laptop and cellphone batteries exploded
and suddenly rumors began pouring out of Tokyo that the
Third Generation Prius had been delayed by lithium. Since,
it hasn't been managing the thermodynamics of lithium via
a Battery Management System (BMS) that Toyota has focused
on when discussing lithium......
.....it's been battery manufacturing.
Corruption in just one cell, in one just one battery that
makes its way into an actual lithium-powered car, could
crush consumer faith in lithium in just one, even
harmless, explosion. Suddenly, billions of dollars spent
on R&D, on new production lines, are at a standstill.
That's the reality of today's lithium battery.
People might accept one in a million cell phone
explosions, but they will never accept one in a million
car explosions - at least that's what automakers believe,
and they aren't willing to roll the dice to find out if
this assumption is true, at least not yet.
GM's Bob Lutz has stated that this manufacturing liability
is due to cobalt-driven lithium chemistry and that battery
makers, such as A123 - one of GM's Chevy
Volt partners - have created more stable lithium
chemistries that make battery manufacturing more reliable,
and he might be right.
Or, he might just be the
industry's slickest spin-master.
Ultimately, any lithium-based chemistry is going to be
volatile - it's the nature of lithium. Yes, this
volatility is manageable, but can manufacturing defect
always be guaranteed via a BMS? That is the dilemma that
Toyota is now facing.
So, back to the billion dollar question: Might different
lithium chemistries alleviate this problem?
Perhaps chemistry has nothing to do with the problems of
lithium and the problem is purely manufacturing.
Nonetheless, by claiming such a chemistry problem - which
might be far more about proprietary profits rather than thermodynamics
- GM can create the perception that they are possibly
ahead of Toyota in the future of hybrid cars, without even
selling hardly any hybrid cars today, and for the next few
years, compared to Toyota.
Again, marketing genius - I'm not defending this possible
illusion, just commending it for what it possibly is.
Ultimately, manufacturing enough cells for 20,000, even
100,000 hybrids, might be achievable today, but it would
be expensive. Such a production number also wouldn't come
close to covering the demand for a lithium-powered,
non-plug-in Prius, and that's a problem.
Does Toyota make half its
third generation hybrids lithium-powered, the other half
NiMH? That just doesn't seem to make any economic sense.
Moreover, only enough lithium to power millions of hybrid
vehicles can make lithium cost-effective for millions of
consumers, and that's the Catch-22.
The sad reality of today's hybrid vehicles is that they
are caught between a rock and a hard place. Lithium is
almost certainly the future, but it's expensive, and the
manufacturing know-how to make it cheaper via
mass-production does not exist today - it might be just
around the corner, or it might be years around the corner.
Yet, focusing on NiMH instead of lithium today is probably
nothing short of a slow suicide.
Call it luck, but Toyota's Prius success was too much of a
good thing. Toyota's Prius success created plug-in hybrid
fanatics, but those fanatics just might have slowed their
own cause.
Yes, 100 mpg plug-in
hybrids are possible today, but the economies of scale to
make those hybrids cost-effective today are limited by
battery manufacturing limitations - not foot-dragging
automakers.
Unfortunately, that reality might not just slow plug-in
hybrid development, but it might also cause a shortage of
conventional NiMH hybrids, such as the Toyota Prius.
Boy, progress just really sucks sometimes.
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