News About Nissan Battery Future

[Stoaty]

One regrettable thing is the website we all updated to track lost bars etc has fallen into disrepair. I enquired recently about updating it (I lost my second bar recently) and as told it was 'not needed anymore' now we have the capacity warranty - it had done its job. However as a result we now we have no real world data to track the performance of the 2013/14/15 batteries and how they compare to the inferior 2011/12 batteries.

We can get reports in 2-3 years about how the "Lizard" batteries are performing relative to the Battery Aging Model. If the Lizard is performing as claimed, areas like Phoenix should be performing close to what 2011 Leafs have done in Seattle.

 

[evnow]

I would be much happier right now if Nissan HAD used Panasonic batteries and a Tesla-style TMS... I still believe it is superior overall to Nissan's (as yet unproven) Lizard battery...

I think Tesla is a special case which doesn't fall under here. Panasonic Li batteries are otherwise not used by anyone else.

No - I don't think so, at all.

By all indications large formats will achieve price parity with small cells in a couple of years and large formats have an inherent advantage when it comes to mass assembly.

BTW, it is interesting that Panasonic has not tried to make large format cells. They are just content to play second fiddle ...

 

[surfingslovak]

If the Lizard is performing as claimed, areas like Phoenix should be performing close to what 2011 Leafs have done in Seattle.

That would be good!

 

[TomT]

Perhaps so, but I would have been willing to pay a little more for a battery that wasn't ultimately down 32% in capacity as mine currently is...

You do realize that the cars would have cost more. The addition of TMS and titanium and aluminum deflector plates would have driven the cost of the car up higher than it is now.

 

[pkulak]

Perhaps so, but I would have been willing to pay a little more for a battery that wasn't ultimately down 32% in capacity as mine currently is...

You do realize that the cars would have cost more. The addition of TMS and titanium and aluminum deflector plates would have driven the cost of the car up higher than it is now.

It would probably have added about 5 grand (at least) to the price of your car. You can spend that right now and have a car with a 100% battery after 3 years. Can't beat that degradation!

 

[Berlino]

It would probably have added about 5 grand (at least) to the price of your car. You can spend that right now and have a car with a 100% battery after 3 years. Can't beat that degradation!

Nissan Canada doesn't offer the battery replacement deal. Is it USA only?

 

[keydiver]

They probably don't offer it in Canada because:
a) no one/not enough people in Canada have complained about degradation, and
b) I doubt anyone ever will suffer enough heat degradation in Canada to take advantage of the warranty within 5 years/60,000 miles. Even here in the US, there are people like me in a very hot climate whose battery is still barely going to degrade 33% within 5 years. IMO, they have still set the bar too high (or low, depending how you look at it), as it is no where even close to the "5 year/80%" degradation they claimed we should see. I'm sure the Nissan pencil-pushers wrangled a long time before they finally pulled out that 67% figure, to minimize the actual number of warranty claims they might see.

 

[evnow]

Reading tea leaves - seems to me Nissan using LG batteries is less certain now than it seemed a couple of weeks back.

http://www.greencarreports.com/news/1094805_ghosn-nissan-not-tied-to-its-own-electric-car-batteries-will-seek-other-suppliers-pragmatically" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

“With electric cars, we consider that the reason for which we got involved with batteries, at the beginning, is we couldn't find batteries good enough for our cars—so we decided to assemble our own batteries,” Ghosn explained.

“And we will continue to do that as long as we don't think there are enough good batteries on the market, or we don't think there is competition to sustain the move on batteries.”
...
“We'll continue to scrutinize the market,” summed Ghosn, prefacing his answer as very pragmatic.

“As long as we don't see many competitors in the battery business allowing us to be able to access the technology we want for our cars and allowing us to make competition work between the different suppliers, we're going to continue to make our own batteries.”

 

[RegGuheert]

I think Ghosn is putting his battery people on notice as much as anything else. As much as his customers feel they have been burned over the LEAF battery degradation issue, I'd bet Carlos Ghosn feels even more burned by it. I suspect he is making the clear message, both internally and externally, that he will not be painted into a corner on his EV push over some battery issues. And I'm pretty sure his people know that he is not bluffing. If he decides that the best business decision is to procure the batteries from a third party, I have no doubt that he will do just that.

The good news is that Carlos Ghosn is not expressing doubts about the LEAF or Nissan's focus on EVs going forward. It seems clear that he wants to ensure that his vision is successful going forward. I think he can start to see the light at the end of the tunnel at this point.

 

[evnow]

Here is the interesting quote. Clearly Ghpsn thinks in the long term batteries will be sourced from specialized battery companies. He thinks this is like the early days when auto manufacturers made tires.

In responding to our question at the Paris Motor Show this past week, Ghosn likened making batteries to automakers' past view of tire manufacturing as a core business, because of the lack of an industry and a competitive market for them.

“With electric cars, we consider that the reason for which we got involved with batteries, at the beginning, is we couldn't find batteries good enough for our cars—so we decided to assemble our own batteries,” Ghosn explained.

 

[evnow]

So, whatever happened to the battery sourcing decision ? It was supposed to be taken in October and we haven't heard anything since September. If there was some change and Nissan had an agreement to buy from LG, I'm sure we'd have heard something from LG.

 

[DanCar]

This article is not sourced but says Ghosn said in September they will use LG.
http://www.businesskorea.co.kr/article/7427/more-power-korean-companies-taking-lead-ev-battery-market" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
Same text, different web site:
http://www.electric-vehiclenews.com/2014/11/korean-companies-taking-lead-in-ev.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
http://www.plugintoday.net/blog/tag/battery/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Those duplicate articles contradict this one:
http://www.greencarreports.com/news/1094805_ghosn-nissan-not-tied-to-its-own-electric-car-batteries-will-seek-other-suppliers-pragmatically" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
Which says that Ghosn says they will stay with in house production. Since the later article is better sourced or more reputable, I'll believe the later one.

I think the first article got confused between Nissan and Renault as Renault will be using LG batteries.

 

[BoulderLeaf]

And then there is this:

http://dailykanban.com/2014/12/battery-breakthrough-nissan-poised-take-range-off-table/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

So it sounds like Nissan is keeping this in-house, at least for now, as hinted at after the initial reports were deemed to be incorrect.

 

[mkjayakumar]

In a late night interview at Tokyo’s Business News channel, a relentless host pressed Carlos Ghosn for answers about the future of Nissan’s electric vehicle program. Is Nissan working on new batteries? Ghosn: “Yes.” Can you tell us more? Ghosn: “No.” Will the range double? Ghosn: “Yes.” That means more than 400 km? Ghosn: “Yes.”

....
....

Listening to Nissan’s CEO, who usually is not prone to making outlandish claims, Nissan appears to have the battery breakthrough out of the lab and ready for large scale production.

 

[evnow]

WSJ has an article about an interview they did with Ghosn. He says they are open to LG Chem for future Leaf.

http://www.wsj.com/articles/nissan-to-consider-lg-batteries-for-electric-cars-1437052009

Recently there news reports of LG Chen doubling their employee count in the MI factory for a "non-GM" customer. Wondering whether that is Nissan.

 

[edatoakrun]

WSJ has an article about an interview they did with Ghosn. He says they are open to LG Chem for future Leaf.

http://www.wsj.com/articles/nissan-to-consider-lg-batteries-for-electric-cars-1437052009

Recently there news reports of LG Chen doubling their employee count in the MI factory for a "non-GM" customer. Wondering whether that is Nissan.

The article seems to imply otherwise:

...Mr. Ghosn said the decision on a battery supplier for an overhauled Leaf, expected in a few years’ time, would come down to which battery performs better.

“There is no guarantee for anybody that you’re going to get the business without performance,” he said...

Also notice that this could be another hint that the gen 2 LEAF intro may be pushed back beyond fall 2016.

Meaning ~30 kWh may be the largest pack available for the LEAF, for some time beyond the 2016 MY.

 

[evnow]

Also notice that this could be another hint that the gen 2 LEAF intro may be pushed back beyond fall 2016.

Meaning ~30 kWh may be the largest pack available for the LEAF for, some time beyond the 2016 MY.

Yes, it is unclear what Nissan is going to do.

Ghosn has been saying different things at different times
- Nissan will have a Leaf version that will beat Chevy Bolt is both time & range
- Nissan will have a much longer range EV within a "few years"
- Nissan could use LG Chem battery in a future Leaf

Ghosn never speaks clearly about a Gen 2 Leaf. So we don't know whether "a few years" or "future" means MY17 Gen 2 Leaf or something else after Gen2 ?

 

[evnow]

Here is the basic quote from the article. Rest is context.

“We have opened to competition our battery business in order to make sure we have the best batteries,” Mr. Ghosn said in an interview. “For the moment, we consider that the best battery maker is LG.”

Mr. Ghosn said the decision on a battery supplier for an overhauled Leaf, expected in a few years’ time, would come down to which battery performs better.

“There is no guarantee for anybody that you’re going to get the business without performance,” he said.

I take the "there is no guarantee without performance" to mean, AESC will not be guaranteed a sale if the batteries don't perform well.