by constantcrying on 12/19/2024, 6:10:40 PM
by michaelt on 12/19/2024, 5:09:32 PM
Battery swapping has some great strengths - much quicker than even fast charging, and none of the thermal/lifespan problems that come with super-fast 300kW chargers. It's good for the people who can't charge at home to have a range of options available.
And of course if battery swapping let range-nervous drivers feel safe buying a 150-mile-range car rather than a 300-mile-range car, that would lower the upfront costs of vehicles significantly.
The downside, as I see it, is presumably you're locked into a single-vendor battery rental and charging contract for the entire life of the vehicle.
After all, if I could take my car with 100,000 miles on the battery to a swap station, pay $20 and drive out with a brand new battery that was mine to keep forever? Great deal for me. Not such a great deal for whoever pays for a swap, loses their nearly new battery and gets my heavily worn battery.
And presumably you're going to struggle to sell the car second hand if the buyer has to pick up your $100/month battery lease.
Swappable batteries are a terrible idea.
1) Cars increasingly make batteries structural components. Swappable batteries are extremely hard to realize, as they need very complex mechanical constructions. Leading to even more expensive EVs.
2) Infrastructure is the largest challenge in adoption. Swapping infrastructure is far more complex than charging infrastructure. Reach anxiety can be counteracted by a dense grid of chargers. A grid of battery swap stations is necessarily thinner than a charging grid. Each station is more expensive and needs more maintenance.
Swappable batteries make the two problems EVs are facing worse. No serious company should consider them and no infrastructure for them should be financed.