The famous car designer, Henrik Fisker (pictured), who will launch an electric car with a claimed range of 400 miles this summer, has set up his own battery-making company, Fisker Nanotech.
Danish-born Fisker, who designed the Aston Martin V8 Vantage and DB9, and the BMW Z8, originally said his new EV, the EMotion, would feature “game-changing” battery technology that marries a graphene supercapacitor and a lithium-ion battery for nine-minute fast charging capability.
But last week he appeared to be going in reverse on this decision, suggesting the first luxury sports sedans will come with lithium-ion battery cells. An announcement from Fisker on Facebook stated: “Fisker EMotion will come with state of the art NMC (Li-ion) chemistry produced by one of the world’s leading battery companies, & Fisker proprietary battery pack, giving the vehicle over 400 mile range. We still continue our efforts in advancing battery research in Graphene & Solid State chemistry!”
The man in charge of Fisker Nanotech, Jack Kavanaugh, is still chasing the ‘game-changing’ next-generation battery technology. Kavanaugh, who previously worked for Nanotech Energy in California, said: “The challenge with using graphene in a supercapacitor in the past has been that you don’t have the same density and ability to store as much energy. We have solved that issue with technology we are working on. Altering the structure of the graphene has allowed them to improve the supercapacitor’s energy density.”
He also said a newly developed machine had lowered the cost of producing graphene to just 10 cents per gram.
The EMotion is being built by VLF – a manufacturer Fisker partly owns. “There will also be a second, higher volume and lower cost model to follow,” Fisker told Bloomberg. “Production for that will be handled by an established carmaker, because the established car brands have really mastered high-volume, high-quality car production.”
Fisker also said the all-electric vehicle would be a “spiritual successor” to the Fisker Karma hybrid launched in 2011. The Karma cost more than $100,000 and sold about 1,800 units in North America and Europe before the bankruptcy of its battery supplier ended production. The vehicle’s manufacturer, Fisker Automotive, was later sold to Chinese auto-parts conglomerate Wanxiang.
