The impact they're hoping it'll have is people will think this isn't the right time to buy an EV so they'll keep buying Toyota gas cars. That's why Toyota is constantly in the news regarding battery tech - it's to support their fossil fuel business.
I pretty much agree. To prove this theory wrong they have to produce a working prototype with those capabilities.
Those capabilities don’t even make sense.
— Do ICE cars have 750 mile range? No. If you could really charge a battery that quickly, there’s no real reason to have more range than a typical ICE car, and you could follow ICE car habits. The incentive would be to make the car cheaper at that point.
— will that change charging at home? Also, no. I have a 50a charging circuit, similar to my 50a stove circuit. Many houses have wiring that can support that, or it’s not too big a change to support that. That’s sufficient for a full charge on pretty much any EV (except maybe that horrible excuse for excessive consumption that is the Hummer), but I’m usually just topping off from whatever I used during the day. If anything, EVs should get more efficient, so my overnight charge will support more range. A homeowner will never be able to afford the infrastructure to support that ten minute charge time. Even, say doubling the charge: a 100a charging circuit likely means upgrading your electrical service for most people, so now it’s expensive, and most of the time that’s wasted.
— will that change supercharging? Also, no. Think of how expensive superchargers already are: you already meet or exceed the cost of fuel for ICE cars. Now imagine the cost of the infrastructure to double or triple that charging rate. Are you really going to pay that premium?
Personally I’m really liking changing my habits to treat fueling my car like my phone: plug it in at night and it’s just always ready.
When they talk about these fast charge times, it's always about DC fast chargers. Home chargers (levels 1&2) simply don't need it, have never been close, and no one really cares. This is fodder for the road trip mentality, or counter-FUD to the FUD that charging is long and slow.
If it actually pans out, I'm sure we'll start to see DC fast charges advertising their speed, possibly with a premium price. It's already a detail being tracked, it just doesn't usually take a front seat.
More likely that they’re trying to hedge their bet on their hydrogen fuel cell technology that they’ve heavily invested in. It’s actually fairly impressive.
It's cool tech but it's expensive. Per mile, it can't compete on price with gas let alone battery EVs.
Hydrogen isn't working out for them so now they're just delaying as much as possible.
Hydrogen cars cannot be better than battery electric cars, because the laws of physics doesn't allow them to be.
A HFCEV is just a BEV with extra steps and efficiency losses. Reverse hydrolysis is used to generate electricity (with losses) that in turn charges a small battery that drives the car.
Smaller batteries can't provide the same amount of power as larger batteries (that's why the fastest EVs always have large batteries and why performance drops as the battery gets close to empty).
Already it's a loss for HFCEVs, but the bad news doesn't end there - that ultra-pressurised hydrogen doesn't just magically appear in your tank. So we need to look into that. In fact, let's look at the whole process.
I'm going to be very generous here and assume that all hydrogen is produced with green energy - this obviously isn't the case. Hydrogen production is far more carbon-intensive than almost all national electricity grids are.
BEV:
Electricity is generated, and sent over power lines until it makes its way to a charger. This charger directly charges the battery of the car (whole process, typically over 90% efficient). The battery drives the electric motor. The car moves (electric motors, 90-97% efficient).
HFCEV:
First water must be collected and purified. I don't know how energy intensive that is, but it could be a lot. Then it needs to undergo hydrolysis, which is extremely energy intensive. The hydrogen needs to be pumped out and compressed, which requires yet more energy. From there, the hydrogen needs to be loaded onto transport, be it shipping tankers, trucks, trains. It needs to be physically transported, which is more energy. Then if it was on a tanker or train it needs to be put into smaller distribution vehicles. Then transported to a fueling station. The pumps and station needs a lot of energy to run. People fill their cars up. The car runs an (again quite energy intensive) reverse hydrolysis, which charges the battery and powers the electric motor.
There's a lot more "work" being done than sending electrons down wires.
And this is before we even get into things like infrastructure or safety. A typical hydrogen fueling station costs over $5m to build, in part due to the safety regs of pressurised hydrogen being a very explosive substance (and fueling stations have blow up before, despite them virtually not existing).
Chargers range from $600 to $10k each. Say a location has 20 of them. That's still pennies compared to a hydrogen fueling station. Petrol stations cannot be used for hydrogen. They look the same but they are not the same, even ignoring all the additional safety requirements.
Electricity on the other hand has infrastructure everywhere, even wired directly to our homes. Electricians exist everywhere, it's a widely understood technology and pretty much any electrician is capable of installing at least a home charger.
Sorry for the rant, but no, HFCEVs will not take off. They're vastly more complex. More expensive. Less safe. Less performant. Nowhere near as energy efficient. There's not really any angle you can look at where they make sense even if we assume battery tech completely stagnates.
So TLDR "Toyota, Stop trying to make hydrogen happen! It's not going to happen"
Hydrogen is not going to happen. It's wildly impractical and there is no infrastructure for it. EV is the way of the future, but Toyota's strategy is to bring customers along with hybrids first. Most of their lineup has a hybrid powertrain, and in most cases it is the same 2.5L HEV engine, just retuned for more HP on larger vehicles. The Camry up to the Grand Highlander and their Lexus counterparts use it. Meanwhile, if they are successful with solid state battery technology, it'll make the rest of the market obsolete. Their strategy is to make incremental steps toward EV vs trying to force the market into an EV.
And how do you produce hydrogen? Either with methane (producing tons of co2) or by wasting tons of electricity with hydrolysis. BEV is the superior technology in all aspects but one: recharge time.
Hydrogen cannot compete with BEVs for passenger cars. This will never ever change, because the problem isn't even current technology, the problem is physics.
Even putting that aside for a moment, there's a reason why VW and Mercedes cancelled hydrogen R&D the second batteries became dense enough for usable car range.
There's a reason BMW, once extremely anti-EV and pro-hydrogen has now switched. There's a reason why Toyota's new CEO is distancing the company from the absolute failures their hydrogen projects have been and have said they're getting into EVs.
BMW and Toyota were the two big pro-hydrogen carmakers, and they're abandoning it.
I don't want my reply to be a massive wall of text, so my issues with the physics of hydrogen cars will be in another comment.
This is such an absurd take about Toyota, who has been putting some of the most reliable and fuel efficient vehicles on the road for decades. Just because they haven't jumped all in into an emerging market doesn't mean they secretly want to build a bunch of gas guzzlers and keep people hooked on gasoline.
This battery tech has the potential to revolutionize anything containing a battery just like lithium ion batteries did when we were still stuffing D-cell batteries into everything. It's a worthy endeavor and all these comparisons to failed gimmicks from other industries are BS.
Toyota, who has been putting some of the most reliable and fuel efficient vehicles on the road for decades
That's kind of my point - they want to keep doing that and they can see the market rapidly moving away from them, so they're trying to make it stop.
Solid state battery tech is indeed a worthy endeavor, I just don't believe the company to actually deliver it will be Toyota. Judging from the woeful efficiency of their BZ4x they'd need advanced battery tech to get similar range as other EVs.
That's great. Build it. Until this hits the showroom floor, I don't care. Electric cars have been consistently 10 years away for the past like 30 or 40 years. For every other automaker, electric cars are now here today. Except Toyota, where they are still 10 years away. And for me, The electric car isn't 10 years away, it's parked in my driveway. So as far as I'm concerned, this is all just press bullshit to try and discredit current EVs and buy Toyota time to continue pushing gas and hybrid.
And as for the whole thing of people not buying EVs, that's twofold. One, people are hurting right now, and people in bad economic condition get really price conscious. The second gas prices go up they'll all be trading their gas guzzlers for EVs. Second, the simple fact is a lot of EVs on the road kind of suck. And other than Tesla, the public charging infrastructure is awful so if you like road trips you're going to have a bad time. Given that in another year other automakers will mostly be switching to Tesla charge ports, unless you're buying a Tesla there's some logic in waiting.
I bought a car last summer, and I had my wallet out ready to buy an EV. I had only 2 criteria:
Guess how many models were available? 1 - the Tesla Model Y, 7-seater option. And I did order one, but they cancelled my order because they stopped selling that variant in Canada.
So that's why I didn't buy an EV. Manufacturers can't be arsed to build a car that meets my very simple criteria; they prefer making another boring 5-seater crossover or yet another humongous "luxury" SUV. I want a minivan, dammit.
Alternatively, you could go the hybrid route as those are arguably better for most people. Plus their batteries are often large enough you can get 20-40 miles of all electric driving. That alone covers over 95% of all people's trips.
There are a few options in that category. I believe Toyota's Highlander is a 3 row hybrid. I think Hyundai's new Santa Fe also has a hybrid power train with 3 rows.
The Mazda CX-90 is another viable hybrid. Though Idk if that officially released yet.
But yeah, in terms of pure 3 row EV's, we're lacking.
Plugin hybrids are killer. EV around town and good MPG on road trips.
The only thing that will sell that car is if it actually gets those charge and range numbers, it’s affordable - and I mean affordable relative to current average ICE cars, not EVs; and it actually does car things that people want. Not built like a tin can, decent interior and seating, etc.
Current EVs price most people out of the market right away. Range and charge times eliminate a lot more people because there may not be charging convenient to where they leave the car for work, shopping, etc and they don’t want to sit for “x” time to allow the car to charge. Towing reducing range rapidly in EV trucks seems to keep people away because it’s not doing what a ICE truck can do despite all the power the motor has.
Yes, we’re still in the relatively early stages of EV development, so I’m not trying to bash EV. I’m very much for them. Just got a PHEV and love it, going for weeks and only burning 1/8 tank of gas is f’n awesome. But straight EV has a lot of work to do to become viable for the masses.
2010 investigating solid state
2013 mentions working on solid state
2017 ETA commercialize by Early 2020s
2019 Will establish a joint venture with Panasonic by 2020 no ETA on batteries
2023 June commercialization in 2027-2028
Note that further interviews state: limited production starts in 2027 The 745 and 10 min charging are worded as "could enable" IE will NOT be in the 2027-28 initial release.
They also plan to introduce it in hybrids first.
Fool me once, shame on you.
Fool me eight times, I’m an absolute moron for believing Toyota’s bullshit once again.
And that's assuming they put in a battery that large and not a marginally bigger battery than the competitors.
I mean, nobody actually needs that big of a battery. The vast majority drive less than what EV batteries provide.
If they can introduce a car that weighs 2,000lbs less and have a battery replacement half that of the competitors, while providing the same range, that’s a huge win.
I think it’s still reasonable to focus on the 250ish mile range. I have a semi-old 2018 PHEV that gets 15-20 miles on electric plus 350 miles on gas and I fill up a few times a year. I live relatively close to work but 100 miles of electric range would be enough for 99% of people.
But when I leave the beaten path, I still use a good chunk of the gas engine. Going on a normal road trip on interstates is fine but rural gas stations aren’t converting yet. It still takes planning to go off the beaten path even if it’s obvious we’ll get there.
Pretty sure I saw something recently where they said they'd only have the batteries to make 10k SSB cars a year by 2030
It still blows my mind that Toyota single-handedly made hybrids a very successful thing and yet squandered that position to Elon effing Musk. Toyota could’ve been THE market-leader for EVs while still making a killing with the Prius and ICE cars. They’d have a solid lock in all markets.
Toyota has one of the best reliability reputations of any automaker and yet anyone in the EV market (like I was recently) passes them over because they have zero models to sell. Instead of parlaying the Prius’ R&D into a viable EV too, they’ve left money on the table. Hyundai has gone all in and is selling a ton of EVs. I see more of theirs / Kia’s on the road than anything else (besides teslas).
I was in the impression that Toyota didn't see full EVs as viable products in long term. Sticking with hybrids was the safe option.
These "breakthroughs" are Toyota "Full-Self Driving next year!" fluff and I'll believe it when it's shipped and performing.
Available in 2027 or 2028. I might be in the market around then, though I'm sure they're gonna push it to the luxury brands first as an upgrade.
If there was any chance of this being viable by 2028, they would have a demo car today that works
Car production timelines are LONG
Yes this. If those years were realistic there would be a car we'd be looking at in prototype form.
Dude, Toyota is bullshitting like this for the last 20 years exactly for the reason you've written.
Really feeling like "new battery technology" is the vehicular equivalent of "holographic storage" for computers.
People have been talking about it for decades, there have been promising demos and absolutely no commercial application. :(
Meanwhile:
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/americans-aren-t-buying-evs-122809686.html
"among those respondents who did purchase a car or truck in the last 12 months, only 3.71% bought a new fully electric model, compared to 27.32% who got a gas combustion vehicle and 13.53% who opted for a new hybrid.
Used vehicle buyers chose to buy gas-fueled cars, per the study. According to response rates, 41.91% preferred to buy a car or truck with an internal combustion engine, whereas 4.51% and 9.02% went for used fully electric and hybrid varieties, respectively."
"among those respondents who did purchase a car or truck in the last 12 months, only 3.71% bought a new fully electric model, compared to 27.32% who got a gas combustion vehicle and 13.53% who opted for a new hybrid."
Where are the missing 55%? And only 27.32% went for an ICE?? Something doesn't add up.
"Used vehicle buyers chose to buy gas-fueled cars, per the study. According to response rates, 41.91% preferred to buy a car or truck with an internal combustion engine, whereas 4.51% and 9.02% went for used fully electric and hybrid varieties, respectively."
Does this take into account how the market for used cars looks like? It seems like there would be tons of more ICE cars than electric varieties, since they've been even more popular in the past.
Edit: At least the EU is stepping up https://www.reuters.com/markets/europe/eu-october-car-sales-up-146-ev-sales-jump-more-than-36-2023-11-21/
Almost 50% of new passenger car registrations Jan-Oct were fullt electric or hybrid.
"Where are the missing 55%?"
Diesel? Stat specifically says gas combustion. But that doesn't make ANY sense unless they ran the poll somewhere outside the US.
Oho... I think I have it figured out...
Follow the logic:
"Among those who purchased a car or truck in the last 12 months..."
3.71% - New Electric
27.32% - Gas Combustion
13.53% - New Hybrid
So of the people buying a car or truck in the past 12 months, 44.56% bought NEW vehicles. The remaining 55.44% bought USED.
The failing is excluding the word "new" from the gas purchases while it's included in the other two.
Then they relay the used statistics.
41.91% - Used ICE
9.02% - Used Hybrid
4.51% - Used Electric
55.44%
Makes me even more optimistic about future EV retrofitting. I have an FJ Cruiser that has an incredible amount of room for batteries between the frame rails; I’d love to have it be retrofitted one day.
Excellent make it then makr a cheaper, lighter option with half that range.
"The company has estimated that vehicles boasting solid-state batteries could be available starting in 2027 or 2028."
Could be available a few years from now? Wake me up if that actually happens.
This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.
