A few days ago, Nissan held an all-solid-state battery technical briefing meeting on the line. According to the instructions, Nissan plans to achieve large-scale production of solid-state batteries by 2028. Compared with other toyota, Hyundai, Audi and other car companies that are also engaged in solid-state battery research and development, Nissan's planning for solid-state batteries is quite aggressive.
Not only will it skip semi-solid-state battery technology directly, but toyota's conservative scheme of "hybrid car first" will not be adopted, but a pure electric model that will directly mass-produce all-solid-state batteries in one step. According to the plan, Nissan's first mass production car equipped with solid-state batteries is expected to be launched in 2028.
From a technical point of view, compared with liquid lithium-ion batteries, all-solid-state batteries have the advantages of lighter weight, faster charging, less affected by temperature and safer. However, in the development process, Nissan also bluntly said that the all-solid-state battery still has many technical problems before the large-scale mass production is installed.
For example, at the technical level, solid-state batteries need to be evenly stacked with multi-layer cells, and once the force between each layer is uneven or the volume change caused by battery charge and discharge is not fully considered, it will lead to local accumulation of charge, which may cause a short circuit in severe cases.
In addition, solid-state batteries are also affected by the current soaring raw material prices, so nissan's important research direction is to develop cheaper alternative materials such as manganese.
However, even if Nissan already has a certain foundation for solid-state battery research, Nissan is only taking the first step towards this goal, that is, to have a solid-state battery feasibility research laboratory that can conduct manually manufactured, small-scale battery experiments.
Kenzo Oshihara, Nissan's deputy general manager for innovative battery production, said that Nissan's laboratory can only produce about 50 four-layer soft-pack solid-state batteries per month, while only one electric car needs about 5,000 soft-pack solid-state batteries.
Oshihara revealed, "Nissan's laboratory will take a long time to realize the production of solid-state batteries for vehicles, and the equipment for mass production must be more sophisticated." ”
If all goes according to plan, Nissan will start a solid-state battery pilot plant in 2024 and achieve mass production in 2028. The cost of an all-solid-state battery is expected to fall from $75 per kWh to $65 per kWh, which is comparable to the current cost of liquid lithium-ion batteries.
A breakthrough in this battery space will also help Nissan launch electric models in segments such as pickup trucks, large SUVs and even sports cars. Nissan believes that all-solid-state batteries can change the game of the electric vehicle industry.