Last month, Reuters reported that Tesla is planning to introduce a battery for its electric cars that will last for over a million miles, a technological advancement that many see as a watershed moment for EV adoption across the world. In the report, the introduction is planned for “China later this year or early next,” but Tesla hasn’t publicly announced these plans.
Now, Contemporary Amperex Technology Co. Ltd., the Chinese battery supplier for Tesla as well as Volkswagen AG and BMW Group, announced it has developed and is ready to manufacture a million-mile EV battery, as reported by Bloomberg. It’s not clear if this battery is the same or different from the one touted by Tesla, but there are more details on the CATL front.
According to Bloomberg, CATL Chairman Zeng Yuqun said the new battery will last 16 years and 1.24 million miles. As we’ve noted before, your average EV battery warranty is currently in the ballpark of eight years and 100,000 miles, so this is a significant jump in terms of consumer confidence and potential for reuse. Even if they are 10 percent more expensive than current options, as Zeng admitted, the benefits far outweigh that initial price jump.
All of this may seem a little inside baseball, especially because none of the technological advancements matter to your average driver until the battery is in a consumer vehicle. So who is going to get their hands on the million-mile battery first?
We already know Tesla will be debuting one, and as Bloomberg noted Elon Musk’s company signed a two-year contract with CATL in February. But the article also makes clear that the EV battery supplier, the largest in the world, works with many other carmakers, from BMW to Porsche.
“If someone places an order, we are ready to produce,” said Zeng.
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