Panasonic To Build $4 Billion Battery Plant In Kansas To Meet Tesla Demand (nikkei.com) 43
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Nikkei Asia: Panasonic will invest $4 billion in a second U.S. electric vehicle battery factory in Kansas, its subsidiary Panasonic Energy announced on Thursday, confirming an earlier Nikkei report. The factory is expected to hire as many as 4,000 employees and supply a new high-capacity battery for Tesla. The decision follows Tesla's April opening of a second American EV factory in Texas to meet brisk demand.
Panasonic aims to triple or quadruple EV battery production capacity by fiscal 2028 from the current level of roughly 50 gigawatt-hours per year. It plans to install two production lines at a battery component factory in Wakayama Prefecture, Japan, in fiscal 2023 and begin manufacturing its new high-capacity model, the 4680. That investment is expected to total roughly 80 billion yen ($580 million). Panasonic had said it would determine whether to build new manufacturing facilities after seeing how production at the Wakayama plant fared in terms of profitability.
Increasing production demands from Tesla, a leading source of the Japanese electronics group's earnings, were likely a factor in the decision for a new U.S. plant, along with Panasonic's progress on the new technology. Prototypes started to ship in May. Emanuel noted that Panasonic's investment plan of up to $4 billion will create as many as 4,000 American jobs. Panasonic's first U.S. plant in Nevada, the Gigafactory 1, is jointly operated with Tesla. The Japanese company invested roughly 200 billion yen in that facility, which only began turning a profit in the year ended March 2021 as high defect rates kept mass production from getting off the ground.
Panasonic aims to triple or quadruple EV battery production capacity by fiscal 2028 from the current level of roughly 50 gigawatt-hours per year. It plans to install two production lines at a battery component factory in Wakayama Prefecture, Japan, in fiscal 2023 and begin manufacturing its new high-capacity model, the 4680. That investment is expected to total roughly 80 billion yen ($580 million). Panasonic had said it would determine whether to build new manufacturing facilities after seeing how production at the Wakayama plant fared in terms of profitability.
Increasing production demands from Tesla, a leading source of the Japanese electronics group's earnings, were likely a factor in the decision for a new U.S. plant, along with Panasonic's progress on the new technology. Prototypes started to ship in May. Emanuel noted that Panasonic's investment plan of up to $4 billion will create as many as 4,000 American jobs. Panasonic's first U.S. plant in Nevada, the Gigafactory 1, is jointly operated with Tesla. The Japanese company invested roughly 200 billion yen in that facility, which only began turning a profit in the year ended March 2021 as high defect rates kept mass production from getting off the ground.
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Take that dick out of your mouth before trying to speak
Well now (Score:2)
I'm no Elon apologist, and he really needs a no-man filter when he releases information via the twitterverse or some such, but he just keeps on winning.
Good (Score:2)
I'd like to see domestic battery manufacturing that makes it economically viable to have an off-grid home solar setup, and/or common hybrid vehicles that can double as whole-home battery backups.
Fiscal “year” (Score:2)
Freakin A, editors. Just get the basics right, please. Is that so much to ask?
Where's the lithium strip mine going to be located (Score:2, Interesting)
People seem to forget that mining lithium is quite environmentally-destructive. Additionally, sulfuric acid needs to be trucked in to separate the .5% lithium typically contained in the dirt. There is talk about mining it at the Salton Sea and Humbolt County, California.
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People seem to forget that mining lithium is quite environmentally-destructive.
Trolls seem to only think Lithium mining is destructive when literally every single component in a car, bus, train or airplane is destructive.
"We should stick to internal combustion gas cars!" Where do you think oil comes from? The platinum in your catalytic converter? Steel in the engine block? Etc
"We should build trains!" Where do you think the steel for the rails comes from? Strip mines.
"We should just walk!" Where do you think the food is grown to feed you the extra calories?
EV Battery components a
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People seem to forget
We haven't forgotten. We're just not bringing it up because it sullies the electric car narrative for planet saving and that's inconvenient. Besides, lithium mining is easily offshored beyond the Environment so it's fine.
Also, it would be best if you'd stop bringing it up as well; it's easy to get a reputation as a pro-fossil fuel planet wrecker and you don't want that! Trust us.
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People seem to forget that mining lithium is quite environmentally-destructive.
No, it is not. You are missinfomred.
Additionally, sulfuric acid needs to be trucked in to separate the .5% lithium typically contained in the dirt.
Never heard about that. Why would that be the case?
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Well,
as you have not found any reason why water that gets pumped out of the ground and gets stripped from lithium need sulfuric acid, I assume you Americans do it the same as we Germans do: without sulfuric acid.
But alas ... I can not read every article that mentions sulfuric acid.
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Never heard about that. Why would that be the case?
Because that how it is extracted. A bit like uranium is, which is also very messy. There are very few free lunches, it's all about compromises. The good thing about modern battery technology is that the batteries, when combined with battery management, can last a very long time so it's overall less of an issue than extracting oil to put in cars, or whatever is likely to be needed to produce synthetic fuels.
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Lithium is not extracted with sulfuric acid.
Perhaps I should have made that point more clear :P
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The crushed mineral powder is combined with chemical reactants, such as sulfuric acid
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Obviously after it got extracted from the ground. Facepalm.
So the claim:strip mining (which does not happen anyway) uses sulforic acid is just wrong.
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So the claim:strip mining (which does not happen anyway) uses sulforic acid is just wrong.
No, it's accurate. They don't take the 99.5% of rock they don't want away to be processed, it's processed adjacent to the mine to reduce transport costs, hence the mining of lithium (and things like uranium, gold) can be a problem if the way the acid and the waste acid is not carefully controlled. OK, you might want to argue semantics that processing it on site after the ore has been dug up is not the same as using sulphuric acid during strip mining, but it's semantics, and not a practical difference. Yes i
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It is a practical difference.
As if they use sulforic acid, it stays on side.
And Lithium is not really strip mined anyway, those mines do not exist any more since decades
The idiot parent wanted to claim that using sulforic acid is an environmental hazard: it is not.
Typical lithium mining is done by pumping (hot) water underground and refining the brine, or now more modern: by tapping hot water springs that are lithium rich.
No one is running into a forrest, cutting all trees and tries to strip mine lithium fr
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It is a practical difference.
As if they use sulforic acid, it stays on side.
I'd suggest you read up on the problems associated with acid in mineral extraction and site contamination.
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I'd suggest you read up on the problems associated with acid in mineral extraction and site contamination.
Thanks for the suggestion.
As such contamination is in no way relevant, no idea what I should read :P
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It's a question of doing the last damage. Is an EV better or worse for the environment than a ICE car over its lifetime? Answer that for both the environment/climate change and for human beings who breath in ICE exhaust emissions.
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There wouldn't be any mining at the Salton Sea. They would be using the brine that is already being pumped to the surface for geothermal power and extract the lithium from that. And they are also testing a new process to separate the lithium that doesn't use hydrochloric acid- so maybe read up a bit before posting?
Is it just the cell? (Score:3)
I've always been curious about what really gets produced in these Gigafactories. Do they just manufacture the part that fits in your hand, i.e. the battery cell, such as the supposedly higher capacity 4680 [electrek.co]?
Or are these factories also responsible for the assembly, putting these cells together into the luggage-sized EV packs that's the first (and perhaps only) thing you'll see when watching a hard-hack video of some guy divorcing a Tesla from its battery?
I'm curious because I'm one of the "re-users" of the 18650 cell that's supposed to the main component of Tesla's current EV battery packs. It works quite well for electric lanterns and UPS systems in place of the traditional sealed lead acid (SLA) [wikipedia.org] batteries.
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Well, the Model 3 and Model Y have never used 18650 cells. It looks like the Model S and X still use the 18650 cells, but I would expect them to be phased out at some time in the not-too-distant future.
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Re: Is it just the cell? (Score:1)
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Re: Is it just the cell? (Score:1)
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Are you suggesting that standing an egg on end is obvious?
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Hyperlink fail. Now corrected.
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You seem to have no knowledge of how much research it took to come up with that tabless design. Those aren't "new specifications." Those were serious improvements of the battery manufacturing process.
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The raw materials are probably refined and turned into something industry standard elsewhere, e.g. the metal used for the body of the battery will be rolled and delivered as a sheet for punching out.
Interesting that Tesla is sticking with Panasonic. Their made-in-China cars perform better than the US ones because the Chinese batteries (made by CATL IIRC) are superior. The Chinese and Korean manufacturers have decided to quote the usable energy in the battery, and provide a suitable amount of extra energy st
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Good to hear. (Score:1)
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Are you okay MacMan? EVs are a great excuse to shill for nuclear power, so I'm surprised you would not want to see more of them.
Oh wait, you are afraid of batteries because they make nuclear pointless by addressing the only thing you have against renewables - variable output. Makes sense now.
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Batteries cannot compete on energy density of hydrocarbon fuels. Electric vehicles will be toys for the wealthy, not the car for the middle class.
The market is sorting this out just fine. The fact that every manufacturer sells an electric car means it fits the needs of the customer. You really should check F-150 prices and then electric offerings from Kia or Hyundai and get back to me.
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The market? The government hands out subsidies for EVs and other "green" things. The government also sets fuel economy standards that the automakers can only meet if they set ICE prices so high that customers choose EVs instead.
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Teslas are still the most popular EVs even though they are no longer eligible for subsidies. And although fuel economy standards have forced car makers to build more hybrids, the main reason people choose EVs is because they have so much lower maintenance costs than ICE cars.
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Not sure what you're smoking. Are you saying the fuel economy standards are unrealistic? A base model F150 is over $30k. Not exactly pocket change and it's the best selling vehicle in the country. You really don't understand subsidies. Once the manufacturer sells a certain number the subsidies end. They ended for Tesla around the same time Elon decided to announce he's now a republican out to pwn libs. The last round of economy standards resulted in bitching and moaning from auto manufacturers but guess wha
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The planet will be fine. It's the people that are going to be fucked. If we keep mining theses hard to get minerals for electric motors and batteries in electric cars then we will create an environmental disaster that would make global warming look like a good idea.
Lithium isn't hard to get. It's the 33rd most abundant element on the planet. It is pretty much everywhere. Also, batteries contain less and less lithium with each generation.
We will almost certainly see "electrified" vehicles come that have an internal combustion engine with an electric "boost" motor, and many comforts that are common in today's luxury BEVS.
That's called a parallel hybrid. They're excessively complicated and expensive to build, so they are largely going away.
No batteries though, or not near as many batteries. They might use capacitors instead.
ROFL. The energy density of even the most recent capacitor tech, which is not commercially available, is about a factor of 3 lower than the outgoing generation of Tesla batteries, or about a factor of 5 lower tha