One of the reasons why electric vehicles are so expensive is due to the high cost of their batteries. What if you could cut that cost in half?
Volkswagen and a technology partner have mastered a battery manufacturing process called 'dry coating' which could cut the cost of cell production by hundreds of millions of euros a year.
The carmaker, which is working with printing press manufacturer Koenig & Bauer AG on the technology, said the two companies are the first to perfect the procedure for both the positive and negative electrode. No doubt others will master the process in due course but "No-one else can do this today," battery chief Thomas Schmall says.
Volkswagen said it has produced several hundred cells with its method on a pilot line and should be ready for industrial production by 2027.
Together with scaled-up production and cheaper raw materials, the carmaker hopes the procedure will help bring down cell costs by around 50 percent, Schmall said.
Tesla, which obtained a similar process through acquiring startup Maxwell Technologies in 2019, has so far been able to dry-coat the anode, but is still having issues with the cathode, sources told Reuters.