Hyundai Motor is developing solid-state lithium batteries which are claimed to be safe from explosions for its electric vehicles.
The company has reportedly developed pilot-scale battery production facilities, sources close to the matter said, comparing the move to an approach taken by the automaker’s Japanese rival Toyota, according to the Korea Herald Newspaper.
“Hyundai is developing solid-state batteries at its Namyang R&D Center’s battery precedence development team and it has secured a “certain level of technologies,” a source told the Korea Herald.
The Korean automaker is autonomously developing the new technologies without partnering with Samsung SDI and LG Chem.
Since the solid-state batteries are made of solid electrolyte instead of liquid electrolyte, it has a significantly lower risk of ignition or explosion.
“The approach of Hyundai Motor’s development of the solid-state battery is similar to Toyota, which also owns its production facilities,” the source said.
Toyota plans to commercialize solid-state batteries in around 2020 with its own manpower and production facilities, although experts view it may require more time.
The Japanese automaker has around 200 engineers developing solid-state batteries at its Higashi Fuji Technical Center, compared to the less than 30 engineers at Hyundai Motor.
Hyundai Motor reportedly has a pilot scale production line for the batteries and it may also have its own production facilities in the future like Toyota if necessary.
Choi Jung-deok, an analyst at LG Economic Research Institute said that while it is still a distant future and uncertainties remain, “if automakers are able to succeed the mass production of next-generation batteries, the paradigm of batteries in the future may be shifted.”
Industry sources said Hyundai may be able to mass produce the solid-state batteries around or after 2025. In such a scenario and considering the five-year cycle of car production, the battery should be completed around 2020.
Conventional battery makers including Samsung SDI and LG Chem are taking a more cautious approach. Although they are developing solid-state batteries, they may unveil solid-like batteries first, which have some liquid electrolyte, instead of directly mass producing solid-state batteries.
Both Samsung SDI and LG Chem confirmed that they are developing the technologies, but they declined to make comments on the current development level of the technologies, says Cho Woo-seok, a researcher at Korea Electronics Technology institute’s Advanced Batteries Research Centre.