CHARGED Electric Vehicles Magazine - Iss 14 June/July 2014

ELECTRIC VEHICLES MAGAZINE

ISSUE 14 | JUNE/JULY 2014 | CHARGEDEVS.COM

Project

LiveWire

Harley-Davidson’s CHIEF ENGINEER ON THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE ELECTRIC HOG P. 50

A CLOSER LOOK AT HOW BATTERIES FAIL P. 20

POTTING MOTORS TO REDUCE HOT SPOTS P. 26

THE DEALERSHIP DILEMMA P. 42

APPEALING TO THE WIRELESS GENERATION P. 76

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THE TECH CONTENTS

20 | How batteries fail 20

A closer look at degradation mechanisms

26 | Engines of fate

Epoxy-impregnated motors show great promise for reducing hot spots

30 | Venting under pressure

30

The importance of venting EV electronics

current events 10 |

Consortium runs silicon carbide DC-DC converter High-performance anode uses milled beach sand

11 | 12 |

Motiv Power Systems raises $7.3 million Continental has a new tire optimized for hybrids Daimler and BMW to co-develop wireless tech

10

13 | 14 | 15 | 16 |

GM developing next-generation power inverter DOE-supported research to commercialize Si anodes New ultracaps increase shock and vibration tolerance Boston-Power raising $250 million in funding A123 acquires battery technology from Leyden

17 |

MIT: LiFePO4 electrodes reveal exotic state of matter New ANSYS software tools for battery developers

12

18 |

Auto segment uses 10.5% of advanced batteries Toyota developing solid-state Li-ion batteries

THE VEHICLES CONTENTS

42 | The dealership dilemma

42

Are auto dealers the EV’s worst enemy?

50 | LiveWire

Harley-Davidson’s Chief Engineer on developing the electric HOG

62 | The early days of Tesla

An excerpt from the new book, Tesla Motors: How Elon Musk and Company Made Electric Cars Cool, and Sparked the Next Tech Revolution

50

90 | B-Class Electric Drive

Mercedes-Benz enters the EV scene

current events 34 | 36 |

White House to Tesla: We can’t pre-empt state law CARB funds new round of plug-in incentives

37

Nissan LEAF headed for India as subsidies roll out

37 | 38 |

French Ethics Jury: Don’t call EVs “green” or “clean” Over 5,000 BMW i3s sold in the first half of 2014 Volvo’s XC90 PHEV: up to 400 HP, 40 Nm torque

39 | 41 |

Nissan announces price for replacement LEAF battery EV maker BYD reports massive sales growth EDI and Greenkraft develop CNG-PHEV truck

41

76

76 | The wireless

82

generation

Q&A with Qualcomm’s Joe Barrett

82 | A match made in the

shade

Studies indicate that EVSE and shade structures could attract prime customers

70 70 |

VC firm Beringea invests £3 million in Chargemaster Tritium Fast Charger earns UL compliance

71 | 73 | 74 |

71

Beijing to deploy 1,000 fast chargers EV owners’ electricity use 4x the average after midnight 125 chargers to be installed at Tokyo development California awards $5 million for 475 EV chargers

75 |

University of Delaware leases Mini-Es in V2G project

Publisher’s Note Signs of the second generation The automotive design cycle is painfully slow compared to that of other high-tech toys we’re used to upgrading every year or two. But rest assured, EV builders are busy designing the next generation of plug-in vehicles.

The Nissan LEAF and Chevy Volt, both of which went on sale in December 2010, are expected to have second-generation versions out around 2016 or 2017.

Andy Palmer, Nissan’s Chief Planning Officer, has indicated that the next LEAF could include a choice of battery pack sizes. In May, Palmer also told Automotive News that future EVs should deliver up to 186 miles of range to compete with hydrogen fuel cell vehicles that will soon hit the road in some select markets. Other Nissan execs said that the next-generation LEAF will have a more “mainstream” design.

The company has also hinted that the Infiniti EV, shelved in 2013, will finally go on sale sometime in 2016 and use the same new-and-improved battery chemistry that’s slated for the next-gen LEAF. Palmer described the new batteries as “technology moving very, very fast,” with regard to range and energy density.

GM is also hard at work redesigning the Volt to drive down costs. Volt 2.0 is expected to be unveiled at January’s Detroit Auto Show and share the all-new 2016 Chevy Cruze platform, with a similar exterior look to the current Volt. Green Car Reports predicts that the next Volt will have roughly the same range as the first edition, although it will be powered by a smaller, more efficient gas engine and battery pack. Two big questions: Will it have a fifth seat? Will the company offer two versions, including a lower-priced model with a smaller battery and shorter driving range? A Reuters report cited “supplier sources” when suggesting two versions might happen, but GM declined to comment.

In other speculative GM-related EV news, LG Chem CFO Cho Suk-jeh told Reuters his company plans to supply batteries to an undisclosed automaker for a 2016 EV with more than 200 miles of range. Multiple GM execs, including former CEO Dan Akerson, have indicated that the company is working on such a vehicle, designed from the ground up as an EV. In September, GM VP Doug Parks told the AP that “the real trick will be who can do a 200-mile car” for an MSRP of about $30,000. “We’re all in races to do that,” said Parks.

And, of course, there is Tesla’s often-discussed third-generation vehicle - now officially named Model III. It’s expected to go on sale by 2017 with a range of over 200 miles. The company has said it will be based on a new platform that’s about 20 percent smaller than the Model S and will use much less aluminum to cut costs. According to Elon Musk, the Model III will be priced around $35,000.

If only half of the rumors and speculative statements about the second-gen electrics are true, these vehicles will significantly increase the plug-in value proposition and put many more butts in electric-powered seats.

EVs are here. Try to keep up.

Christian Ruoff Publisher

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Christian Ruoff Publisher Laurel Zimmer Associate Publisher Charles Morris Senior Editor Markkus Rovito Associate Editor Jeffrey Jenkins Technology Editor Eric Fries Contributing Editor Nick Sirotich Illustrator & Designer Contributing Writers Michael Kent Charles Morris Markkus Rovito Christian Ruoff Joey Stetter Paul Voelker Contributing Photographers Jack Amick Tinou Bao Neilson Barnard Robert Couse-Baker Kārlis Dambrāns Jyri Engestrom Nicolas Fleury Josh Graciano Listers Group Adafruit Industries Cédric Janodet

Steve Jurvetson Michael Kappel Ian Muttoo Norio Nakayama Shafigh Nategh Erin Page Dave Pinter Nicolas Raymond Pete Slater Ray Stubblebine Remko Tanis

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CURRENTevents

10

Photo courtesy of Prodrive

A consortium led by the British technology firm Prodrive has successfully run a silicon carbidebased multiport DC-DC converter in an EV. Silicon carbide devices operate at a higher frequency than equivalent silicon components - at 75 kHz in the test vehicles - with a significant reduction in switching losses. This allows the magnetic components to be reduced in size, and has enabled the converter to achieve efficiency of 98.7 percent, gravimetric power density of 10.5 kW/kg and volumetric power density of 20 kW/liter.

The DC-DC converter has four ports: two connect to the traction motor and high-voltage battery; a third connects to a secondary energy source, which in this test car is a supercapacitor bank; and the fourth powers the vehicle’s 12 V systems. The converter matches the voltages of these components and transfers energy among them in response to CAN commands from an external controller.

The test EV has a 220 V battery, 37 kW traction motor, and two 200 kJ supercapacitor banks, which operate at 75-150 V. Mark Willows, Prodrive electrical systems and control specialist, said, “In normal driving, the converter boosts the battery voltage to around 400 V to optimize motor performance, and can supplement the battery supply with additional energy from the supercap banks when the driving situation demands it. During regeneration, the converter transfers energy from the motor to the battery or supercapacitor banks as requested by the supervisory controller.

Energy can also be transferred directly between the battery and supercapacitor ports. The system can be configured to support other energy sources, such as fuel cells, or could supply multiple traction motors.”

The consortium is now working on a follow-up project that increases operating voltage to 750 V, further increases power density and demonstrates operation at increased coolant temperatures.

Researchers at the University of California Riverside have created a lithium-ion battery that outperforms the current industry standard by three times, using a nanoscale silicon dioxide anode.

“This is the holy grail - a low cost, non-toxic, environmentally friendly way to produce high-performance lithium-ion battery anodes,” said Zachary Favors, a UC Riverside graduate student and coauthor of a new paper, Scalable Synthesis of NanoSilicon from Beach Sand for Long Cycle Life Li-ion Batteries, published in Nature Scientific Reports.

Favors found a variety of sand that contains a high percentage of quartz and milled it down to the nanometer scale, then performed a series of purification steps, ending up with a material that looks like powdered sugar.

He then ground salt and magnesium into the purified quartz and heated the resulting powder.

With the salt acting as a heat absorber, the magnesium worked to remove the oxygen from the quartz, resulting in pure silicon.

The pure nano-silicon formed in a very porous 3D sponge-like consistency. According to the research team, that porosity enables them to build batteries with an expected lifespan and energy density three times higher than those with traditional graphitebased anodes.

Images courtesy of Scientific Reports: Favors et al

High-performance anode uses milled beach sand

Consortium runs silicon carbide DC-DC converter

THE TECH

California-based Motiv Power Systems has raised $7.3 million in growth capital from investors led by Colorado’s Magness Investment Group. The funding comes as the second Motiv-equipped all-electric school bus is delivered to Kings Canyon Unified School District.

Motiv’s electric Powertrain Control System (ePCS) is designed to electrify any truck or bus chassis with a variety of commercially-available battery packs and motors.

The Motiv ePCS battery packs and motor are installed to replace the engine and transmission of a new, incomplete chassis such as the Ford E450 in a ship-through modification. This process, common in the truck industry, means minimal changes between the fossil fuel and electric versions of the final vehicle. Existing truck and bus builders who already use these incomplete chassis can build and sell electric versions of their existing models.

“Motiv has cracked the code on electric trucks,” said

Gary Magness, Manager of the Magness Investment Group. “We are impressed with how Motiv’s approach leverages the existing truck and bus builder ecosystem to achieve scalability. I’m pleased to be a part of this revolution in trucking that brings environmental sustainability and significant fuel savings to an industry that’s the backbone of our economy.”

“It’s an honor to have the support of an investor like Mr. Magness,” said Motiv CEO Jim Castelaz. “Not only does he see the potential in the market we are addressing, he understands our approach and believes in our vision of breaking the complete dependence trucks and buses currently have on fossil fuel.”

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CURRENTevents Daimler and BMW to co-develop wireless tech

The Conti.eContact is designed to generate minimal audible noise in the vehicle interior, to compensate for the fact that hybrid vehicles have little engine noise, making tire noise more noticeable. A thin layer of polyurethane foam attached to the inside of the tread reduces the vibrations that are generated as the tire rolls along the road, communicating less vibration to the chassis.

12

Image courtesy of BMW

In 2011, Continental introduced the Conti.eContact, a tire optimized for electric vehicles, with lower rolling resistance that translated into increased range. Now the company has further refined the design to meet the needs of hybrid models. The Conti.eContact is available in six sizes for 17- and 18-inch rims.

The rolling resistance of the new Conti.eContact for hybrids is 20 percent lower than in a conventional tire, while handling and wet-braking performance are similar. Part of this is thanks to Continental’s Green Chili, which is not a taco sauce, but a silica compound that’s made in such a way that the internal friction of the filler particles and the polymers is lower than in conventional rubber compounds.

The sidewalls of the new Conti.eContact have been redesigned to minimize aerodynamic drag and rolling resistance. The new Conti.eContact also loses less energy when the tire deflects and rebounds than a conventional tire does.

Images courtesy of Continental

Continental has a new tire optimized for hybrids

Daimler and BMW have agreed to jointly develop and implement a common technology for wireless charging. The system consists of two components: a secondary coil integrated into the under-tray of the car; and a primary coil integrated into a floor plate that can be placed on a garage floor. Electrical energy is transmitted at a power rate of 3.6 kW and efficiency of 90 percent.

The arrangement of the coils, and consequently of the field pattern, is based on a design derived from their circular shape that allows a compact and lightweight construction, along with effective spatial confinement of the magnetic field, according to BMW. Once the vehicle is positioned above the primary coil, the driver starts charging at the push of a button. The process can also be controlled from a smartphone.

The system transmits data via a WiFi connection to help the driver with parking. The space between the coils is monitored, and charging can be halted instantly if any foreign bodies are detected. Rain and snow have no effect on the power feed - all conductive components are protected, so the primary coil can be installed outdoors.

The technology standard foresees the future possibility of increasing the charging rate to 7 kW, which would allow the battery in the BMW i3 to be fully charged overnight.

BMW is testing a working prototype of the system with the i8, and Mercedes-Benz said it plans to begin fleet testing with the S 500 PHEV “soon.”

THE TECH

GM is developing a next-generation power inverter capable of 55 kW peak/30 kW continuous power. Green Car Congress reported that GM’s Sean Gleason, who gave a presentation on the project at the DOE’s Annual Merit Review, said GM is almost two-thirds of the way through the $16.6 million project ($6 million of the funding support came from the DOE), which began in October 2011 and is scheduled to be finished in January 2016.

As specified by the DOE’s 2020 goals, the new inverter will bring the cost of the power electronics to $3.30/kW (produced in quantities of 100,000 units), power density to 13.4 kW/l, and specific power to 14.1 kW/kg, with an efficiency of greater than 94 percent.

The inverter is intended to be modular and scalable to meet all vehicle applications.

For the project, GM is working with Tier 1, 2 and 3 suppliers (Hitachi, Delphi, Infineon, HRL, Panasonic,

Photo courtesy of GM

GM developing next-generation power inverter

AVX, Kemet and VePoint), along with the National Renewable Energy Laboratory and Oak Ridge National Laboratory.

Gleason noted that GM has not made prototype power electronics in an internal facility since 1999, and that the company is now considering bringing power electronics production back in-house.

CURRENTevents

The DOE is supporting six applied battery research projects, with the objective of developing cells that provide energy density of more than 200 Wh/kg, along with long cycle life and excellent abuse tolerance. All six projects are using some form of silicon-based material for the anode.

A team led by the Argonne National Laboratory is developing a new high-energy redox couple (250 Wh/ kg) based on a high-capacity full gradient concentration (FCG) cathode (230 mAh/g) and a Si-Sn composite anode (900 mAh/g). The FCG cathode material consists of lithium transition-metal oxide particles with the nickel concentration decreasing from the center towards the outer layer and the concentration of manganese increasing accordingly.

TIAX is working on combining its proprietary CAM-7 cathode material with a blended silicon/carbon anode to achieve >200 Wh/kg, >400 Wh/L energy, >800 W/ kg and >1600 W/L 10s pulse power targets. CAM-7 is a stabilized high-nickel cathode material that combines high energy content with high power capability. TIAX has implemented CAM-7 in high-energy 18650 cells with graphite anodes that can deliver 2.7 Ah and 247 Wh/kg.

A 3M-led project hopes to combine a high-capacity silicon alloy anode with a high-energy NMC cathode and advanced electrolyte. The team seeks to develop the high capacity Si alloy with a stable microstructure using an innovative conductive binder. Targets include a 20% increase in mAh/g and a 10% increase in mAh/cc.

Envia is leading a project that has developed HCMR (High-Capacity Manganese Rich) cathodes based on layered-layered (LL) composite structures. Envia tailors HCMR based on the application (e.g. hybrid, plug-in hybrid or EV) using particle morphology, composition and nanocoatings.

14

A Penn State/University of Texas at Austin team is designing a cell with a layered oxide cathode and silicon alloy-carbon anode with optimized binders and electrolyte. Performance targets include 2.5 Ah cells with 330 Wh/kg and 1600 W/L, with more than 500 cycles of life, and excellent safety characteristics. The team reports that it has already developed a silicon-carbon anode with 1500 mAh/g capacity, 95 percent capacity retention after 100 cycles and coulombic efficiency of more than 99 percent.

Farasis Energy is leading a project to demonstrate a PHEV cell with an energy density of 250 Wh/kg and an EV light-duty cell with an energy density of 350 Wh/kg that can meet the cycle life goals for those applications.

Farasis’s concept is that layered and LL NCM materials paired against a silicon-based anode offer the greatest potential to meet the PHEV and EV performance goals, especially if higher-voltage operation can be enabled.

Layered NCM materials offer good rate capability, high tap density, good stability at moderate voltages and reasonable average voltage; however, the materials have stability problems at higher voltages. To address that, the team is looking to surface stabilization and doping.

Image courtesy of International Information Program (IIP)/Flickr

DOE-supported research projects seek to commercialize silicon-based anodes

THE TECH

Maxwell Technologies’ new DuraBlue ultracapacitor cells incorporate a number of upgrades over previous versions. The 2.85 V, 3400 F cells offer up to 1,000,000 duty cycles, with up to 18 kW/kg of specific power and up to 4 Wh of stored energy. They use the industrystandard 60 mm cylindrical K2 form factor, and are available with threaded terminals or laser-weldable posts.

Although the new DuraBlue cell carries about a 10 percent price premium compared to its predecessor (2.75 V, 3000 farad), the increased energy density allows fewer cells to be used for equivalent performance, so the new cells actually offer a lower price per Wh. Perhaps the most significant improvement: the new cells have greatly increased vibrational resistance and shock immunity, which are particularly important in the mass transit market.

“One of the things we learned in transportation, especially in mass transit, is that shock and vibration

are big issues,” said Director of Product Marketing Chad McDonald. “The placement of the ultracapacitors in these buses exposes them to a vibration profile that exceeds what we had expected.

We have a good position in the bus market, but are seeing more competition. Therefore, we think that this additional vibration tolerance will give us a very defensible position.”

“Our new DuraBlue Advanced Shock and Vibration Technology combines Maxwell’s unique and patented dry electrode formation and manufacturing process with a robust proprietary cell structure design to meet or exceed the most demanding shock and vibration requirements of the growing number of power-hungry applications in global transportation markets,” said Franz Fink, Maxwell’s CEO.

Photo courtesy Maxwell Technologies

New ultracaps increase shock and vibration tolerance

CURRENTevents

Battery maker Boston-Power is closing on a new investment round of $250 million from investors in China and elsewhere, according to the Wall Street Journal’s Venture Capital Dispatch blog. The company was founded in Massachusetts, but moved most of its operations to China in 2011.

Last year it announced a multi-year agreement to provide lithium-ion battery systems to Beijing Electric Vehicle Company (BJEV), the electric vehicle delivery arm of Beijing Automotive Industry Company. Boston-Power’s Swing 5300 cells will be used in multiple BJEV models and brands, beginning with the C70 sedan, which is based on the Saab 9-5 chassis.

The Swing 5300 cell sports a cobalt and manganese cathode and a graphite anode, an energy density of 490 Wh/L or 207 Wh/kg (186 Wh/kg usable at 90 percent depth of discharge), and is designed to have a 10-year reliable life. Operating temperature range is -40 degrees C to 70 degrees C; constant power is 440 W/kg; and pulse power is 1000 W/kg.

Boston-Power’s lithium-ion battery production plant in China has an annual capacity of 300 megawatt-hours, and the company plans to increase capacity to one gigawatt-hour next year, said Chairman and acting CEO Sonny Wu. Mr Wu also said that Boston-Power plans to sell about $100 million worth of product this year and will soon consider a public offering.

Mr Wu said that he expects Boston-Power to become profitable “in a couple of years.” He characterized his company’s expansion plans as competition for Elon Musk and Tesla, which plans to build a battery Gigafactory with 35 GWh of capacity.

“Somebody has to compete with him,” said Wu.

16

A123 Systems, now a wholly owned subsidiary of China’s Wanxiang Group, has acquired Leyden Energy’s intellectual property covering lithium titanate (LTO) and non-flammable electrolyte (Li-imide) technology.

As part of the deal, some of Leyden’s key technical staff will be joining A123’s R&D organization.

Leyden’s LTO/LMO battery, the subject of a Charged feature article in October 2013, was built on its proprietary Li-imide platform, and is optimized for start/stop applications in several ways: It can deliver a lot of power over a wide temperature range, can recharge rapidly (critical for recovering regenerative braking energy), has long cycle life and calendar life, is small and lightweight and requires no complex battery management system.

“As the world’s OEMs continue to invest more effort in the development of their respective microhybrid systems, the global diversity of requirements is growing rapidly. By expanding our technology portfolio for this fast-growing market, A123 now has the right solution for nearly every micro-hybrid program worldwide,” said A123 CEO Jason Forcier.

“We are pleased to welcome the Leyden Energy scientists to A123 and look forward to further development in each segment of our expanded portfolio.”

Leyden’s Li-imide electrolyte does not react with water, nor does it generate hydrofluoric acid, making it especially resistant to heat. According to Leyden, this enables higher energy density and longer cycle life for legacy carbon-based active materials (anode and cathode), and permits the development of new chemistries with high-energy-density active materials, including silicon anodes.

Photo courtesy of Leyden Energy

Boston-Power raising $250 million in funding

A123 acquires battery technology from Leyden

THE TECH

New ANSYS software tools for battery developers Image courtesy of ANSYS

Transmission electron microscopy has allowed MIT researchers to directly observe a lithium iron phosphate (LiFePO4) electrode during charging, and they found that, just as suspected, a solid-solution zone (SSZ) forms at the boundary between lithiumrich and lithium-depleted areas, as lithium ions are pulled out of the electrode.

The new findings, published in Nano Letters, help to resolve a puzzle: in bulk crystal form, both lithium iron phosphate and iron phosphate (FePO4, which is left behind as lithium ions migrate out of the material during charging) have poor ionic and electrical conductivities. Yet when treated with doping and carbon coating and used as nanoparticles in a battery, the material exhibits an impressively high charging rate.

“We directly observed a metastable random solid solution that may resolve this fundamental problem that has intrigued [materials scientists] for many years,” says co-author Ju Li. Replacing a sharp interface between LiFePO4 and FePO4 that has been shown to contain many additional line defects called “dislocations,” the SSZ serves as a buffer, reducing the number of dislocations that would otherwise move with the electrochemical reaction front. “We don’t see any dislocations,” Li says. That could be important, because the generation and storage of dislocations can cause fatigue and limit the cycle life of an electrode.

The imaging technique used, developed in 2010

by Li and co-author Akihiro Kushima, makes it possible to observe battery components as they charge and discharge, which can reveal dynamic processes.

Illustration courtesy of ACS, Niu et al

MIT: LiFePO4 electrodes reveal exotic state of matter

Software developer ANSYS has now incorporated battery models in the latest release of its Fluent software, thanks to the efforts of a team that also includes GM and the DOE’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL).

The team worked on a DOE-funded project, Computer-Aided Engineering for Electric Drive Vehicle Batteries (CAEBAT), to combine new and existing battery models into simulation software, including modeling thermal management, electrochemistry, ion transport and fluid flow.

The collaborators integrated several physical battery scales (electrodes, cell, pack and full vehicle) and physical phenomena (electrochemical, thermal, fluid and structural), and blended detailed 3D field simulation technologies with systems-level simulation.

“The CAEBAT project has been a great opportunity for ANSYS,” said Sandeep Sovani, the company’s Director of Global Automotive Industry. “We are partnering with other recognized leaders in EV battery technology to develop and deliver powerful modeling tools that can be used by all battery manufacturers to accelerate production of safe, reliable, high-performance and long-lasting EV batteries.”

The team will continue to refine automation techniques and validate the models with experiments.

Future features will include cycle-life and abuse (such as overheating) models, as well as NREL’s multi-particle model, with the ability to model a mixture of active materials with different particle sizes.

JUN/JUL 2014 17

CURRENTevents Toyota developing solid-state Li-ion batteries Auto segment uses 10.5% of advanced batteries

Anode

Cathode

Anode

Cathode Solid Electrolyte

Photo courtesy of Pete Slater/Flickr

Electrolytic Solution

Batteries are big business. According to the latest Advanced Battery Tracker from Navigant Research, more than 6 billion advanced battery cells were sold in 2013, representing 40 GW of power capacity and more than $13.4 billion in sales (a modest increase over 2012’s $12.8 billion). The majority of those batteries were manufactured in China.

Most high-tech batteries (87 percent) went into consumer electronics, but the automotive segment accounted for about 10.5 percent, a steadily growing share.

Lithium-ion continues to be the dominant chemistry - more than 99 percent of advanced batteries shipped. The only major segment with significant penetration by other chemistries is stationary energy storage, in which some systems use flow, sodium metal halide, sodium sulfur and aqueous sodiumion batteries.

The new Navigant report, aimed at battery manufacturers, electronics vendors, automotive OEMs and other industry players, identifies developments and trends in the advanced batteries market. It explains how demand for advanced batteries varies across the six major application segments, lists the top 10 battery vendors and describes how the vendor landscape in each segment is changing.

18

Conventional Battery

All-Solid-State Battery

In a presentation at the International Meeting on Lithium Batteries in Como, Italy, Dr Hideki Iba and Dr Chihiro Yada from Toyota’s Battery Research Division noted that, while lithium-air batteries may not be commercialized until 2030, solid-state batteries could be ready for the market as soon as 2020.

The Japanese automaker has already developed prototype cells with an energy density of 400 Wh/L, and built a prototype electric kickboard powered by an all-solid-state battery.

Solid-state lithium-ion batteries offer long cycle life, as well as higher volumetric energy densities than current Li-ion designs. They also can be packaged more efficiently, as the cell design can allow in-series stacking and bi-polar structures, and could be safer, as there is no risk of leakage of a liquid electrolyte, and the inflammable and inorganic solid electrolytes have high thermal stability.

As reported in a paper in ATZelektronik worldwide, Dr. Yada and co-author Claudia Brasse noted that until recently, solid-state Li-ion batteries have suffered from limited power densities, partly due to the large lithium-ion transfer resistance at the interface between cathode and solid electrolyte.

Therefore, researchers are concentrating on developing better lithium-ion-conducting solid electrolytes, designing improved electrode/electrolyte interfaces to reduce interfacial resistance and improving Li-ion conductivity in active materials.

Yada and Brasse noted, “there remain many issues to be solved, and their practical application seems limited at the present stage.”

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How

Batteries Fail

A lot of research has been done to improve lithium-ion battery safety, cycle life and power output over a range of high and low temperatures, yet understanding the fundamental processes and degradation mechanisms in Li-ion batteries remains a challenge.

By Paul Voelker, Vertical Marketing Manager - Environmental & Industrial Markets for Thermo Fisher Scientifics’ chromatography and spectrometry products

T

o understand the degradation processes of lithium-ion batteries, it is important to understand how they operate. A typical cell is made up of an anode, cathode, electrolyte and separator.

The anode is composed of carbon or graphite, the cathode of a lithium metal oxide and the electrolyte of a lithium-ion salt in a non-aqueous (aprotic) solvent. The separator is a permeable membrane that enables the lithium ions to shuttle between the anode and cathode, and it keeps the two electrodes from making contact and causing a short circuit.

20

THE TECH

Lithium-Ion Battery Operation Charging

e-

Li+

ELECTROLYTE

Li+

Li+

Li+

Li+

Li+ Li+

Li+ Li+

Li+ Li+

ANODE -

Li+

SEPARATOR

ANODE

Li+

Li+

Li+

Li+

Li+

Li+

Li+

Li+

Li+

Li+

Li+

Li+

ELECTROLYTE

Li+

Li+

Li+ Li+

Li+ Li+

Li+

CATHODE +

Graphite Sheets/Li

Discharging

Current

Current

ANODE -

Lithium Ions Li+

During discharge, lithium ions migrate from the anode to the cathode. Electrons move in an external circuit in the same direction as the lithium ions, and current moves in the opposite direction. The discharging process is referred to as de-intercalation. During charging, an external electrical power source, or house current, applies an over-voltage that forces the lithium ions to pass in the reverse direction. This process is referred to intercalation.

During intercalation, lithium ions move from an ordered lithium metal cathode lattice and become embedded between graphene sheets in the anode.

The solid electrolyte interface (SEI) enables the battery to operate in an efficient and reversible manner. The SEI film is composed of electrolyte reduction products that start forming on the surface of the anode during the initial battery charge. The SEI film functions as an ionic

SEPARATOR

e-

Li+

Li+

Li+

Li+

Li+

Li+

Li+

Li+

Li+

Li+

Li+

Li+

CATHODE +

CATHODE

Metal Oxide Host

The solid electrolyte interface film is composed of electrolyte reduction products that start forming on the surface of the anode during the initial battery charge. conductor that enables lithium to migrate through the film during intercalation and de-intercalation over the life of the battery. At the same time, the film also serves as an inductively passive electronic insulator which prevents further electrolyte reduction products forming on the anode, under typical operating conditions.

JUN/JUL 2014 21

Failure mechanisms While capable of operating efficiently for years, Li-ion batteries can begin to fail prematurely when exposed to atypical conditions such as elevated temperature, charge effects or the presence of trace contaminants. These effects can initiate irreversible cell degradation, resulting in a loss of energy density, cycle life and safety.

The following five exothermic degradation reactions can occur between cell components: 1. Chemical reduction of the electrolyte by the anode 2. Thermal decomposition of the electrolyte 3. Chemical oxidation of the electrolyte by the cathode 4. Thermal decomposition by the cathode and anode 5. Internal short circuit by charge effects Anode-related failures The SEI film that forms on the anode is composed of a mixture of inorganic and organic reduction products.

These include lithium oxide, lithium fluoride and semicarbonates (e.g. lithium alkyl carbonates). Under typical conditions, such as room temperature and the absence of charge effects and contaminants, the SEI reaches a fixed film thickness, and the LIB can operate reversibly for years.

Chemical Reduction of the Electrolyte by the Anode At elevated temperatures, alkyl carbonates on the SEI decompose into insoluble Li2CO3 that can increase the film thickness of the SEI layer, clogging the pores on the carbon surface and limiting accessibility of lithium ions to the anode surface. Inhibiting intercalation leads to an increase in impedance and eventually a loss in battery capacity, also referred to as capacity fade. Gases formed by the decomposition of the electrolyte increase the internal pressure in the cell and raise potential safety issues in sensitive environments.

Extended storage of the LIB is another condition that results in an incremental increase in SEI film thickness and capacity fade.

Calendar loss vs cycling loss There are two sources of battery capacity loss: calendar loss and cycling loss. Calendar loss results from the passage of time and is measured from the maximum state of charge. Cycling loss is due to charging and discharging the battery and depends on both the maximum state of charge and the depth of discharge.

Capacity fade is measured as the percentage of total capacity range that is used during a cycle.

22

Li-ion batteries can begin to fail prematurely when exposed to atypical conditions such as elevated temperature, charge effects or the presence of trace contaminants.

THE TECH Over-charging & over-discharging Over-charging the LIB (over 4.2 V) can initiate the reduction of Li+ on the anode as lithium plates, resulting in irreversible capacity fade. The randomness of the metallic lithium embedded in the anode during intercalation results in the formation of dendrites. Over time the dendrites can accumulate and pierce the separator, causing a short circuit between the electrodes and leading to a release of heat, and possibly fire and/or explosion. This process is referred to as thermal runaway.

Over-discharging (under 2 V) can also result in capacity fade. The anode copper current collector (a less commonly referenced battery component used to facilitate electron transfer) can dissolve into the electrolyte when the LIB is discharged. However, when charged, the copper ions can reduce on the anode as metallic copper in addition to the copper collector. Over time, metallic copper dendrites can form and lead to a short circuit in the same manner as metallic lithium dendrites.

Structural Disorder of the Anode The anode is composed of materials that have a high surface area and provide large discharge and charge capacity. Cycling the battery at a high cycling rate and at a high state of charge induces mechanical strain on the graphite lattice from a high concentration of lithium ions packed between the graphene sheets. The mechanical strain caused by the insertion and de-insertion results in fissures and splits of the graphite particles, making them less oriented as compared to the original graphite particles. A relative change in the orientation of the graphite particles affects the reversible capacity of the anode and results in capacity fade.

Electrolyte-related failures The majority of electrolytes used in LIBs are composed of a lithium hexafluorophosphate (LiPF6) electrolyte in a solvent mixture of linear and cyclic carbonates (e.g. ethylene carbonate [EC] and dimethyl carbonate [DMC]).

The combination of LiPF6 and carbonates is selected because of their high conductivity and SEI-forming ability. A mixture of carbonate solvents is needed to satisfy the requirement for high ionic conductivity (to dissolve and coordinate the lithium salt ions) and low viscosity (where the solvated ions occupy a small volume). As the two properties are mutually exclusive in a single carbonate solvent, the requirement is satisfied by mixing a high

As the SEI film thickens, it gives rise to an increase in impedance that can ultimately lead to capacity fade. ionic-conductivity solvent with a low-viscosity solvent.

Electrolyte degradation mechanisms include hydrolysis and thermal decomposition.

Hydrolysis Water is a major concern in LIBs. At concentrations as low as 10 ppm, water begins catalyzing a host of degradation products that can affect the electrolyte, anode and cathode.

Under typical conditions the electrolyte LiPF6 provides an ionic medium, enabling Li+ to shuttle between the electrodes during intercalation and de-intercalation.

However, LiPF6 also participates in an equilibrium reaction with LiF and PF5.

Under typical conditions, the equilibrium lies far to the left. However, in the presence of water, the equilibrium reaction starts shifting to the right to form LiF, an insoluble, electronically insulating product. LiF forms on the surface of the anode resulting in an increase in SEI film thickness. As the SEI film thickens, it gives rise to an increase in impedance that can ultimately lead to capacity fade.

The hydrolysis of LiPF6 also yields PF5, a strong Lewis acid that reacts with electron-rich species such as water.

Phosphorus pentafluoride reacts with water to form hydrofluoric acid and phosphorus oxyfluoride. Phosphorus oxyfluoride can in turn react with a second equivalent of water to form an additional quantity of hydrofluoric acid and the byproduct difluorohydroxy phosphoric acid.

The presence of hydrofluoric acid converts the rigid SEI film into a fragile one. In the case of the SEI layer that forms on the cathode, the carbonate solvent can diffuse onto the surface of cathode oxide over time, causing the release of heat and a possible thermal runaway condition.

Thermal Degradation of the Electrolyte Carbonate-based LIBs, while effective at forming efficient SEI and providing power requirements, suffer from thermal decomposition. Decomposition of electrolyte salts

JUN/JUL 2014 23

and interactions between the salts and solvent start at as low as 70 degrees C. Significant decomposition occurs at higher temperatures. At 85 degrees C, transesterification products, such as dimethyl-2,5-dioxahexane carboxylate (DMDOHC) are formed from EC reacting with DMC.

Photo courtesy of Adafruit Industries/Flickr

Solid-polymer electrolytes In addition to liquid electrolytes, solid electrolytes are also in commercial use. Solid-polymer electrolytes (SPE) offer low environmental impact, are not as toxic as their liquid counterparts, are relatively low-cost, and remove any risk of flammable electrolyte and carbonate mixtures leaking out of the battery.

However, there are two inherent disadvantages: low ionic conductivity and low lithium transference. The low ionic conductivity results from poor salt dissociation. SPE is reported to dissociate as ion pairs. The low lithium transference results from stronger interaction of the polymer matrix with the lithium cation as compared to the anion.

Studies show that immobilizing the anion with additives produces a relative increase in lithium transference and ionic conductivity. Results from the analysis of an anion receptor, lithium triflate (LiCF3SO3) attached to an SPE composite by Raman spectroscopy show the distribution of electrolyte components in the polymer.

Cathode-related failures Two of the most commonly studied cathode materials are lithium cobalt oxide (LiCoO2) and lithium manganese oxide (LiMn2O4). LiCoO2 is the most widely used cathode material. LiMnO4 is considered a suitable alternative because of its low cost and ease of preparation, but its relatively poor cycling and storage capabilities have prevented it from being considered as a commercial replacement.

Cathode degradation mechanisms include manganese dissolution, chemical oxidation of the electrolyte by the cathode and structural disorder of the cathode.

mance. Temperatures as low as 50 degrees C initiate the deposition of the Mn2+ on the anode as metallic manganese (similar to lithium and copper plating), leading to an increase in impedance, a loss in battery capacity and potential thermal runaway. Cycling the LIB over the theoretical maximum and minimum voltage plateaus also results in severe capacity fade, due to destruction of the crystal lattice from Jahn-Teller distortion, which occurs when [Mn4+ is reduced to Mn3+] during discharge.

Manganese dissolution The dissolution of manganese into the electrolyte is reported to occur as a result of hydrofluoric catalyzing the loss of metallic manganese through disproportionation of trivalent manganese, shown below.

Material loss of the spinel results in capacity fade.

Thermal effects can also result in decrease in LIB perfor-

Electrolyte oxidation by the cathode Storage of an overcharged LIB (over 3.6 V) initiates electrolyte oxidation by the cathode and induces formation of an SEI film on the cathode. As observed with the anode, excessive formation of the SEI on the cathode serves as an insulator, resulting in capacity fade, and can also lead to uneven current distribution.

24

THE TECH Storage of an undercharged LIB (under 2 V) results in the slow degradation of LiCoO2 and LiMn2O4 cathodes, the release of oxygen and irreversible capacity loss.

Better instruments With the growing demand for LIBs comes the expectation of improvements in battery performance and safety.

These expected improvements include higher power output, minimal capacity loss, and extended battery life over extremes in temperature, charging and storage conditions.

One of the most significant improvements to the performance of LIBs, the SEI layer, is also one of its key weaknesses. The SEI layer is composed of electrolytecarbonate reduction products that serve both as an ionic conductor and electronic insulator between the electrolyte and the electrode, but as results show, it is prone to thermal degradation. Formation of the thin layer on the anode and cathode has been the subject of great interest, as it determines many performance parameters of the

A variety of instruments and technologies will be needed to effectively understand degradation processes for each component battery. But, as the layer is formed after the battery has been assembled, it is difficult to analyze in-situ, making ex-situ analysis the only practical alternative. As a result, there are still many unanswered questions regarding SEI formation, composition and decomposition.

Advances in battery technology will be required to meet the growing demand for Li-ion batteries. To build higher-performance batteries, a variety of instruments and technologies will be needed to effectively understand degradation processes for each component individually and how they interact as a system.

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Engines Fate of

A

nyone working within the corporate world has probably been battered with the word “synergy” to the point of it being rendered meaningless. However, when true synergy (interaction of two or more agents producing a combined effect greater than their separate effects) takes place in a developing market, the beneficial consequences can fan out across multiple businesses, as well as to the consumer side.

In the developing world of electric vehicles, we often think of the driving forces as companies long entrenched in automotive, start-ups focused on electrification, academia, and certain arms of the government. Yet sometimes it just takes one enterprising operator to discover a new link in the chain of development and thus cook up a little bit of unexpected synergy.

That’s what happened in 2013 when Shafigh Nategh, Ph.D., completed his doctoral thesis at KTH Royal Insti-

26

A doctoral candidate plucks a thermal management material out of LORD Corporation’s voluminous catalog, and one Ph.D. later, the EV world may have an exciting new boon for the efficiency of electric motors.

By Markkus Rovito

For his thesis, he...compared the performance of identical motors when they were simply varnished, impregnated with a standard epoxy called Epoxylite or impregnated with SC-320. tute of Technology in Stockholm, Sweden, in its School of Electrical Engineering. Nategh studied the thermal management of high-performance electrical machines and had seen a talk on LORD Corporation’s highly thermally-conductive, electrically-insulating silicone mate-

THE TECH

Average Hot Spot Temperature for Potted Motors 180

Varnish Epoxylite LORD SC-320

160

Temperature (°C)

140 120 100 80 60 40 20

error bars = -+ 3StDev

0 3.0

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Current (A) Based on data from Daniel E. Barber, LORD Corporation

rial, SC-320. For his thesis, 320, including increased he designed an oil-cooled horsepower, smaller/ permanent-magnet motor lighter-weight motors, and Hot-spot temperatures for the and compared the performotor lifetimes motors using LORD’s SC-320 material improved mance of identical motors and efficiency. were 34.8 to 40 percent lower than when they were simply varOnce LORD got wind the motors using varnish and 19.8 to of Nategh’s findings, it nished, impregnated with 26.2 percent lower than the motors a standard epoxy called noticed the opportunity Epoxylite or impregnated to move into the electric using Epoxylite. with SC-320. motor market in the aeroIn short, hot-spot temspace and automotive secperatures for the motors tors. Now the maker of the using LORD Corporation’s SC-320 material were 34.8 material,which was not originally designed for electric to 40 percent lower than the motors using varnish, and motors, is beginning to further validate Nategh’s conclu19.8 to 26.2 percent lower than the motors using Epoxysions with its own tests, as well as courting partners in lite. Those results imply far-reaching benefits for electric the EV world to work on even better materials that can motors using a thermally conductive material like SCprovide greater efficiencies for the motors.

JUN/JUL 2014 27

Impregnation Process Described by Shafigh Nategh, Ph.D., 2013 Doctoral Thesis, KTH Royal Institute of Technology

1

2

3

4

Mix potting material and hardener at a 1:1 ratio by weight and volume

Cover the motor’s stator in a mold to form the potting material

Draw a vacuum to about 80 kPa and introduce potting material

Cure for 90 minutes at 125°C, and remove the molds

“

Simmering down tions as well. It’s not a maLORD Corporation was terial we developed for a founded in Erie, Pennsylapplication; it’s a He impregnated the coils and the particular vania in 1924, but now has material that adds value to end windings…which acted as a dozens of offices in many an application - anything bridge between the coils - which countries around the world. that sees extreme temperaIn its early years, LORD are the hot spots in the motor - and tures, harsh environments had much success selling or chemical spills.” the housing, which was cooled. engine mountings to auDan Barber, Ph.D., staff tomakers, but since then it scientist in LORD Corhas expanded to encompass poration’s Open Technolhundreds of business-to-business products, including ogy Innovation Group, now works on further validating adhesives, coatings, motion-management technologies Nategh’s research and finding ways to improve SC-320’s and magnetically responsive products. LORD Corporaproperties specifically for electric motors. “[Nategh] tion’s SC-320 thermal conductivity silicone encapsulant designed a motor that was cooled by a liquid circulating was designed for electronic encapsulating applications, through the housing of the stator,” Barber said. “He imbut was never targeted specifically for electric motors. pregnated the coils and the end windings with a vacuum“This material is state-of-the-art, but it’s been around potting operation using SC-320, which acted as a bridge for a long time,” said Jim Greig, LORD’s electronic matebetween the coils - which are the hot spots in the motor rials global sales and marketing manager. “It’s been used - and the housing, which was cooled. To ‘impregnate,’ you in thermal management applications, such as AC-to-DC put a form around the motor. You evacuate that to get the converters. We’re seeing some success in charger applica- air out. Then you introduce the material under vacuum,

”

28

THE TECH and you even apply a little bit of pressure to force it in there. But usually if you’ve got low enough viscosity, just a vacuum fill is sufficient.”

The Epoxylite that Nategh tested had a thermal conductivity of 0.9 W/m-K, while SC-320 thermal conductivity is more than three times that: 3.2 W/m-K. Nategh tested his different motors using various coolant flow rates, but Barber said that in LORD Corporation’s followup tests, the coolant flow rate made no statistical difference. Rather, “the potting material and current made a huge difference, so you can predict how the motor is going to perform based on this.”

At a current that would cause the varnish-only motor to reach its maximum temperature of 150 degrees C, the motor using Epoxylite heated to 126-132 degrees C - a 12-16 percent improvement - and the motor using SC-320 heated to 106-109 degrees C - a 27.3-29.3 percent improvement. Such heat reductions can result in a much longer lifetime for a motor.

“If you’re familiar with the motor industry,” Barber said, “they say every 10 degrees in temperature you can decrease, you get a doubling of the lifetime. The other way you can go is to ask, How much extra current can I put through this motor to reach that temperature limit?

You can put about 26 percent more current through the motor before you expect to reach that temperature [150 degrees C], and current is almost directly related to horsepower for a motor. So you’d expect a 26 percent increase in horsepower with the same motor design. We’re trying to validate some of those numbers by designing our own motors and potting them with various materials in-house. We’re just at the beginning of that project.”

Rather than increased horsepower from the same motor design, a thermal management material like SC-320 could enable smaller, lighter-weight motors to achieve the same horsepower as larger, unpotted motors. In any case, decreased heat losses could lead to improved motor efficiency.

“We’re going to test the efficiencies and some of these assumptions about current and temperature,” Barber said. “These motors won’t be oil-cooled, so we’re interested to see what will happen with a more typical motor that doesn’t have any active cooling, like liquid flowing through the stator. They’ll be more like cooling fans - just air blowing on the motor.”

Of course, if SC-320 can provide such a cornucopia of benefits for electric motors, it will be up to OEMs to mix

and match the resulting efficiencies as they see fit. If cost is the biggest factor to an OEM, decreased motor sizes and cooling demands could help reduce overall motor cost.

“We’re trying to give performance to these high-end vehicles,” Greig said, “and we’re weighing the cost. That’s important because we want to drive mass adoption. Not everybody has $120,000 they want to spend on an EV.” Conductive expansion Besides designing motors to perform their own tests to validate and expand upon Nategh’s original SC-320 findings, LORD is also in the process of developing new high thermal conductivity epoxies to match or exceed SC-320’s performance. And it’s planning on developing even higher thermal conductivity materials with lighter weight and/or lower viscosity. By the time this article is published, Barber said LORD would have a prototype of the new epoxy-based material. “Then we’ll be able to offer both a compliant silicone material - a softer elastomeric type material - that has a little bit more vibration damping, and a hard material that’s more like a traditional potting material.”

LORD Corporation is seeking development partners and early adopters to test prototypes and validate the potential benefits of its thermal conductivity materials for electric motors. “We’ve still got a little bit of work to do in validating all of this data,” Greig said. “If SC-320 really does allow more power out of the same motor, or the same power out of a smaller motor, that would be interesting to the EV guys, because they could essentially take weight out of the car by putting in a smaller motor.”

If all goes well, the EV industry may have a new player on its hands, one with 90 years of experience in the unglamorous yet important space of motion-management technologies. And if or when that happens, it will be due to some synergy created by a greater focus on vehicle electrification. Nategh went searching for an EV solution, and may have found it outside of the established EV industry.

The famous (or infamous) motivator and human potential advocate Tony Robbins has an applicable saying: where focus goes, energy flows. Synergy and energy - both derive from the Greek word ergon, meaning “work.” We think the case of LORD Corporation’s SC-320 material shows that the more people who focus on the EV - or any - industry, the better that industry will work.

JUN/JUL 2014 29

Venting under

Pressure Membrane technology specialist Robert Lavertu on the importance of venting EV electronics

By Michael Kent

P The larger electronics in plug-in vehicles have more power, more heat and higher pressure differentials that present new technological challenges to OEMs and suppliers.

30

rotecting a car’s sensitive electronics throughout its lifetime is a must, whether it’s a conventional ICE vehicle or an EV. However, the larger electronics in plug-in vehicles have more power, more heat and higher pressure differentials that present new technological challenges to OEMs and suppliers.

Any power semiconductor inevitably generates heat while conducting current, due to small inefficiencies in the device.

Because the electronics in hybrids and EVs operate at high power levels, the heat created can be substantial. To protect the electronics from damage and maintain optimal efficiencies, they are usually cooled with fluids. Robert Lavertu, Product Specialist at W. L. Gore & Associates, told Charged that abrupt changes in temperature can cause pressure differentials which, if not managed, can lead to premature failure of the electronics. “One challenge for electronic components both in cars with internal combustion engines and in those with hybrid or electric motors is the difference between their operating

THE TECH

Figure 1 - Pressure Difference Caused by Temperature Shock

Power Electronics (4 L free volume) cooling rapidly form 70°C to 40°C within a 5 minute period

Pressure Difference [mbar]

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temperature and the cooler outside environment,” said Lavertu. “After heating up in operation, components can cool off very rapidly if they encounter cold spray from the road or at the carwash. This subjects the electronics housings to an extreme vacuum, which consequently pulls air in through the seals. Over time, this adverse pressure equalization stresses the seals and sealing components so much that dirt particles and liquids can get in and corrode the electronics, shortening their service life. The fact that low-viscosity fluids and cleaning agents are used in vehicles only heightens the danger of ingress.”

According to Lavertu - who specializes in membrane technology - venting enclosures is critical to ensuring that weathertight seals last the lifetime of a vehicle.

Equalizing Inverter Pressure To demonstrate this phenomenon, Lavertu presented the example of an AC inverter splashed with chilled water.

The basis for the calculation is a housing measuring

40x20x20 cm, which corresponds to a volume of 16 L. In this example, one quarter of the housing’s interior is empty, which means that the housing contains 4 L of free air volume. While in operation, the inverter reaches a temperature of 70 degrees C. When the underside of the car is sprayed with cold water, 8-10 degrees C, it causes the inverter to cool down to 40 degrees C within a fiveminute period.

“In an unvented housing, this temperature differential leads to a vacuum of about 90 mbar,” said Lavertu. “This vacuum occurs every time the car is driven through cool water, and stresses the seals so much that they can begin to leak over time. The result is that cleaning agents, oil, chemicals, water, etc. get into the inverter housing and can damage the sensitive electronics.”

Lavertu says that adding a vent ensures the vacuum is rapidly equalized and that pressure spikes cannot occur at all (Figure 1). And after only six minutes, the pressure inside the vented housing returns to the ambient pressure.

JUN/JUL 2014 31

Figure 2. Pressure Difference Caused by Elevation Battery box (50 L available volume), drive from 1,370 MASL to 570 MASL with a 15 minute break

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The Battery Box Because of its size, Lavertu notes that the high-voltage battery of a hybrid or electric vehicle will need a venting solution that achieves much higher airflow to equalize pressure. To illustrate one problematic pressure scenario, he describes a high-altitude 30-minute drive in Austria from Innsbruck (570 m above sea level) to the Brenner Pass (1,370 m above sea level).

An EV with a battery housing measuring 100x50x30 cm will have a volume of 150 L and a free air volume of approximately 50 L. “In an elevation difference of 800 m, that unvented battery enclosure will cause a positive pressure of 90 mbar to build up,” said Lavertu. “Even with a 15-minute break at the pass’s rest stop, the pressure cannot equalize, which puts permanent stress on the seals.

90 mbar positive pressure corresponds to approximately 450 kg acting on the surface area of 0.5 m². A lightweight housing cannot withstand such pressure for long. And although the seals are designed to cope with high loads, this extreme stress will eventually cause them to fail, and the housing will no longer be sealed properly.”

Since the battery comes into contact only with water spray and not with water at high pressure, the IP protec-

32

“

In order to equalize the vacuum, air gets sucked in through the affected seals, transporting with it dirt particles and liquids.

”

tive rating does not need to be as high as it does for components built into the engine compartment, explained Lavertu.

“Even more dangerous than the positive pressure from the trip up the mountain is the vacuum of 90 mbar that develops in the housing during the drive back down.”

Lavertu continued. “In order to equalize the vacuum, air gets sucked in through the affected seals, transporting with it dirt particles and liquids; these could condense in the housing and cause damage. In a vented battery housing, only a negligible vacuum of about 15 mbar develops (Figure 2). This does not overtax the seals and can be completely equalized during a 15-minute break.”

Photos courtesy of GORE

THE TECH

GORE PolyVent Compact Series (AVS 200)

Membrane tech To achieve pressure equalization and ensure reliability of the power electronics and the high-voltage battery pack throughout the car’s service life, Lavertu recommends using venting solutions that feature membranes. Membrane technology permits air exchange in a closed housing while simultaneously keeping out liquids and dirt particles. As seen in the example of a high-voltage battery box, airflow rate and water entry pressure are the two fundamental characteristics that determine the membrane’s performance for a particular application. Airflow describes how much air passes through the membrane in a given period, at a given differential pressure. This determines how quickly pressure differentials can be equalized. Water entry pressure is the minimum hydrostatic pressure that the membrane must be able to withstand before it leaks. But airflow and water entry pressure are not the only variables, explained Lavertu. “Temperature resistance and chemical resistance are also important parameters for membrane venting components.”

Large battery housings, for instance, which need to let lots of air in and out quickly but have a less demanding IP protection rating, should be fitted with a membrane

GORE Membrane Technology

Airflow rate and water entry pressure are the two fundamental characteristics that determine the membrane’s performance for a particular application. that permits higher airflow. Electronics housings fitted under the hood, on the other hand, often have to cope with high temperature peaks. The minimum required IP protective rating is IP6k9k, which ensures that electronics housings are reliably protected from dust particles, brief submersion and vapor stream. These generally feature membranes with high temperature resistance.

Since the challenges associated with individual applications vary widely, automotive OEMs and suppliers should, in each case, work closely together with the membrane manufacturer to develop a technically and economically suitable solution.

JUN/JUL 2014 33

CURRENTevents

THE VEHICLES

White House to Tesla: We can’t pre-empt state law

States should not be allowed to prevent Tesla Motors from selling cars directly to customers. The state legislators are trying to unfairly protect automobile dealers in their states from competition. Tesla is providing competition, which is good for consumers.

Over a year later, an answer finally came. The official response, written by Dan Utech, Special Assistant to the President for Energy and Climate Change, reads in part: We’re excited about the next generation of transportation choices, including the kind of electric vehicles that Tesla and others have developed…but as you know, laws regulating auto sales are issues that have traditionally sat with lawmakers at the state level.

We believe in the goal of improving consumer choice for American families, including more vehicles that provide savings at the pump for consumers. However, we understand that pre-empting current state laws on direct-to-consumer auto sales would require an act of Congress.

The message goes on to give the Obama administration a pat on the back for the measures it’s taken to promote progress in the transportation sector, which have indeed been substantial, including increased fuel-economy standards, loan guarantees and support for research.

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Photo courtesy of Nicolas Fleury/Flickr

In July 2013, a White House petition with over 138,000 signatures asked the federal government to intervene in the ongoing war between Tesla Motors and trade associations representing auto dealers by blocking states from requiring that cars be sold only by third-party dealers. The Obama administration promises to review and respond to any citizen petition that garners 100,000 signatures within a month.

The petition asked the administration to “allow Tesla Motors to sell directly to consumers in all 50 states.” It read:

Tesla was not impressed - the company criticized the White House for a delayed and timid response.

“Rather than seize an opportunity to promote innovation and support the first successful American car company to be started in more than a century, the White House issued a response that was even more timid than its rejection of a petition to begin construction of a Death Star,” said Tesla VP Diarmuid O’Connell. “Instead of showing the sort of leadership exhibited by senior officials at the Federal Trade Commission, who declared their support for consumer freedom of choice, the White House merely passed the buck to Congress and trumpeted its advances in promoting vehicle efficiency. Given the economic and environmental principles at stake, we would have hoped for stronger leadership and more action.”

Several top officials from the Federal Trade Commission took Tesla’s side in a blog post in April, saying that the various state governments’ moves to restrict Tesla’s direct sales were “bad policy for a number of reasons.” A group of 70 economists and law professors and several politicians on both sides of the aisle have also made public statements in support of Tesla Stores.

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CURRENTevents Nissan LEAF headed for India as subsidies roll out

Photo courtesy of Nicolas Raymond/Flickr

CARB funds new round of plug-in incentives

The California Air Resources Board has approved a funding plan for fiscal year 2014-15 that includes several new and renewed incentives for advanced vehicle technologies. The $222-million pot of money includes $200 million from ARB’s cap-and-trade program. The agency is required by law to invest a portion of proceeds in disadvantaged communities.

“Action taken by the Board today will provide $100 million to directly benefit disadvantaged communities,” Air Resources Board Chairman Mary D. Nichols said. “The funding plan and ARB’s amended ‘car scrap’ program together provide emission reductions for all Californians and financial incentives for those who need it the most.”

Highlights of the plan include: • $116 million to support the Clean Vehicle Rebate Project (CVRP), which offers rebates to buyers of zero-emission and near-zero-emission cars.

• Fuel-cell electric vehicles are now eligible for rebates of $5,000 per vehicle.

• $9 million for pilot programs, such as car sharing, to help consumers in disadvantaged communities access clean-vehicle technologies.

• $85 million for heavy-duty freight vehicles.

• $10-15 million in incentives for the purchase of heavy-duty hybrid and electric vehicles.

• $20-25 million for large-scale pilot projects to provide demonstrations of zero-emission technologies in the freight and transit sectors.

• $50 million for advanced-technology freight demonstration projects, including zero-emission drayage trucks.

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Nissan is aiming to bring the LEAF to India and is considering a collaboration with local manufacturers to provide charging infrastructure.

“We are actively looking at the LEAF for India...I think there is a lot of potential for that car here,” said Nissan Chief Planning Officer Andy Palmer. “There is no doubt electric cars are the future. The product is there, what we need is infrastructure. Charging is a big challenge. We are open to collaboration with local manufacturers on that. That is the fastest and easiest way of setting up charging stations.”

As reported by the Hindustan Times in India, Nissan wants to emulate the model it uses in Japan, where the company collaborates with domestic car makers Toyota, Honda and Mitsubishi.

That would probably mean a partnership with Mahindra Reva, which is the only EV maker in the Indian market at the moment, with a manufacturing capacity of 40,000 units per year. (Several other firms, including Tata Motors and Maruti Suzuki, are working on hybrid and electric models.)

Palmer wouldn’t say if the two companies had already been in contact, but Pawan Goenka, Mahindra’s Executive Director and President, Automotive, told the Hindustan Times, “We are open to collaboration with any company that has a vision for electric vehicles in India.”

A lack of subsidies and government support has held back India’s EV market, but that situation is changing. Last December, the government announced subsidies for EVs beginning in April, to the tune of Rs 12,000 crore ($1.9 billion) over the next seven years. According to the Financial Express, the National Board of Electric Mobility recently approved an even more generous plan - Rs 13,600 crore between now and 2020.

“We will go to the Cabinet with the new electric mobility scheme soon. Its launch is important, as the increased usage of electric vehicles will help in cumulative fuel savings up to 9,500 million with 24 tonne cumulative reduction in CO2. It will also help to create 2.5-3 lakh additional jobs by 2020,” said an unnamed official in the heavy industries ministry.

THE VEHICLES

Most of us are used to thinking of EVs as green and clean. It seems that the French, however, can be a bit more literal-minded. France’s Jury of Advertising Ethics (JDP) has ruled that EVs cannot be advertised as being “green” or “clean.”

The JDP said that an ad for the Renault Zoe with the slogan “To fight pollution, drive a car” that was posted around Paris when traffic restrictions were introduced to fight an air-pollution crisis was misleading.

The agency said that EVs do have an impact on the environment due to wear and tear of parts and charging needs. “There are many other means of transport which it is commonly believed are less harmful to the environment, such as cycling or collective transportation. [The Renault ad] therefore sends a message contrary to generally accepted principles of sustainable development.”

In April, the JDP issued a similar ruling against three electric car-sharing services, which said on their websites that their vehicles were “ecological” and “clean.”

Photo courtesy of Cédric JANODET/Flickr

French Ethics Jury: Don’t call EVs “green” or “clean”

“These advertisements must be balanced,” said Stéphane Martin, CEO of the Professional Advertising Regulatory Authority. “Every vehicle has an impact on the environment during its construction and its life cycle.

You cannot describe the electric car as ‘clean,’ but it can be argued that it contributes to sustainable development and is cleaner than non-electric cars.”

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CURRENTevents

Volvo’s XC90 PHEV: up to 400 hp, 40 Nm torque

The BMW Group is having a banner year - it sold more than a million vehicles in the first half of 2014 for the first time (that includes MINI, Rolls-Royce and BMW Motorcycles).

The new i division, which comprises BMW’s plugin models, shared the wealth. In June, 1,241 BMW i3s were delivered to customers worldwide, bringing year-to-date sales to 5,396.

The i3 went on sale in Germany and several other European countries in November 2013, and sales over there have been brisk. The i3 was the top selling plug-in in Germany during the first quarter of 2014.

The electric city car made its US debut in May with 336 sales, and followed up in June with 358.

“The US will be the largest market for the i3,” Harald Krueger, BMW’s production chief, said in April. At the current production rate, BMW will be building about 20,000 units this year.

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Volvo’s new XC90 SUV, to be launched later this year, claims to be the world’s most powerful and cleanest SUV. The all-wheel-drive seven-seater will offer a range of powertrain options, of which the top of the line will be the “Twin Engine” PHEV. A two-liter, four-cylinder supercharged and turbocharged Drive-E gasoline engine powers the front wheels, and an 80 hp (60 kW) electric motor drives the rear. Combined output is 400 hp, with 640 Nm (472 lb-ft) of torque. The driver can choose hybrid mode or pure electric mode, which offers a range of around 25 miles.

Image courtesy of Volvo

Photo courtesy of Kārlis Dambrāns/Flickr

Over 5,000 BMW i3s sold in the first half of 2014

The new XC90 is the first model to use the company’s Scalable Product Architecture (SPA) chassis technology, which is designed to allow a lot of flexibility to offer different engine options without sacrificing interior space. “Since our new SPA technology is designed from the start to accommodate electrification technologies, the Twin Engine installation does not compromise luggage or passenger space,” said Senior VP Peter Mertens.

THE VEHICLES

Nissan LEAF owners can now purchase a replacement battery pack. The price is $5,499 (with the return of the original battery pack, which is required and valued at $1,000), plus tax and a dealer’s fee for installation, which is estimated to take about three hours. For 2011 and 2012 LEAF models, a $225 installation kit is also required.

Nissan spokesman Brian Brockman announced the news in a post on the MyNissanLeaf forum. Brockman acknowledged that the company shelved an earlier plan to lease replacement batteries, following some “spirited discussion (and very vocal criticism).”

The new “lizard batteries,” which are the same as those sold with the 2015 LEAF, use a new chemistry that reduces capacity loss under high temperatures.

The new battery doesn’t offer any improvements in performance or range, and Nissan declined to comment on any future plans for a higher-capacity battery pack.

Photo courtesy of NissanEV/Flickr

Nissan announces price for replacement LEAF battery

Replacement packs will carry similar warranty coverage to a new LEAF: 8 years/100,000 miles against defects and 5 years/60,000 miles against capacity loss.

Nissan is finalizing details of a financing plan (not a lease or rental) that will offer a monthly payment “in the $100 per month range.”

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THE VEHICLES

CURRENTevents

EDI and Greenkraft develop CNG-PHEV truck

Image courtesy of BYD

Photo courtesy of EDI

EV maker BYD reports massive sales growth

BYD’s sales of “new energy” vehicles jumped tenfold between January and April compared with the same period a year earlier, according to China Business News. A BYD spokesman said that sales growth would have been even faster if it were not constrained by insufficient production of batteries.

BYD recently projected its net profit for the first half of 2014 at between 350 and 490 million yuan ($56-$79 million). Chairman Wang Chuanfu said in June that the company will see a turning point in sales in the second half, expecting acceleration in the commercial vehicle sector.

The company introduced its BYD Qin, a plug-in hybrid compact sedan, last December. The model has sold nearly 4,500 units so far and has an order backlog of more than 8,000. Projections put sales of the Qin at 20,000 this year.

Some 10,501 new energy vehicles were sold in China in the first four months of this year, up 154 percent from the same period a year earlier, according to the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers. Separately, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology announced that the nation produced 3,770 new energy cars in May, up 98 percent from a year earlier.

Efficient Drivetrains, Inc. (EDI) is partnering with Greenkraft to develop a Class-4 truck that runs on compressed natural gas (CNG) and incorporates a plug-in hybrid drivetrain.

The project will fit EDI’s multi-mode PHEV powertrain (EDI-Drive) to Greenkraft’s CNG-powered, 14,500-pound, Class-4 medium-duty truck, which is equipped with a 6.0 L GM engine. The new beast is projected to have a 40-mile all-electric range.

EDI received a $900,000 grant from the California Energy Commission for the project, which includes design, manufacturing, testing/validation and demonstration. Goals of the project include improving thermal efficiency by 29 percent compared to the existing CNG-powered truck; and tripling the miles per gasoline gallon equivalent (GGE) figure from approximately 9 miles per GGE to 27.

The EDI-Drive system automatically adapts to operate as a pure EV, as a series hybrid suited for stopand-go city traffic conditions or as a parallel hybrid optimized for the highway. The in-line form factor is designed to allow the drivetrain to be integrated into any light-, medium- or heavy-duty vehicle design.

To accommodate charging throughout the day, the CNG-PHEV will be equipped with an intelligent onboard charging system that can determine the power capability of any standard plug automatically.

It will carry adapter plugs and an extension cord, helping to ensure that the CNG-PHEV can charge at any standard industrial outlet.

JUN/JUL 2014 41

Photo courtesy of Listers Group/Flickr

The

Dealership

p Dilemma

By Charles Morris

I

t’s safe to say that car dealers aren’t a particularly beloved bunch. Shopping for a car may not be as bad as going to the dentist, but for many people, it’s right up there.

Technically-minded buyers find it frustrating to try to glean some factual information from the typical rambling sales pitch, while more gentle souls hate the haggling and the high-pressure hard sell.

EV boosters have another reason to vilify ol’ Cal Worthington and his colleagues. Many dealers are woefully ignorant about plug-in vehicles, and some actively discourage customers from going electric, talking up legacy ICE models with seemingly similar features and admittedly far lower sticker prices.

Green Car Reports recently wrote that “hundreds of cases have been reported of customers walking into a Nissan or Chevy dealer to buy a LEAF or Volt, then being aggressively steered toward a Sentra or Cruze.”

Even if most salespeople don’t try to talk their customers out of buying an EV, many have very little knowledge about the cars they’re selling, or of EVs in general. Ignorance may be just as much of a barrier to sales as hostility - it’s hard to imagine that a customer who walks into a dealership not knowing much about EVs is going to buy one if he or she can’t get quality answers from the salesperson. With all the obstacles at the dealership level, it’s amazing that plug-ins are selling as well as they are.

Photo courtesy of Michael Kappel/Flickr

Photo courtesy of Jack Amick/Flickr

Plug-in vehicles are relatively complicated to understand, and misinformation is rampant in the media. Unfortunately, the OEMs’ efforts to educate their dealers are falling short, and we’re convinced that’s the real reason for the problem - not a Luddite conspiracy, but a lack of proper training.

The one company that sells only EVs, Tesla, wants nothing to do with the traditional dealership model, for reasons that Elon Musk has eloquently expressed: “Existing franchise dealers have a fundamental conflict of interest between selling gasoline cars, which constitute the vast majority of their business, and selling the new technology of electric cars. It is impossible for them to explain the advantages of going electric without simultaneously undermining their traditional business. This would leave the electric car without a fair opportunity to make its case to an unfamiliar public.”

The one company that sells only EVs, Tesla, wants nothing to do with the traditional dealership model.

Tesla sells its cars directly to consumers, which has led to all-out war with the powerful auto dealers’ trade groups. In many states, the law requires cars to be sold through third-party dealers, a business model that many, including politicos on both sides of the aisle, see as outdated. The battle is proceeding on a state-by-state basis, and, while recent compromises in New York and Pennsylvania are hopeful signs, any final settlement is probably years away.

One of the dealer groups’ main arguments against direct sales is the importance of warranty work. The National Automobile Dealers Association’s annual NADA Data report, released in May, emphasized warranty repairs, saying, “Warranty work performed by new-car dealers totaled $14.4 billion in service and parts last year - all at no cost to the customer.”

However, Automotive News reports that warranty work

44

makes up only a sixth of dealers’ overall service and parts revenue, and warranty work is on the decline. As many in the EV press have noted, the dealers’ real fear is probably that, if Tesla gets away with selling directly to consumers, other OEMs, perhaps including Chinese automakers, will wish to do the same, and auto dealers will eventually go the way of travel agencies and record stores.

Some EV pundits see repairs as a reason for dealers to steer customers away from plug-ins. After all, EVs require far less maintenance than legacy vehicles, so dealers don’t want to kill the internal combustion goose that lays all that lovely warranty work down the road. However, this seems a bit far-fetched at this point. The day that EVs are so common that they put a dent in the auto repair

Photo courtesy of Dave Pinter/Flickr

THE VEHICLES

industry is decades away and, if the majority of dealers are as ill-educated about EVs as some have proven to be, it’s likely that most of them don’t even realize that EVs need fewer repairs.

Spirited debate At the recent EDTA Conference, Charged attended a panel discussion about the issue. What we heard was not terribly encouraging.

Dirk Spiers, the Director of battery life-cycle management firm ATC New Technologies, said that while there are a number of reasons people don’t buy EVs - high prices, lack of choices, range anxiety - “All those things are [gradually] being addressed. The real problem is the dealer, because they are reluctant to get behind EVs. They have no knowledge. They are resisting it. Fixing the dealer problem is as important as all those other issues.”

Spiers noted that, when Apple decided to take over the retail sale of its products, there was a lot of skepticism, but now Apple stores are highly successful, and the company enjoys complete control of the marketing and service of its products. The battle continues with Tesla, which is clearly following in Apple’s footsteps.

Spiers concedes that there are some very good dealers, especially in EV-savvy states such as California and

“

None of us ever drove a Volt at a dealership with a fullycharged battery.

”

Oregon. Elsewhere, however, he has found ignorance and apathy to be the rule. Spiers personally went to a number of Volt dealers, and sent friends and family to others.

Among the discouraging findings: “None of us ever drove a Volt at a dealership with a fully-charged battery.” These dealers don’t seem to realize that the whole point of a plug-in vehicle is plugging it in.

Spiers also recounted the story of a friend who recently bought a LEAF, despite the best efforts of the dealer, who “tried everything to sell them an Altima, even saying that the LEAF only has 40 miles of range.” In fact, the LEAF’s EPA-certified range is 75 miles.

Spiers firmly believes that EVs are better than ICE vehicles - manufacturers just need to get the word out. He notes that EV buyers are passionate, and often encourage others to look into going electric. “Somehow we have to

JUN/JUL 2014 45

“

Give them the tools, give them the information. And harness those customer satisfaction ratings.

”

Photo courtesy of harry_nl/Flickr

Photo courtesy of Josh Graciano/Flickr

“For dealers, it’s innovate or die,” said Spiers. He envisions dealers becoming solution providers, as computer makers are doing, perhaps selling related products such as solar panels and energy storage. Most important, OEMs need to have an ongoing dialog with their dealers, and not just at product launch. “Engage and educate.

Give them the tools, give them the information. And harness those customer satisfaction ratings.”

46

Disturbing data Another participant in the EDTA panel was Eric Everett, Senior Associate Automobile Editor at Consumer Reports (CR). Earlier this year, the respected consumer advocate conducted its own research on the issue. CR sent 19 secret shoppers to 85 dealerships in four states, and they asked a number of specific questions about the vehicles to test the salespeople’s knowledge. The results were disappointing, to say the least.

When asked how much it would cost to charge an EV, only about 19 percent of salespeople gave reasonably accurate answers. Some responses were bizarre - one dealer said that it would cost “ten times as much to charge at 120 volts as at 240.” One Honda dealer said no one had ever asked that question.

A third of dealers could not accurately explain how the federal tax incentive works.

Fewer than 40 percent gave accurate information about battery lifespan and warranties. Most EV batteries are warranted for 8 years or 80,000 miles, but few dealers seemed to know that. One Toyota salesman said that the Prius Plug-in required a battery replacement “every couple of years.” On the other hand, many salespeople were not aware that batteries degrade over time - one even said that range would increase as the battery got older.

CR found that selections tended to be poor - the vast majority of dealers had no more than three EVs to choose

Photo courtesy of Ian Muttoo/Flickr

harness this passion to do something with these dealers. We need to explain that this is a different consumer model. We are brought up with low upfront cost and high maintenance fees. You see it with razors and blades, you see it with mobile phones, with printers and cartridges.

With EVs, it’s the other way around. The vehicle is fairly expensive, but afterwards, your costs are maybe 50 cents a day.”

THE VEHICLES

Photo courtesy of Michael B./Flickr

Photo courtesy of Robert Couse-Baker/Flickr

Consumer Reports sent 19 secret shoppers to 85 dealerships in four states...The results were disappointing, to say the least.

Consumer Reports Survey Results Only about 19% of salespeople gave reasonably accurate answers about costs to charge an EV A third of dealers could not accurately explain how the federal tax incentive works Fewer than 40% gave accurate information about battery lifespan and warranties A strong correlation observed between a salesperson’s knowledge about electric cars and his or her tendency to recommend buying one

Photo courtesy of Listers Group/Flickr

from. Why? Oddly, some said consumers weren’t interested, while others said that EVs sold out as quickly as they could get them.

CR’s team found a strong correlation between a salesperson’s knowledge about electric cars and his or her tendency to recommend buying one. They found that salespeople at Chevrolet, Ford and Nissan dealerships tended to be better informed than those at Honda and Toyota.

This is unsurprising, as Ford, GM and Nissan have made major investments in plug-ins, whereas Honda and Toyota have by all accounts produced compliance cars only because the California Air Resources Board forced them to, and have made little effort to market them.

CR found that Toyota salespeople were the most likely to discourage the purchase of a plug-in model - one New

JUN/JUL 2014 47

Photo courtesy of Kārlis Dambrāns/Flickr

York salesperson refused even to show CR’s shopper a Prius Plug-in. In fact, most of the Toyota dealerships CR visited recommended buying a standard Prius hybrid instead of a Plug-in. To be fair, that may not be bad advice.

CR’s testing concluded that the Plug-in offered only a small mileage advantage over the standard Prius at a large additional cost. As much as we e-vangelists may hate to admit it, not every EV is a good buy for every customer.

Credit where it’s due Representing the automakers’ side of the story on the EDTA panel was Robert Healey, BMW of North America’s Electric Vehicle Infrastructure Manager. As he took the podium, he joked that he was feeling “depressed” after hearing so many negative stories about auto dealers. His presentation made it clear that BMW has at least made a serious effort to prepare its dealers to sell EVs (the i3 was not yet on sale at the time of CR’s survey, so we don’t know how BMW dealers would have stacked up).

BMW has taken a step-by-step approach to electrification. The company leased its Mini-E, then its ActiveE, to large groups of drivers around the world and solicited

48

Rather than launch the i3 in selected geographic markets, BMW gave all its dealers the option of selling the new EV. their feedback, so by the time it launched the i3, it presumably had a substantial amount of data about customers’ concerns.

Rather than launch the i3 in selected geographic markets, BMW gave all its dealers the option of selling the new EV. Those that sign on must commit to installing charging stations and other necessary equipment, as well as training programs for both service personnel and sales staff.

Service training was “a bit more intensive” than what BMW would require for an ordinary new model. Technicians were required to complete nine modules of train-

THE VEHICLES

Photo courtesy of BMW

his or her needs are met. The company partners with Bosch to install home chargers, with ChargePoint for public charging, and with SolarCity to install solar panels.

As a last-ditch defense against range anxiety, BMW even offers loaner gas vehicles for i3 buyers, for those times when they need to make long road trips.

Healey admits that some dealers are more committed to the i concept than others. “20 percent of our dealers will embrace electromobility…and want to sell you this car. 80 percent are reactive, they’re not proactive.”

David Noland of Green Car Reports must have visited one of Healey’s 80 percent. The salesman who showed him an i3 said that he had never driven it, and hadn’t received any training specific to the i3. He also threw out the ridiculous idea that the efficiency of the i3’s electric motor would improve once it was broken in.

Noland also wrote that one Canadian BMW dealer was so desperate for i3 knowledge that it hired the wellknown EV blogger Tom Moloughney to fly to Toronto and brief his salesmen. If that’s what it takes to get dealers educated, then we’d be happy to help out too. But, one way or another, OEMs need to get serious about the dealership issues if they expect to sell the plug-in cars that they’ve invested so much to develop.

Sales staff are supposed to go through a full day of classroom instruction, followed by a day driving the i3 and learning its features. ing, including “an in-depth dive into high-voltage battery repair.”

Sales staff are supposed to go through a full day of classroom instruction, followed by a day driving the i3 and learning its features. There is also training for staff in the Finance and Insurance department, to bring them up to speed on the intricacies of federal tax incentives, the implications for leasing, etc.

Perhaps more than any other EV maker (except Tesla), BMW sees an EV purchase as part of a new lifestyle.

Through its 360 Electric program, BMW tries to assess each customer’s individual situation, and make sure that

A nuanced new auto industry It’s always tempting to see some sort of anti-electric conspiracy, but it seems unlikely that most managers are explicitly instructing salespeople to steer people away from EVs. After all, many dealerships opt in to having EVs on their lots in the first place (of course, others also opt out).

The plug-in vehicle world is extremely nuanced, and education is clearly at the heart of this problem. Try explaining to a novice the technical differences between a BMW i3 REx, Chevrolet Volt and Toyota Prius Plugin. All three have a plug and a gas tank, but also differ in significant ways.

On top of the many different electrification configurations, add a variety of recharge times, power levels and plug standards, and it’s easy see that inexperienced sales staff will need intense training sessions to really understand all the ins and outs of the plug-in scene.

Salespeople’s reluctance to sell EVs is partly due to plain old resistance to new ideas, but the main reason is a serious lack of knowledge. That needs to change, and the OEMs are the only ones who can change it.

JUN/JUL 2014 49

eHO

OG

As Harley-Davidson tours America testing the waters for its prototype electric motorcycle, LiveWire, early riders like what they see and hear.

Photo courtesy of Harley-Davidson

F

By Markkus Rovito

or decades, few names have been as synonymous with traversing the American landscape as Harley-Davidson. After 111 years, Milwaukee, Wisconsin’s Harley-Davidson Motor Company has survived many ups and downs, including outlasting the Great Depression, producing American bikes for two World Wars, changes in ownership, dips in product quality, investor class-action lawsuits, and a slow, steady resurgence spanning more than 30 years in which the company’s business and reputation have notched upwards.

Harley-Davidson remains the only major American motorcycle producer, and it’s arguably the most beloved of all American vehicle manufacturers. In the post-Easy Rider United States, few pastimes denote reverence for your homeland more than a long-haul motorcycle road trip - always on a Harley, preferably on a chopper. That’s why, for decades, Harley-Davidson has cornered the American market for “touring” motorcycles with >700 cc motors, and has built a huge part of its cycle brand on factory customization. Its 2013 launch of Project Rushmore solidified its commitment to the luxury touringbike space; the customer-feedback-driven upgrade package graced Harley touring hogs with more power, better brakes, updated tech, ergonomics and more.

THE VEHICLES However, a company this old seems to know that in business, the only constant is change. We’re starting to see the fruits of the 2009 decision to shut down its wholly owned Buell sportbike brand to concentrate solely on the Harley brand. Now, after only producing heavyweight, >700 cc cruiser motorcycles since 1977, Harley-Davidson has been leisurely dipping its toes into new waters. This year it began selling its line of urban street bikes, including the 500 cc Street 500 starting at $6,799, trying to appeal to a new class of young riders by launching the Harley-Davidson Riding Academy using the Street 500 as the training vehicle.

The company already has its next forward-thinking project underway. This one, Project LiveWire, introduces Harley’s first-ever electric motorcycle.

Electrifying a classic For Harley-Davidson, Project LiveWire “is absolutely 100 percent different,” Jeff Richlen, the company’s Chief Engineer, told Charged. Obviously the first electric Harley was going to be a different beast, but the company has been taking its time with Project LiveWire to figure out how to introduce electrification in a way that still felt like a Harley-Davidson.

Conceptually, the LiveWire program began about four years ago, when executives and the HOG board of directors evaluated the prospect, and eventually decided to make Project LiveWire similar to their Project Rushmore in that it would be focused on customer feedback.

Photo courtesy of Harley-Davidson

“

In a motorcycle, you don’t have the real estate and the packaging space.

”

Before they could gather much of that feedback, however, they first needed to build a prototype electric bike, and that was no easy task. “Delivering a great motorcycle in the electric space is not as easy as it looks,” said Richlen, who worked in the company’s custom vehicle operations for several years. “The number-one challenge is developing the powertrain/power electronics/battery combination. For a four-wheel passenger car, there’s lots of space, lots of real estate. But in a motorcycle, you don’t

JUN/JUL 2014 53

have the real estate and the packaging space. So it’s a particular challenge to have the look, feel and sound - which are really our three tenets at Harley-Davidson - like a traditional motorcycle. If you look at LiveWire, everything is very purposeful. From the first pencil mark on paper to the last motorcycle version we built, everything is well thought out with a plan in mind - how we package the power electronics, how we do the powertrain combinations. Getting all that to fit within the two-wheel space and still have it look like an awesome motorcycle was certainly not by accident.”

54

“

Aluminum is a first for Harley Davidson.

”

Besides the electric powertrain, the LiveWire embodies other design departures from traditional Harleys. Its frame is cast aluminum, which creates a kind of dark grey exoskeleton around the motorcycle, which uses silver,

Photos courtesy of Harley-Davidson

THE VEHICLES

black and red to create a cool look somewhere between sporty and high-tech rebel.

“Our bikes are traditionally tubular-steel welded,” said Richlen. “If you look at any of our bikes - touring, sports or softail, pick any one in the family - they’re a combination of tubular steel, some casting, and also some forging that’ll all get welded together into one single-steel weld.

Aluminum is a first for Harley-Davidson. Obviously in the electric space, weight is a pretty important factor. This one was largely developed in a virtual space, and heavily optimized for weight.”

“

56

Now Hiring Brammo CEO Craig Bramscher noted in a recent Charged feature that there are only so many cool jobs for people who love electric motorcycles. It sounds like a few of the coolest jobs imaginable just opened up - Harley-Davidson is looking for EV specialists.

The careers section of the company’s web site lists five electrical engineering openings, including:

”

• Director Electrical Vehicle Technology • Staff Technical Engineer - Electrical Vehicle

Photo courtesy of Harley-Davidson

As the Motor Company, that was the central jewel, as in all of our traditional ICE bikes the jewel of the motorcycle is really the motor.

Photo courtesy of Daniel G./Flickr

Harley-Davidson is working with some parts suppliers for the LiveWire, but it’s all custom-made - no off-the-shelf components. The motor, batteries and power electronics are all cooled differently. “There’s what I call a typical radiator system up front that liquid-cools the power electronics,” Richlen said. “Then in the tail, there’s an oil cooler that cools the motor and gear box assembly.

The batteries are just convection air-cooled.”

Despite its unavoidable, overall newness, the LiveWire was still mandated to follow the Harley-Davidson design philosophy in which form follows function, but both evoke emotion. Like all Harley motorcycles, the LiveWire’s motor was to be the visual centerpiece, and then to emphasize the explosive electric acceleration, the LiveWire also took design inspiration from racing bikes.

“If you look at the lower longitude of our motor, that was from day one a focal point,” Richlen said. “As the

According to the job posting, the EV Director will be responsible for “personally driving successful execution of the largest, most strategically important production and innovation EV projects,” and is expected to be the company’s top electric vehicle expert.

The position requires a Bachelor’s Degree in Electrical Engineering or a related field, as well as a minimum of ten years of product development experience.

Jeff Richlen, Harley-Davidson’s Chief Engineer, told us that the EV Director will work closely with him as “we look toward the future and what we’re considering for the EV space. I’m a chief engineer, that would be a complementary technical position that supports the development of EV strategy. So it really is looking at the technical side of helping to develop electric vehicles, if we choose to go forward.”

All of the engineering positions are located at Harley headquarters in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. The Director job was posted on June 19, and two Staff Technical Engineer openings were posted on June 23.

THE VEHICLES Motor Company, that was the central jewel, as in all of sent business-as-usual for Harley-Davidson better than our traditional ICE bikes - the jewel of the motorcycle is a nationwide road trip. The Project LiveWire Experience really the motor. It was very deliberate to highlight it and launched June 24 in New York City, and will pass through have it look very muscular. That theme carries through30 Harley dealerships in 30 US cities before wrapping up out. It may not be immediately obvious, but the front in Jacksonville, Florida on December 20. The tour stops wheel is 18 inches versus 17 inches in the rear, and that allow licensed riders to take a 5-7 mile test spin of the front end gives it that muscular appearance. The motor current LiveWire prototype, and the unlicensed can try housing itself has hints of a Top Fuel dragster. Putting together the two elements of engineering function and styling is why we refer to it as ‘where innovation meets art.’”

Then there is the sound. Similar to the sound of the Spark-Renault Formula E racecars we wrote Electrification Evolution about in Charged Issue 11, the LiveWire sounds like a fighter plane that George Jetson may have flown (Hear it at Projectlivewire.

Hybrid com, where you can also get tour Start / Stop dates and additional info). Again, Electric it’s nothing like the traditional Harley growl, but still pretty badass. It’s another example of how Harley-Davidson has tried to adapt its combustion legacy to an electric motorcycle.

“It wasn’t like we invented a motor or we invented batteries,” Richlen said. “It’s really the combination of putting great technology together in a great way. It’s not particularly compelling to wrap a frame around a box of batteries, which is essentially the power plant. But the way we did it, and the way that we constructed a frame around it, doesn’t look like a box of batteries rolling on two wheels.”

The automotive industry is changing fast.

With an engineering team dedicated to ■ ■ ■

Get on the bus While an electric bike represents a big change, the company wants to show its customers that it’s not changing its core design principles. And nothing could repre-

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The market is rapidly accelerating from only a few hybrid vehicles to broad electrification in several forms. From start-stop systems to full electric vehicles, the number of battery types and systems continue to evolve.

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@Midtronics JUN/JUL 2014

bike I rode felt 100 percent production ready “andThedidn’t resemble a cobbled-together prototype

in any way. Fit, finish, and function were excellent... every detail...is clean, stylish, and of high quality.

Compared to the last Zero SR we tested, the LiveWire feels quicker off the line, even smoking the rear tire on a couple of hard launches for the video camera. Even in “demonstrator” form, the Harley-Davidson LiveWire is the best electric motorcycle I’ve ridden.

Blake Conner, CycleWorld.com

”

Riding the LiveWire is pretty shocking too. This is a “fired-up, amped-out monster. It’s almost silent but

for a high-pitched jet engine whine that comes from the transfer of power from the huge electric motor to the composite belt that drives the rear wheel. The propulsion is outrageous...the engine is said to produce 74 horsepower and 52 foot-pounds of torque, on a vehicle that weighs just 460 pounds. Because it’s an electric engine, the power goes directly to the rear wheel. The torque is instantaneous. There’s no getting up to the power band. It’s all power band, from zero to 92 mph.

Charles Fleming, Los Angeles Times

”

58

The LiveWire impresses even before riding, as Harley “engineers have clearly put a lot of effort into making

this an e-bike that pleases the eyes. Acceleration is indeed brisk, leaping away from traffic with a quiet ferocity that thrills even motojournos jaded by big power. It can pull away from a stop as gently as an expertly calibrated clutch hand. [A 53-mile range is] the reason why the LiveWire is thus far a proof of concept machine rather than a production bike.

Kevin Duke, Motorcycle.com

”

it accelerates like a dragster, it corners more “likeWhilea Japanese sport bike. Compared to the existing

electric motorcycles on the market, the LiveWire is similar in its responsiveness off the line to the 2014 models from Zero and Brammo, but it offers only half the range. Its motor and battery placement, dual ride modes and regenerative braking setup were clearly benchmarked, though the way Harley has chosen to disguise its powertrain is unique and probably the most attractive of the bunch. Even though this isn’t a production bike, the LiveWire’s fit and finish also far surpasses its rivals.

Susan Carpenter, Autoblog.com

”

Photo by Ray Stubblebine, courtesy of Harley-Davidson

First Impressions Drive reports from the motorcycling media

THE VEHICLES

Photo by Neilson Barnard, courtesy of Harley-Davidson

out the “Jumpstart” simulated riding experience.

During Project LiveWire, Harley-Davidson will be collecting as much customer feedback from the test rides as possible to potentially inform the direction of the final product, but also to help determine whether there will be a final product. There’s currently no solid commitment to a production-model LiveWire. In 2015, the Project LiveWire Experience will continue in the US and expand to Canada and Europe. After that, LiveWire’s fate is uncertain, but Richlen told us that the company may opt to extend the tour for another year. If the test feedback warrants it, perhaps production LiveWires will hit the open road instead.

Let’s not skirt around the issue of masculinity. We all know that whether it’s warranted or not, Harley-Davidson’s image has been steeped in some amount of machismo, and whether it’s warranted or not, electric vehicles still carry a stigma of wimpiness in some circles. That’s

probably why some company literature encourages you to view the LiveWire like the first electric guitar rather than an electric car. However, so far it has appeared that motorcycle gearheads are quicker than many to judge EVs based on their merit alone. Honest appraisals in the motorcycle press of bikes from the likes of Brammo, Energica, Zero, etc. have shown that the proof is in the performance, and that the instant torque of electric mo-

“

While it is extremely exhilarating from an acceleration standpoint, it doesn’t feel uncontrolled. It feels very refined.

”

Photo courtesy of Erin Page/Flickr Photo courtesy of Harley-Davidson Photo courtesy of Harley-Davidson

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torcycles bring smiles to riders’ faces.

“So far, the response has been overwhelming that it’s so smooth and such a natural performance,” Richlen said about the Project LiveWire results. “Customers have been very complimentary that it’s not jerky, not erratic. While it is extremely exhilarating from an acceleration standpoint, it doesn’t feel uncontrolled. It feels very refined.”

Refining reinvention As the tour progresses, the company is processing the feedback it gets and adjusting the questions aimed at the customer. Once a person completes their LiveWire test ride, there is a structured list of interview questions a Harley-Davidson employee asks them, as well as a chance for some free-form chatting. The company wants to know both the post-ride impressions of the LiveWire’s performance, and how that may have differed from pre-ride expectations. Richlen says the LiveWire has a natural, very smooth torque curve that the rider feels when twisting the throttle for power delivery - but was that what customers were expecting?

Harley-Davidson also has plenty of opportunity to collect technical data on the LiveWire during its test rides.

The prototypes have two riding modes to choose from: one optimized for range and one optimized for power.

The range mode limits the amount of power going to the rear wheel. However, as the LiveWire is nowhere near a final version (and there may not be a final version), many technical specs - including estimated range - are not available yet. Media testers were told that in power mode, the LiveWire had 30 miles of range before the Li-ion batteries would need a 3.5-hour recharge at Level 2.

“If we are truly going to live up to our tenet of being customer-led and customer-focused, the technical data can guide us as engineers,” Richlen said, “but as far as lifestyle preferences and how they actually use the product, we will get that out of the demonstrators’ experience.”

So far, much of the test-ride feedback on the LiveWire has varied significantly according to geographic region.

At press time, the tour had been from coast to coast, beginning in NYC and finishing a series of stops along Route 66. “If you’re talking about urban dwellers in New York City, they love it,” Richlen said. “Very few of them saw the range being that big a deal for their type of lifestyle. We spent the morning riding around in lower Manhattan and we used about 30 percent of the battery.

So for an urban dweller, it’s a very good fit. For someone

THE VEHICLES out in the plains of Oklahoma, which is where I was last on the Route 66 tour, range was the first thing they mentioned. They’re in big country, and it would be a significant limitation. But that’s the exact type of feedback we’re looking for: If we were to do a full commercial vehicle like this, who’re the key customers and what would their expectations be for their riding style. I’ve had financial types in Manhattan saying, ‘this would be a great bike for me today,’ and people in Oklahoma City who said, ‘I ride 50 miles to work one way each day, so it just wouldn’t work for me.’”

Forever tied to American ideals, Harley-Davidson has a sustainability policy that speaks of preserving the freedom to ride, including preserving the beautiful American great outdoors for the next 111 years of riders.

The way the company frames it, Harley’s expansion into electrification makes plenty of sense. “America at its best has always been about reinvention,” said Matt Levatich, Harley-Davidson’s President and COO. “Like America, Harley-Davidson has reinvented itself many times in our history, with customers leading us every step of the

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“

I’ve had financial types in Manhattan saying ‘this would be a great bike for me today,’ and people in Oklahoma City who said ‘I ride 50 miles to work one way each day, so it just wouldn’t work for me.’

”

way. Project LiveWire builds on Harley-Davidson’s many recent reinvention successes.”

Freedom, preservation, reinvention - all of the above could correlate to American energy independence, in which perhaps Harley-Davidson could play its own small part. That, along with “tire-shredding acceleration,” sound like good reasons for Project LiveWire to keep on motorin’.

The early days of

Tesla The Roadster redefines the electric car

This article is an excerpt from

Tesla Motors:

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by Charged Senior Editor Charles Morris

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62

T

he five visionaries who founded Tesla - Martin Eberhard, Marc Tarpenning, Elon Musk, JB Straubel and Ian Wright - were certainly greenies, and the environmental value of EVs was one of their prime motivators. However, they were also rocket scientists and sports car connoisseurs, and they were well aware of another advantage that electric powertrains have over internal combustion engines. Dinosaur-burning engines deliver peak torque (rotational force), and thus maximum acceleration, only within a limited range of RPMs - that’s one of the reasons for a multispeed transmission. An electric motor delivers maximum torque from the moment you step on the pedal, and is highly efficient throughout the rev range.

The California company AC Propulsion had taken full advantage of this to build an EV called the tzero, which had a magic power: anyone who drove it instantly changed their opinion of electric cars. This was the rock that Musk and his Musketeers planned to build their company on. Shortly after Tesla was founded, Ian Wright negotiated a deal with AC Propulsion to license its motor and inverter technology.

The tzero’s performance was impressive, but as the Tesla team worked with it, they found that there was a lot of room for improvement. Chief Engineer JB Straubel and his team ended up redesigning almost every part.

Marc Tarpenning told me about the process of developing the custom-built tzero into a vehicle that could be mass-produced. “AC Propulsion had produced 60 drivetrains or something like that, all hand-crafted,” he said. “Each motor was matched with each inverter and they were all hand-tuned. This is not manufacturing, this is high-end hobbyist. It’s like when you buy an audio system from one of these places that makes a hundred stereos a year. We paid them a bunch of money to license [their motor] and we realized they couldn’t manufacture it, so we just designed our own motor which, in the end, was quite a bit different from what we started with.”

According to Tarpenning, the Tesla team moved on from AC Propulsion’s motor pretty early in the game.

“We redesigned it a year before we were in production.

We did need one for the mule [the first test vehicle].

THE VEHICLES

But that was long before we were even into the engineering prototypes, let alone the validation prototypes, which then lead into production.”

The AC Propulsion guys, who didn’t get to ride the Tesla rocket to fame and fortune, remember things a little differently. Paul Carosa, AC Propulsion’s VP of engineering at the time (and now the company’s CTO), told me

“

...AC Propulsion was really a very significant jumping-off point for Tesla in all of the basic propulsion and battery system efforts that they pursued.

”

Photo courtesy of Norio NAKAYAMA/Flickr

“To this day, there’s still a fair amount of our DNA in the Tesla design, which is not to say they haven’t made huge progress and improvements, especially relating to manufacturability and mass production and liability,” said Gage. “But, AC Propulsion was really a very significant jumping-off point for Tesla in all of the basic propulsion and battery system efforts that they pursued. They got a pretty good deal from AC Propulsion.”

that Tesla “stopped paying royalties halfway through the Roadster production, claiming that they were no longer using our technology, which was not clear. If you look at the Roadster motor and the power modules, it’s essentially our technology there. I don’t think the relationship ended on a good note.”

Tom Gage, one of the designers of the tzero (and the subject of a feature article in Charged Issue 12 - February 2014) told me a similar story: “I think they paid a license for the first five hundred vehicles, and then there was a change in design which they claimed eliminated their reliance on our licensed technology. I wasn’t too pleased with the way they did things. They just sent an email saying, we’re going to stop paying a license fee now because we’ve changed the design. There was never any real discussion of what they had changed. It was hardball, but that’s the way they do things in the auto industry.”

The way that the patents and the contract were written, it would have been difficult to prove that Tesla did anything wrong, and AC Propulsion didn’t want to get into a legal battle. “After all was said and done, our patent wasn’t as clear as it should’ve been,” said Gage. “So, [a lawsuit] would’ve made the lawyers rich but probably nobody else.”

Control issues One of the critical components of an EV is the motor controller, which handles the complex interaction among the driver, the battery and the motor in order to deliver a smooth ride. JB Straubel envisioned a digital control system that would replace AC Propulsion’s analog controller.

Straubel gave Andrew Baglino, one of the engineers he had hired, a project: he was to design a set of test equipment that would be used for endurance testing on the motors and batteries, something that would be quite necessary for the process of building a reliable production vehicle. It took months, but when it was done, as Straubel had intended, the lessons learned in developing the digital test equipment also allowed the team to build a dandy digital motor controller, which vastly improved the Roadster’s responsiveness and ride.

...the lessons learned in developing the digital test equipment also allowed the team to build a dandy digital motor controller, which vastly improved the Roadster’s responsiveness and ride.

JUN/JUL 2014 63

The motor and transmission also ended up getting the Straubel special. Just before the team was ready to put the Roadster into production, they realized that the car’s original two-speed transmission was wearing out much too quickly. Straubel and his team re-engineered the motor’s metal plates and wire coils, giving it more efficiency and more torque, which enabled them to get the desired performance from a simpler single-speed gearbox.

The batteries When Tom Gage and his team built the second generation of the tzero, they were able to make a huge improvement by taking advantage of a new technology that was just becoming commercially available. In fact, this was the key technology that made the current generation of EVs possible - the lithium-ion battery.

The first tzero used 28 Optima Yellow Top lead-acid batteries, which weighed 1,000 pounds and were mounted in the vehicle’s sides. This meant that the doors didn’t open the way most car doors do. “They were actually only maybe about 8 inches tall and kind of opened upwards at a 45-degree angle and you had to step over the side,” Carosa told me. “You were actually stepping over the batteries. It was like a high sill on the side of the car and you had to step up a couple of feet over it.”

Around 1989, a new battery technology called Nickelmetal hydride (NiMH) became commercially available.

NiMH cells offer much better energy density than leadacid, so new applications became practical. NiMH cells enabled the second generation of GM’s doomed EV1 to greatly improve its range, and they made hybrid vehicles such as the Toyota Prius practical.

In 1991, the first lithium-ion batteries came on the market. Lithium-ion batteries offer even better energy density than NiMH, and they retain their charge pretty well when not in use. They have become ubiquitous in consumer electronics - in fact, the current generation of smart phones wouldn’t be possible without them - and they remain the state of the battery art.

EV pioneers like Gage and Eberhard immediately saw the potential of the new battery technology. By replacing the original tzero’s lead-acid batteries with lithium-ion cells, they were able to more than triple the car’s range.

There was never any question for the Tesla team that lithium-ion batteries were the way to go for the Roadster’s battery pack (which Tesla refers to as the Energy Storage System, or ESS).

64

“

...why invent some goofball, different thing when the world’s highest value, highest energy density batteries were being made by the billions as a commodity?

”

The idea of using the laptop-style (Panasonic 18650) lithium-ion cells was a “great minds think alike” moment. Neither the AC Propulsion guys nor the Eberhard/ Tarpenning team claimed the inspiration - all told me that both teams were already working with the idea when they joined forces.

Marc Tarpenning oversaw the engineering of the Roadster’s battery system. “A battery system, almost like a disc drive, has lots of different parts,” he said. “It has mechanical components, and there’s a lot of mechanical engineering involved and safety as well, both mechanical and electrical. Then, there’s a whole bunch of computers, fourteen computers in a battery pack. So, my world is really about the computers, the software and the firmware.”

As Tarpenning recalls, the second-generation tzero was “sort of our proof of concept that this could work, that lithium-ion cells were the right way to go - these little 18650s.” He and Martin Eberhard had used 18650 lithium-ion cells in e-books when they worked together at a company called NuvoMedia. “You had to be careful with them because they were a lot more finicky to work with [than NiMH], but their energy density was so much better that it would be ridiculous not to spend a little bit of engineering time to work with them,” said Tarpenning, “and they kept getting better. Every time we looked around they were another 7% better or 7% cheaper. They were kind of in a slow Moore’s Law.” “This chicken and egg thing around the batteries is ridiculous - why invent some goofball, different thing when the world’s highest value, highest energy density batteries were being made by the billions as a commodity? It was so obviously the thing to do.”

Safety was very much on everyone’s mind. Like gasoline, uranium, or anything that stores a lot of energy, lithium-ion cells can be dangerous if mishandled. If they are damaged, overcharged, or overheated, they can burst

Photo courtesy of Tinou Bao/Flickr

THE VEHICLES into flames or even explode. In fact, as Straubel and his team of engineers discovered, in rare cases, an invisible flaw within a single cell can cause it to overheat without warning, and set off a chain reaction called thermal runaway. In 2006, Sony recalled millions of laptop batteries after it identified such a manufacturing defect.

The negative publicity that could result from any battery overheating incident, whatever the cause, was easy to imagine. The facts that tanks of gasoline are also highly flammable, and that thousands of gas-powered vehicles catch fire every year, would not prevent the press from making the most of any EV battery fire, as Tesla learned in 2013, when three Model S batteries caught fire in separate incidents after collisions, causing a PR nightmare for the company.

Even in 2004, the Tesla team was well aware that the safety of EV batteries would be under the microscope, and their efforts to insure that the Roadster’s batteries were safe verged on paranoia. Straubel and his crew put the battery packs through extensive testing, heating individual cells until they burst into flames. They designed the packs so that each cell is isolated enough from its neighbors that a single overheating cell won’t cause a chain reaction. They built in an array of sensors that monitor acceleration and deceleration as well as any tilting of the vehicle, in order to detect a crash. There are also sensors that detect smoke and overheating. In the case of any abnormal event, the power system shuts down.

Using a battery pack with 6,831 individual cells presented another challenge: all those cells must be connected together not only with power connections, but with data connections that allow the system to monitor the state of charge and temperature of each cell.

Another issue is cooling. Batteries need to be kept

Even in 2004, the Tesla team was well aware that the safety of EV batteries would be under the microscope, and their efforts to insure that the Roadster’s batteries were safe verged on paranoia.

within an optimum temperature range, not just to prevent overheating but also to maximize battery life. Some EVs employ a liquid cooling system, while some (such as the Nissan LEAF) get by with air cooling. The team had a lot of heated discussions about which direction they should go, but finally decided on a liquid cooling system, with a network of tubes running through the pack.

As every laptop owner knows, lithium-ion batteries lose their capacity to store energy as they get older, and in 2004, no one was sure that they would last long enough to be truly practical for automotive applications. A smart phone might go through a few hundred charge/recharge cycles before being cast aside in favor of a shinier and newer toy, but a car buyer is going to expect the power source to last approximately the life of the car - 8 to 10 years, or some 5,000 to 8,000 cycles. In the event, this proved not to be a major problem. Tesla predicted in 2006 that the Roadster’s battery packs would have 70% of their capacity left after 50,000 miles. A July 2013 study from Plug In America, based on a survey of 126 Roadster owners, found that, after 100,000 miles, most of the batteries had done even better than expected, retaining 80-85% of their original capacity.

Elise + tzero + Special Sauce = Roadster The Teslers adapted the tzero’s powertrain for their new vehicle, but not much else. As Ian Wright told me, the tzero never pretended to be a production car, but “you could see that yes, you could make something really nice with this technology, if it just didn’t have all the shortcomings that the prototype had.” They had no intention of using the kit car’s ovate fiberglass body, or its heavy steel frame. They meant to assemble a car that excelled in every detail, and for several of the puzzle pieces, they

JUN/JUL 2014 65

turned to a sports car maker that they all admired - Lotus.

Lotus was founded by engineers Colin Chapman and Colin Dare in 1952. Since 1966, its headquarters and main factory have been located at Hethel, a former RAF airbase in Norfolk, England, with the old runway serving as a test track. Lotus Engineering is a subsidiary that does contract work for other automakers, and many of the world’s most famous high-performance cars have taken advantage of its design services, although that fact is seldom advertised.

“Lotus Engineering is one of the premiere auto engineering companies in the world when it comes to suspension design, tuning, ride and handling development,” said Ian Wright. “I remember being very humbled one day when they offered us a chance to drive on their test track with one of their development drivers - those guys are unbelievably good. They tell stories where they send the development driver out on the track, and he does a few laps and then, without him being able to see what they do, they change one of the damper fittings on the left rear by one click, then they send him back out on the track, then ask him, ‘What did we change?’ and he tells them.”

Some have written that the Roadster was “based on” the Lotus Elise, but this is a vast oversimplification. In fact, the two cars share around six percent of their components. The Roadster incorporates a lot of styling and other elements from Lotus, and some of the powertrain of the tzero, but Tesla made so many modifications and improvements to almost every part that it really is a new vehicle.

Eberhard and Tarpenning approached Lotus’s Roger Becker at the 2003 Los Angeles Auto Show, and talked him into partnering with their nascent company. Ian

66

Photo courtesy of Jurvetson/Flickr

When Lotus chief engineer Richard Rackham designed the Elise chassis, he cleverly used extruded aluminum members that are glued, or bonded, together, rather than welded. This allows for an optimal tradeoff between strength and weight...

Wright was the one who finalized the deal, flying back and forth to England to work out the details. Eventually, the two firms cooperated on several different levels.

Tesla licensed various technologies from Lotus, and also worked with Lotus Engineering for much of the design work on the Roadster. When it was time to begin production, Tesla contracted with Lotus to manufacture the cars in its legendary factory, with Tesla supplying most of the parts.

When Lotus chief engineer Richard Rackham designed the Elise chassis, he cleverly used extruded aluminum members that are glued, or bonded, together, rather than welded. This allows for an optimal tradeoff between strength and weight, very important for an EV, which needs to be as light as possible to maximize range. The Tesla team took full advantage of this technology, but redesigned the chassis in several ways.

They lowered the height of the door sills by two inches, making it easier for tall chaps like Musk and Eberhard to get in and out. They also rearranged the layout for a car that would be heavier than the Elise, and that would have a battery pack but no gas tank, muffler or tailpipe. They made the overall wheelbase about two inches longer to

THE VEHICLES

“

We knew we could make an AC induction motor. The battery system was something that was scary. We wanted to get rid of that risk as soon as we could. So we worked on the battery system first...

”

accommodate the battery, and made several other revisions and improvements.

In early 2005, Lotus provided a couple of glider versions of the Elise. A glider is a car with no engine or transmission, and Tesla would use these to test their electric powertrain. When the boys installed their electrified innards into the glider, they had themselves a mule, which is a working car that can be driven to test various components on the road (according to Marc Tarpenning, it’s called a mule because, like the equine animal, it doesn’t reproduce).

“To get a car onto the road from scratch, it costs hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars,” Tarpenning told me. “Our whole business plan was based on the fact that we weren’t going to do that - we were going to develop a drivetrain and then we were going to take a design that had already passed the crash and safety tests both in Europe and America, that we knew could qualify as being a real car. We knew we could make an AC induction motor. The battery system was something that was scary. We wanted to get rid of that risk as soon as we could. So we worked on the battery system first and we made a Lotus Elise into a mule, using our first-generation battery pack, an AC Propulsion inverter and an AC Propulsion motor.

We drove that around, and that allowed us to get more people interested and to raise more money. It validated that the battery system was going to be okay, we were going to have a couple hundred miles of range and it was going to be really fun to drive. It was a great test platform for all kinds of stuff.”

Lotus provided the airbag system and ABS brake system, components that would have been very difficult for Tesla to develop on its own. This is why the Roadster’s steering wheel and dashboard look pretty much like the Elise’s. Most of the rest of the interior is all Tesla. The

Californians also used the Elise’s windshield and other windows (called the greenhouse or glasshouse in the trade). To roll their own would have meant dealing with a host of related issues including visibility requirements, rollover protection, waterproofing, windshield wipers and more. However, they upgraded to a UV-resistant type of glass that keeps the car’s interior cooler.

Tesla added several high-tech touches, including a color LCD display, a Blaupunkt stereo with a jack for an iPod, and the now-famous Tesla doors with their flushmounted handles. Those door handles - which are operated electronically, and not only look cool but make the car almost impossible to break into - were one of several features that were the subjects of intense debate during development.

Elon Musk was determined to build “not just the best electric cars, but the best cars.” This was a grand strategy, and a risky one. Every added goodie meant more cost and more time. Among the controversial changes was the lowering of the door sill, which made getting in and out of the car easier, but sacrificed much of the cost savings from using Lotus’s existing chassis. “I was very insistent on things during the design phase, and it is true those things cost money,” Musk told CNN in a 2008 interview, “but you can’t sell a $100,000 car that looks like crap.”

One major decision concerned the material that would be used for the body. Again, the boys ended up deciding to go all the way, and use the best material available - carbon fiber composite (aka carbon fiber reinforced plastic or CFRP). As strong as steel, as light as aluminum, and much more flexible to work with than either, this space-age stuff is emerging as the ultimate material for automobile exteriors. It still isn’t cheap, and in 2004, deciding to use it was a bold move. Musk was particularly adamant that the Roadster should use carbon fiber, and he eventually convinced the others.

Once this decision was made, of course, the team was no longer building a modified Elise, but a completely new car, and they had the freedom to design the body however they wanted.

The styling People who aren’t “into cars” might be amazed to learn how much effort automakers devote to a model’s physical appearance. The Founding Fathers, however, were very much car guys, and they wisely spent a lot of time and money on getting the Roadster’s styling just right. Make

JUN/JUL 2014 67

Photo courtesy of Jyri Engestrom/Flickr

no mistake, people perceived the Roadster as a different animal from previous EVs not only because of its performance, but because of its looks.

Once the team had figured out what the overall dimensions of the Roadster would be, they engaged several renowned sports car designers to submit proposals for its styling. Martin Eberhard had a clear vision in his mind of how he wanted the car to look, and he tried to explain his ideas to the stylists. Apparently, however, they were all thinking in terms of a stereotypical “electric car,” and the first designs that came back looked like cheesy space vehicles, complete with solar panels and other sciencefictionesque gizmos - precisely the opposite of what Eberhard and company wanted.

Eberhard’s next call was to his friend Bill Moggridge, a London-born “designer’s designer” who designed the first laptop computer, and co-founded the design studio IDEO. Moggridge (1943-2012) was a pioneer of the human-centered school of design, and is said to have coined the term “interaction design” to describe an approach that focuses on the needs of the people who will be using a product.

Moggridge created a scheme that described the appearance of a car in terms of five separate characteristics, each of which was presented as a continuum with an example car at each end - for example, from masculine to feminine, from retro to ultramodern, etc. Eberhard then

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...all this required some ingenious improvisation and more than a little help from their friends at Lotus.

chose a point along each axis that represented where he imagined the look of the Roadster. They showed this to the designers working on the project, and the next round of proposals was much more in line with what Eberhard and his team had in mind.

Dozens of sketches from the designers were hung on the walls of a room at Eberhard’s house, and over 50 people were invited to vote for their favorites. Barney Hatt, a member of the Lotus Design Studio, emerged as the clear winner. Over the next few months, Eberhard and the others worked closely with Hatt, tweaking every detail of the new car’s styling. Elon Musk was also deeply involved in the details of the design - among other things, he insisted on developing custom headlights, which was an expensive process, but had a lot to do with the impressive appearance of the Roadster’s front end.

After several trips to England and a succession of models at various scales, the pioneers’ vision was realized.

THE VEHICLES In May 2005, they completed a full-scale model, formed from clay and surfaced with a high-tech carbon fiber coating from 3M called DI-NOC. This was a significant visual milestone, but much remained to be done before the Roadster hit the road. The development of any new car involves extensive testing of all the major components and systems, which requires building all sorts of models, prototypes and pre-production vehicles. For Tesla, which obviously didn’t have the vast complex of labs and shops that a major automaker has, all this required some ingenious improvisation and more than a little help from their friends at Lotus.

While one team used the mule to perfect the powertrain, another group used the clay model to work on the aerodynamic tuning - important for any car, but critical for an electric model, as better aerodynamics translates to better range.

By January 2006, Tesla had built a second drivable mule, and was assembling the first engineering prototype.

Between then and early 2007, Tesla built ten of these (EP1 through EP10), which were continually taken apart and reassembled to test various components. Once all the pieces of the puzzle were more or less perfected, the company built about 26 validation prototypes (VP1 through VP26), beginning in March 2007. These were almost-final versions of the automobile, and were used for endurance and crash testing.

Tesla made automotive history on July 19, 2006, when it officially unveiled the first electric car of the modern era for an audience of 350 invited guests in a hangar at Santa Monica Airport. The cars on display were actually the first two engineering prototypes, EP1 and EP2. The new stars also posed for the cameras at the San Francisco International Auto Show in November, where Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger highlighted the Roadster in a speech.

From the very beginning, the story of the internet superstar and his plucky little car that was going to save the planet at 125 mph was catnip to the press.

From this point on, Tesla remained at the center of the green (in both the environmental and monetary senses) spotlight and, as Musk might say, the marketing took care of itself.

Of course, Tesla didn’t have the resources to mount the kind of massive media blitz that a major automaker devotes to a new model, but as Elon Musk and his crew sensed intuitively, it wouldn’t need to do so. From the very beginning, the story of the internet superstar and his plucky little car that was going to save the planet at 125 mph was catnip to the press.

The first hundred cars went to an elite group that included famous actors and other opinion-makers. Several famous entrepreneurs made major investments in the company, and their names brought a lot of publicity. Tesla began to be a hot topic in the silicon-centric circles of the digital entrepreneurial 21st-century Masters of the Universe. From this point on, Tesla remained at the center of the green (in both the environmental and monetary senses) spotlight and, as Musk might say, the marketing took care of itself.

Charles Morris goes on to tell the story of how the Roadster took the automotive press by storm (a little too stormy in the case of the British TV show Top Gear, with which Tesla got into a lengthy round of recriminations and lawsuits). But a rocky road lay ahead. A tide of red ink threatened to swamp the company before it could get the Roadster to market, and personality clashes in the boardroom caused the original management team to break apart. For more information on Charles’s new book, see www.teslamotorsbook.com.

JUN/JUL 2014 69

CURRENTevents

VC firm Beringea invests £3 million in Chargemaster

Photos courtesy of Chargemaster

Venture capital firm Beringea has invested £3 million in EVSE provider Chargemaster. Founded in 2008, Chargemaster claims to be the UK’s largest supplier of EV infrastructure, with over 10,000 public chargers in Britain and another 4,000 on continental Europe.

Chargemaster’s charging units can be wall-mounted, placed on street-side posts or custom-built to customer specifications. They feature built-in communications equipment linked in a nationwide charging network called POLAR. “The Chargemaster team has more experience in designing, building and installing high-technology street-side electronics than any other European organization,” said Malcolm Moss, founding partner at Beringea.

“Chargemaster has demonstrated very significant growth over the last two years and is well positioned to capitalize on the mainstream adoption of electric cars,” said David Martell, CEO of Chargemaster.

“We are delighted to have received this investment from Beringea, which provides a strong endorsement of our number-one market position and additional capital to enable us to maintain our strong momentum.”

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The Veefil Fast Charger, designed and manufactured in Australia by Brisbane-based Tritium, has already won a design award for its striking appearance. This week, on a more practical note, it earned a certificate of UL compliance for the US and Canada. Already compliant for operation in Europe and Australia, the Veefil can now be sold worldwide.

“We are one of the first UL-approved EV fast chargers with multi-standard support for both the CHAdeMO and CCS fast charging standards,” said Paul Sernia, Tritium’s Commercial Director. “It is widely acknowledged that publicly available fastcharging infrastructure is critical for giving drivers the confidence to drive EVs the way they want to.

When this happens, the number of electric cars in use globally will surge. In places like the US, Europe and Asia there are thousands of charging outlets that are used by about 200,000 electric cars. In five to six years, that will be millions.”

In preparation to supply this growing market, Tritium recently announced an agreement with Shanghai-based manufacturer Surpass Sun Electric. While manufacturing for the home market in Australia will continue in Brisbane, volume sales of Veefil for the global market will be processed in China.

Designed for use in locations such as shopping centers, airports and highway service centers, the Veefil is available in a variety of bright colors. Its slimline form factor gives it an extra-small footprint and light weight (165 kg), and it’s liquid-cooled to withstand extreme weather conditions.

Photo courtesy of Tritium

Tritium Fast Charger earns UL compliance

THE INFRASTRUCTURE

Authorities in smoggy Beijing are keen to encourage what they call “new energy” vehicles, but at present the city has few public charging stations - the 60 or so that exist are reserved for buses and taxis. A new plan aims to change that, requiring new residential communities in the Chinese capital to install chargers for 18 percent of their parking units.

“Government involvement is indispensable for the installation of charging posts, since it is not profitable now,” remarked Niu Jinmin, director of the center for promoting new energy cars in Beijing.

The plan also calls for the city to install 1,000 DC fast chargers this year, mainly in public parking lots, business districts, gas stations, parks and hospitals. “The expansion of charging facilities will encourage the conversion of taxis into electric cars,” said Niu Jinmin, explaining that an electric taxi can save 120 yuan ($19.20) a day in fuel

You asked for White...

www.liteoncleanenergy.com

Photo courtesy of Remko Tanis/Flickr

Beijing to deploy 1,000 fast chargers

costs. “Judging from the trial of the BYD E6 electric car in Shenzhen, electric-powered taxis can operate smoothly in the city, so long as there are rapid charging facilities every 150-200 kilometers,” said Niu.

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September 16-18, 2014 Detroit | Michigan | USA PASSENGER, COMMERCIAL, OFF-HIGHWAY Co-located with

Supported by

Information based on 2013 event *Projected 2014 statistics for The Battery Show and Electric & Hybrid Vehicle Technology combined

OVER

ATTENDEES ELECTRIC & HYBRID VEHICLE TECHNOLOGY EXPO ATTENDEES BY JOB FUNCTION (%)

350

OVER

EXHIBITORS

ACADEMIC BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT/SALES CEO/PRESIDENT/MD CONSULTANT FINANCE

This is our third year and so far it’s been excellent. Already in this show we’ve surpassed our number from all three days of last year and we’re not through Day 2!”

CHADWICK R. TAYLOR, TE CONNECTIVITY

GOVERNMENT MARKETING OTHER PURCHASING RESEARCH & DEVELOPMENT TECHNICAL LEAD/ENGINEERING

What I found most useful is the structure of the conferences; they’re very engaging and very diverse. …In addition to the trade show floor which is getting much better participation than I had hoped for and it’s drawing in a lot of my colleagues”.

OLIVER GROSS, ENERGY STORAGE SYSTEMS SPECIALIST, ENERGY STORAGE AND HV SYSTEMS, CHRYSLER GROUP LLC

32

R NT

IESD

NT U CO PRESE

E

RE

REGISTER NOW FOR YOUR FREE PASS www.evtechexpo.com

info@evtechexpo.com

THE INFRASTRUCTURE

As EVs multiply, it’s critical for electric utilities to manage their energy needs. For that they need data on EV owners’ charging habits, and Opower has it. Opower claims to be the world’s largest energy data storehouse, covering 75 utility partners and 50 million households.

The Outlier blog crunches that data into digestible articles about how people are using energy. A recent installment looked at the usage behavior of EV owners who charge their cars at night, based on data from about 2,000 households in the western US. Some of the findings are unsurprising: plug-in peoples’ electric use spikes at midnight, because that’s when they charge their EVs. All the EV owners considered in Outlier’s analysis have signed up with their local utilities to get highly discounted electricity between midnight and 7 am. After midnight, EV owners’ electricity use can rise to four times the average level.

More surprising is the fact that EV rate plan subscribers tend to use more juice than other consumers - and

it’s not because of their EVs. Between 7am and midnight, they use an average of 21 percent more electricity than the typical single-family household. The reason: EV owners tend to have bigger homes and more power-hungry goodies, such as swimming pools.

Outlier also found that people who go electric also tend to go solar. A recent survey of utility customers found that 32 percent of EV owners had installed rooftop solar, which drastically reduces their grid power usage during the middle of the day. When you add it all up, EV/solar households use a little less juice from the grid than the typical utility customer.

The New Book By Charles Morris

Tesla Motors

How Elon Musk and Company Made Electric Cars Cool, and Sparked the Next Tech Revolution

Tesla Motors has redefined the automobile, sparking a new wave of innovation and unleashing forces that will transform not just the auto industry, but every aspect of society. Charged Senior Editor and popular EV blogger Charles Morris takes you through the Tesla story from the beginning, as told by the Silicon Valley entrepreneurs who made it happen.

www.teslamotorsbook.com

Available on Amazon

Photo courtesy of Jurvetson/Flickr

EV owners’ electricity use 4x the average after midnight

CURRENTevents California awards $5MM for 475 EV chargers

125 chargers to be installed at Tokyo development Mitsui Fudosan and NEC plan to install 125 public charging stations at Tokyo Midtown, a high-rise development that includes offices, shopping, housing and hotels, beginning in December. This will be the largest number of EV chargers within a single facility in Japan.

Mitsui Fudosan will install NEC’s new wallmounted AC chargers at 80 percent of Tokyo Midtown’s pay-by-the-hour parking spaces, as well as NEC’s wall-mounted charging controllers, which can perform user authentication for multiple chargers and centralized billing management.

NEC will operate the new chargers in cooperation with Japan Charge Network Co. “Mitsui Fudosan promotes smart city development by taking on a wide variety of social issues ranging from environmental and energy projects to urban development. Following Tokyo Midtown, we will continue developing progressive initiatives that promote a low-carbon society through the introduction of large-scale charging infrastructure to major facilities,” said, Mitsui Fudosan’s Yasuhiro Nakamura.

“NEC focuses on solutions for society with a commitment to being a social value innovator. We will continue to contribute to a low-carbon society by deployment of innovative new EV and PHEV charging infrastructure,” said NEC’s Yutaka Noguchi.

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The California Energy Commission approved funding for a raft of clean-energy projects, including 15 grants totaling more than $5 million to install 475 EV charging stations in communities throughout California, including the cities of San Francisco, Burbank, Torrance and San Diego and the counties of Ventura, Santa Barbara, San Luis Obispo, Orange, Riverside and Los Angeles. These grants are funded by the Alternative and Renewable Fuel and Vehicle Technology Program (ARFVTP).

“The Alternative and Renewable Fuel and Vehicle Technology Program continues to support California’s goal of 1.5 million zero-emission vehicles on the road by 2025,” said Commissioner Janea A. Scott. “These community investments assist in building the network of charging stations needed, and help accelerate growth in the electric vehicle market.”

Other funding items approved in this round include grants of $900,000 each to Transportation Power Inc., Efficient Drivetrains Inc. and Gas Technology Institute to develop natural gas plugin hybrid vehicles; and two more Alternative Fuel Readiness Plans to help various regions of the state develop strategies for the deployment of alternative fuel infrastructure.

“Developing alternative and cleaner transportation fuels and technologies are essential if California is to achieve its long-term greenhouse gas reduction goals” said Commission Chair Robert B. Weisenmiller “Our federal partners, including ARPA-E, are key players in advancing these initiatives.”

THE INFRASTRUCTURE

Photo courtesy of BMW

University of Delaware leases Mini-Es in V2G project The University of Delaware is making a small number of BMW Mini-E EVs available for lease as part of an ongoing vehicle-to-grid (V2G) demonstration project.

“Individual drivers are now needed to expand the demonstration over a wider range of driving patterns,” said project leader Willett Kempton.

The Grid on Wheels program will lease the vehicles for $3,600 per year for two years, which includes any major maintenance needed. Lessees must be Delmarva Power electric customers and must buy an EV charger.

If the car is kept plugged in most of the time when not driving, owners can earn payments of roughly $100 per month, or $1,200 per year.

V2G technology was developed at the University of Delaware by Professor Kempton and EV pioneer Tom Gage. Gage’s company, EV Grid, is a partner in the Grid on Wheels program. In response to signals from the grid operator, a vehicle can discharge its battery to help keep the grid stable. This grid regulation is a revenue-

generating service that electric utilities pay for - traditionally, it’s done by generators, but batteries are more effective because they can respond faster to grid demands.

BMW built a few hundred units of the Mini-E, which uses a powertrain from AC Propulsion, in 2009-2010. The company moved on to the ActiveE and its new production EV, the i3. However, the Mini-E is handy for V2G applications, because it was built with a bidirectional charger.

Appealing to the

Wireless Generation Q&A with Joe Barrett, Senior Director, Marketing at Qualcomm Europe

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Photo courtesy of Alliance for Wireless Power

THE INFRASTRUCTURE

Soon enough, all of the latest and greatest gadgets will come with standard wireless power capabilities.

Rezence demonstrates the future of smartphone charging, wireless receivers built into devices and transmitters built into vehicles

I

n January 2014, the Alliance for Wireless Power announced Qualcomm Technologies Inc. as one of the first companies to earn Rezence certification, a technology and set of specifications endorsed by the world’s leading mobile chipmakers, mobile phone manufacturers and other key industry partners. With Qualcomm and other companies now certified, it is expected that Rezence-based wireless charging consumer electronics will be available this year.

Soon enough, all of the latest and greatest gadgets will come with standard wireless power capabilities. Charging your phone will be as simple as placing it on or above the wireless power transmitter built into your desk, your car’s center console or a variety of publicly-accessible charging points.

In parallel with WiPower Technology for consumer electronics, Qualcomm has been developing its Halo Wireless Electric Vehicle Charging for battery-powered vehicles.

JUN/JUL 2014 77

Charged caught up with Joe Barrett, Senior Director at Qualcomm Europe, to talk about the implications of Wireless Electric Vehicles Charging (WEVC pronounced wev-see).

Charged: Many EV advocates tout the ease and simplicity of plugging in at home. So, why would we need Qualcomm Halo WEVC technology?

Joe Barrett: If we are going to inspire more people to buy EVs and create the demand for EV manufacturers to respond to, we have to appeal to what consumers today want. We need to seize this chance to win over the hearts and minds of the wireless generation.

A number of surveys over the past couple of years have shown strong consumer interest in and positive attitudes towards EVs. The positive sentiment towards EVs comes despite some of the barriers to adoption: the current high cost of most EVs, limited early-stage public infrastructure, and range anxiety.

WEVC would be a significant step towards easing these concerns and enhance the overall experience of owning an EV. Moving EV charging from a “plug in overnight”

Generation Y expects any technology to be simple, elegant and efficient and they will become a significant part of the car-buying market.

55%

of respondents in the USA, China, Japan, Spain, Russia and France have a favorable opinion of EVs, and

43% are somewhat or very open to buying one, according to a August 2013 GfK survey.1 [1] www.gfk.com

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model to a charge wirelessly “little and often” model could potentially reduce the size of EV batteries. Once WEVC technology is broadly implemented at home, at work, in public locations, it will mean drivers simply look for a WEVC bay and park - the EV will then begin charging wirelessly automatically.

Also, because there are no cumbersome cables or charging posts, WEVC can be deployed almost Joe Barrett anywhere, from parking Qualcomm Europe bays to supermarkets, to garages and on city streets, and even one day at traffic lights and on our major roads and highways.

Charged: Do you think wirelessly charged phones and tablets will create more demand for WEVC technology?

Barrett: We are all using more and more wireless technologies. Consider the simple telephone. It has become untethered and has taken on a whole new genre as a personal connected part of who and what we are.

Other devices are going the same way. You only have to look at consumers between 18 and 25 years of age, often referred to as the Millennial Generation or Generation Y, who have been brought up in the era of smartphones and internet-everywhere. Generation Y expects any technology to be simple, elegant and efficient, and they will become a significant part of the car-buying market; their requirements and tastes will shape the future of the automotive industry.

Charged: Are there fundamental differences between the technology used for wirelessly charged consumer electronics and EVs? Or is it simply scaled-up hardware?

Barrett: The fundamental principles behind all Wireless Power Transfer (WPT) solutions are the same - resonant magnetic induction, whether is it charging your electric toothbrush, your mobile device or your EV. The more power you are transferring or the greater the air gap

Images courtesy of Qualcomm

THE INFRASTRUCTURE 1

Power Supply

2

Base pad

3

Wireless power & data transfer

4

Vehicle pad

5

On board controller

6

Battery

Qualcomm’s solution to one part of the interoperability conundrum is ‘multi-coil’ base pads... between the charging pad and the receiving pad, the more sophisticated and complex the technology needs to be. WPT also has to be efficient, and in this respect the WPT efficiency of the Qualcomm Halo WEVC technology is greater than 90 percent from grid to the EV battery.

Complexity increases exponentially when you want to charge and move at the same time.

Charged: Are there technology hurdles that have to be cleared before we start to see OEMs include WEVC in automotive applications, or is it a question of standards and consumer demand?

Barrett: Wireless power is not a new phenomenon, even in transport. It is already used in factory automation and car assembly, for instance. Qualcomm Halo WEVC relies on developments and innovation in WEVC technology,

which allow high power to be transferred over large air gaps and with high tolerance to misalignment. What this means in reality is that Qualcomm Halo WEVC systems will charge low- or high-ground-clearance EVs and still work even if drivers park their EV without precise alignment of the charging pads on the EV and the ground.

EVs are the logical solution to reducing emissions and improving the air quality in our cities, but there are hurdles - namely safety and interoperability. For WEVC

JUN/JUL 2014 79

Co-located with

Detroit | Michigan | USA

September 16-18, 2014

*

OVER

ATTENDEES THE BATTERY SHOW ATTENDEES BY JOB FUNCTION (%)

350 OVER

*

EXHIBITORS

TECHNICAL/ENGINEERING BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT/SALES CEO/PRESIDENT/MD RESEARCH & DEVELOPMENT MARKETING

This is our third year and so far it’s been excellent. Already in this show we’ve surpassed our number from all three days of last year and we’re not through Day 2!”

CHADWICK R. TAYLOR, TE CONNECTIVITY

OTHER CONSULTANT

Information based on 2013 event *Projected 2014 statistics

PURCHASING FINANCE ACADEMIC GOVERNMENT

What I found most useful is the structure of the conferences; they’re very engaging and very diverse. In addition to the trade show floor which is getting much better participation than I had hoped for and it’s drawing in a lot of my colleagues”.

OLIVER GROSS, ENERGY STORAGE SYSTEMS SPECIALIST, ENERGY STORAGE AND HV SYSTEMS, CHRYSLER GROUP LLC

32

ES TRI TED N U EN

CO PRES RE

REGISTER NOW FOR YOUR FREE PASS info@thebatteryshow.com

www.thebatteryshow.com

THE INFRASTRUCTURE

to overcome these, drivers need to be confident that, if they park over a charging pad - be it at home, on the street or in a car park - the WEVC system will always work, no matter what the EV model or manufacturer.

For EV manufacturers and infrastructure supply companies, this means interoperability is vital to ensure any WEVC system on any EV model can use any wireless charging point. Qualcomm’s solution to one part of the interoperability conundrum is multi-coil base pads, where the technology is compatible with the various single-coil or multi-coil charging pads that could be used on EVs. This will permit EVs to park in any charging bay and still be charged up. No one ever needs worry about finding a suitable wireless charging point. For governments working with developers of smart cities, Qualcomm believes choosing multi-coil technology base pads for WEVC offers a sensible approach.

Charged: Qualcomm was one of the first supporters of FIA’s Formula E Championship, beginning in September 2014. Many in the industry believe that the series will have an enormously positive impact on the perception of EVs. Qualcomm obviously agrees.

Barrett: Absolutely. Formula E is a tremendous platform for developing sustainable transportation and should help accelerate technology innovation that will filter down into many EVs. Another objective for the industry is to change cultural attitudes and dispel some of the stereotypes about what an EV might look like or be able to do. The new FIA Formula E Championship is a

major part of this cultural change, and it is one of the reasons why Qualcomm became the Official Technology Partner. Formula E will feature cars powered exclusively by electric energy. With a capability of being able to do 0-100 km/h in three seconds and reach a (FIA rules mandated) maximum speed of 225 km, the cars and the championship itself will help demonstrate just what EVs are capable of.

Charged: What is the role of WEVC in the series? Will we see wirelessly powered racecars someday?

Barrett: WEVC will play a major part in the championship. We announced in September 2013 that all safety cars will be charged wirelessly. Qualcomm Halo will be the exclusive WEVC technology for Formula E, and the WEVC system will be offered to the race cars from season two. Jarno Trulli’s TrulliGP team has said it will be working with Drayson Technologies LLP, a Qualcomm licensee, on WEVC for their Formula E racecars.

Qualcomm is also developing dynamic EV charging (DEVC) - charging on the move - with the potential to extend the race time and bring a new level of excitement to Formula E racing. Formula E will go a long way to promoting EVs and WEVC to a mass audience.

However, Qualcomm’s involvement with Formula E will extend beyond WEVC alone. Aside from showing off wireless charging, an objective of Formula E is to use other forms of mobile technology to enhance the experience for fans.

JUN/JUL 2014 81

Photos courtesy of NISSANEV/Flickr

Shade made in the

Studies indicate that EVSE and shade structures could attract prime customers

By Charles Morris

P The quantity and quality of parking can be of critical importance to a business.

ublic charging and parking have a symbiotic relationship, for obvious reasons. A number of companies in the charging field are forging business relationships with parking providers, which may be large employers, owners of commercial, residential or government properties or third-party operators of paid parking facilities.

Most of us devote surprisingly little thought to parking, considering how often we do it. However, the quantity and quality of parking can be of critical importance to a business. Many a potential customer (or potential resident of an apartment complex) decides where to go based on how convenient and pleasant the parking experience will be, and many a business has gone under because of insufficient parking.

Every Charged reader will surely agree that EV charging, especially if it’s free, is a welcome addition to any parking facility. And there’s a growing amount of data that supports the value of charging for parking lot operators. Although public charging is a fairly new phenomenon, there are already a couple of studies that have found EVSE attracts shoppers that stay longer and spend more money.

Photo courtesy of Blink Network

“

Blink members spend twice as much time at a retailer, and they will drive up to two times farther to get to a location with charging.

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”

Another attractive amenity, especially in hotter climates, is shaded parking. Apollo Sunguard, based in Sarasota, Florida, has been manufacturing and selling outdoor shade structures for 18 years, and has long targeted the parking market. Company President Kevin Connelly observed the proliferation of public charging facilities in recent years, and it occurred to him that “charging and shade structures go hand in glove. They really were meant for each other.”

“We use a shade cloth, which allows the air to pass thru, while blocking 97 percent of UV radiation,” Connelly told Charged, characterizing his company’s products as artificial shade trees. “The net result is a 20-degree air temperature drop.”

Photo courtesy of Apollo Sunguard

Data from the DOE-funded EV Project showed retailers that customers were coming from outside the normal radius of influence. EV drivers stayed for longer periods of time, and traveled to new locations that they probably wouldn’t visit if charging weren’t available.

“Blink members spend twice as much time at a retailer, and they will drive up to two times farther to get to a location with charging,” Former ECOtality Executive VP Garrett Beauregard told Charged last year. One among many case studies concerns that quintessential American small business, a McDonald’s franchise in Southern California. “Because we can see where drivers go, where their home is, and where the key-on and key-off events happen, we found out that people were traveling to this particular McDonald’s from far away. Nowadays you don’t usually have to drive far to find a Mickey D’s, but we were seeing people drive to this one from miles and miles away.”

THE INFRASTRUCTURE The Numbers Volt vs LEAF driving habits Another interesting tidbit unearthed by the EV Project is that Volt and LEAF drivers had different habits. Both used public charging during daytime hours while they’re out and about, but Volt drivers tended to charge more times per day. This is likely due to the desire to maximize the amount of miles driven on electric power, a well-known practice among Volt owners.

Chevrolet Volt Summary Report

Number of vehicles: 1766 January 2013 through March 2013 Vehicle Usage Overall gasoline fuel economy (mpg) 126 Overall electrical energy consumption (AC Wh/mi) 253 Number of trips

526,156 Total distance traveled (mi) 4,369,753 Avg trip distance (mi) 8.2 Avg distance traveled per day when the vehicle was driven (mi) 39.4 Avg number of trips between charging events 3.4 Avg distance traveled between charging events (mi) 27.9 Avg number of charging events per day when the vehicle was driven 1.4 Charging Location Total number of charging events Percent of all charging events

Home charging location

124,954 81%

Away-from-home charging locations

21,973 14%

Unknown charging locations

7,718 5%

Operation Modes - Electric Vehicle (EV) & Extended Range (ERM) EV - AC electrical energy consumption (AC Wh/mi) 350 EV - Distance traveled (mi) 3,166,649 EV - Percent of total distance traveled 72.5% ERM - Gasoline fuel economy (mpg) 34.8 ERM - Distance traveled (mi) 1,203,104 ERM - Percent of total distance traveled 27.5%

Nissan LEAF Summary Report

Number of vehicles: 4240 January 2013 through March 2013 Vehicle Usage Number of trips

1,075,251 Total distance traveled (mi) 7,563,354 Avg trip distance (mi)² 7.0 Avg distance traveled per day when the vehicle was driven (mi) 28.9 Avg number of trips between charging events 3.7 Avg distance traveled between charging events (mi) 25.9 Avg number of charging events per day when the vehicle was driven 1.1 Charging Location Total number of charging events Percent of all charging events

Home charging location

216,356 74%

Away-from-home charging locations

60,232 21%

Unknown charging locations

15,199 5%

JUN/JUL 2014 85

Shading a parked automobile can deliver an even larger difference in temperature. For example, in Florida at noon in July, a car’s internal temperature can reach a dog-killing 200 degrees F. According to Connelly, under one of Apollo Sunguard’s shade structures, the maximum temperature inside a vehicle is 98 degrees F. “We also suspected that EVs could benefit from this, because batteries and inverters do not like heat,” said Connelly. “We contacted ECOtality, and they agreed to do a test. The results were dramatic. They demonstrated that an EV charged 15 minutes faster when kept cool, and that they used 2 kWh less energy per charge.”

86

“

We use a shade cloth, which allows the air to pass thru, while blocking 97 percent of UV radiation.

”

By itself, that energy savings probably isn’t enough to justify the purchase of one of Apollo Sunguard’s shade structures, which start at around $1,700 per vehicle space.

However, the savings in charging time is significant, and

THE INFRASTRUCTURE

Photo courtesy of Apollo Sunguard

Apollo Sunguard recently scored a federal contract with the General Services Administration (GSA) to install 168 charging stations throughout the US, in partnership with ChargePoint.

charging in the shade offers a number of other benefits as well. It’s fairly well established that prolonged exposure to temperatures above 86 degrees F will reduce the capacity of lithium-manganese cells, so keeping cool may help prolong battery life.

Also, it takes less time and energy for the AC to cool down the car if the interior isn’t so hot to begin with the savings could amount to as much as 20 minutes of run time for a 1.5 kW AC compressor. Everyone likes to have their car cooled more quickly, but it’s especially important for EV drivers, because less AC use translates directly to greater range.

Of course, the biggest benefit of shaded parking is more comfort.

Connelly is a bit puzzled that there isn’t more demand for shaded parking in the US, because the market is huge in other regions, including Australia and South America.

He cites the examples of Wal-Mart stores in Mexico, and many big-box retailers in Brazil, all of which offer shaded parking.

A study in Brazil found that shaded parking, like EV charging, made customers stay longer and spend more money. It stands to reason that the combination of the two could give a shopping center a big advantage in attracting prime customers.

Apollo Sunguard recently scored a federal contract with the General Services Administration (GSA) to install 168 charging stations throughout the US, in partnership with ChargePoint. Clients include NASA, the US Army and the National Park Service. Connelly says this is part of a pilot program under which the GSA fleet will start seriously moving towards electrification.

The company didn’t sell any shade structures as part of the current GSA contract, but it is steadily working the shade/charging combination into its proposals. It has installed a demo shaded charging facility at the Florida House in Sarasota.

Apollo Sunguard’s products come with a full warranty 15 years for the fabric, 20 for the seals. They are installed using a cantilever system, so there are no posts or columns to back into.

Since getting involved in the EV market, the company has had a lot of people asking, “Why not put solar panels on top?” Its structures are fully capable of mounting solar panels, so it is an option if a customer wants it. Given today’s solar technology however, Connelly feels that his product is more cost-effective on its own.

JUN/JUL 2014 87

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B-Class

Mercedes-Benz enters the EV scene

A new EV is about to hit the streets. The 2014 Mer-

cedes-Benz B-Class Electric Drive arrived at US dealerships in July. The four-door hatchback has front-wheel drive, and can do 0-60 mph in 7.9 seconds. Its Teslabuilt powertrain features an AC permanent magnet synchronous motor with 132 kW (177 hp) of power and 251 lb-ft of torque and a 28 kWh lithium-ion battery.

The B-Class’s EPA-rated range is 85 miles, which compares favorably with the other EVs in its class (84 miles for the LEAF, 81 for the BMW i3). Combined efficiency is 84 MPGe, which does not (the LEAF scores 114 MPGe and the i3 a chart-topping 124 MPGe). The B-Class’s efficiency is more comparable to the larger and sportier Model S (89 MPGe).

Unlike most pure EVs, the new Benz does not have DC fast charging capability, a puzzling omission, as charging time is something that potential EV buyers often cite as an obstacle.

The B-Class does have one unique feature: an optional ($600) Temporary Range Extender. No, this is not a tiny gas engine, but a software feature. The B-Class actually has a 36-kWh battery, but during normal operation it only uses 28 kWh worth of energy. Completely charging and discharging battery cells shortens their life, so EVs are designed to only use the middle energy envelope, or about 2/3 the total energy capacity of the battery. Engaging the Range Extender pushes those upper and lower limits, allowing the B-Class to use about 31 kWh, providing “up to 18” additional miles of range. According to Mercedes, “the range extender should only be used on a limited basis, and could shorten battery life if used excessively.”

As far as market positioning goes, the most likely comparison is to the i3, which went on sale in the US a couple of months ago. The Beemer and the Merc carry almost identical price tags (a little over $42,000) and

By Charles Morris

both appeal to buyers who can’t afford a Model S, but want something snazzier than a LEAF. Unlike the i3, the B-Class is not a native EV - it’s an adaptation of a legacy ICE vehicle (which is sold in Europe, but not in the US). BMW was able to achieve an impressive efficiency rating with the i3 by using light carbon fiber for the body panels, among other things.

The B-class has a steel body, weighs over 1,000 pounds more than the i3 and is about a foot longer.

The most important question of all: What are Daimler’s plans for its new EV? It will appear in the usual EV markets at first, but is scheduled to go on sale in all 50 states, as well as Germany and the UK, in early 2015.

Dan Neil of the Wall Street Journal gave the B-Class a rave review, calling it “an on-point premium family electric vehicle” that’s “massively better” than the gaspowered version, but is convinced that it is strictly a compliance car.

It’s worth noting that Daimler already has one EV, the Smart ED, which is selling quite well in Europe, and is showing some signs of life in the US as well. As always, we’re hoping the latest entrant to the EV market will be a huge success.

Photos courtesy of Mercedes-Benz USA

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