Solid state batteries have been on the horizon, championed as the turning point for electric cars, for at least a handful of years now. Most of the time when the tech heads say some new revolutionary technological advancement is imminent, that really means its decades away and I never have to worry about it. But, perhaps surprisingly, solid state batteries are here, ready to be shipped to your house, and delivering on all of the promises the nerds said they would. Unfortunately you can’t get these batteries in your EV quite yet, but it’s promising to see these electron gobblers delivered and functionally superior. My head won’t stop spinning!
It’s going to take at least a few more years for solid state to hit the electric car you can park in your driveway. That’s just a fact of manufacturing limitations, product development lifecycles, and further research and development needed for large-scale deployment. The power use and charging speed demands of a power station like the one featured in the video below, and a high-voltage high-draw electric vehicle on the road aren’t exactly the same. We’re much closer to the path than I had considered we might be, but we haven’t quite reached our destination. Yet.
This video came across my YouTube feed because I dig gadgets and green technologies, so I was more than happy to click the big red play button, and I’m glad I did. These Lithium Nickel Cobalt Manganese solid state batteries from Yoshino have been properly tested by third-party safety wonks, and the results are impressive.
In the smaller form factor, like the quarter kilowatt unit tested in the video, the benefits aren’t exactly apparent. While the battery itself is smaller and more dense, the packaging and extra functionality included give the Yoshino 241Wh pack a higher pricepoint and a heavier carrying weight. Bump it up to the company’s biggest unit, a 2.6 kWh power bank for camping or home power backup, and you’ll see the benefits much more clearly.
The company’s website currently shows this giant battery at $2,639, which brings its $/Wh rating in line with traditional battery offerings from Ecoflow, Bluetti, and Anker. When you add in that the solid state unit is significantly lighter at just 53 pounds versus over 120 pounds for some of the competitors, the new tech makes a lot of sense.
Even if we can find a way to reduce the size, weight, and hopefully cost, of an electric car’s battery pack by 20 percent, manufacturers would be able to bring better quality products to market with improved energy density. And all of that is before we start talking about how solid state batteries should have better longevity than their traditional gel or liquid cell counterparts.