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Tesla, Panasonic Are Freezing Plans To Add More Battery Production Lines At Gigafactory (techcrunch.com)
Tesla and Panasonic are reportedly freezing their plans to add more battery production lines at Gigafactory 1, its massive factory outside of Reno, Nevada that is a cornerstone to the automaker's business. "The partners had planned to increase capacity by 50 percent next year, but financial problems have forced a rethink," reports TechCrunch, citing a report from Nikkei. "Nikkei also reported that Panasonic was suspending a planned investment in Tesla's automotive battery and EV plant in Shanghai." From the report: TechCrunch confirmed that Tesla is not adding more battery production lines and will instead focus its efforts on existing equipment. Tesla stressed that it will continue to make new investments as needed into the plant. However, the automaker noted that attention and investments might be focused on improving existing equipment to increase battery cell output.
As of November, Panasonic had 11 production lines operating at Gigafactory 1. Panasonic president President Kazuhiro Tsuga told Bloomberg that the company planned to add two more lines by the end of the year to bring total capacity up to 35 gigawatt-hours. The last number shared by Tesla is from July when the company reported an annualized run rate of 20 gigawatt-hours of capacity. It's not clear if those two production lines were added. "We will of course continue to make new investments in Gigafactory 1, as needed. However, we think there is far more output to be gained from improving existing production equipment than was previously estimated," a Tesla spokesperson wrote in an emailed statement.
As of November, Panasonic had 11 production lines operating at Gigafactory 1. Panasonic president President Kazuhiro Tsuga told Bloomberg that the company planned to add two more lines by the end of the year to bring total capacity up to 35 gigawatt-hours. The last number shared by Tesla is from July when the company reported an annualized run rate of 20 gigawatt-hours of capacity. It's not clear if those two production lines were added. "We will of course continue to make new investments in Gigafactory 1, as needed. However, we think there is far more output to be gained from improving existing production equipment than was previously estimated," a Tesla spokesperson wrote in an emailed statement.
Panasonic ended up downgrading the demand from companies making electric cars.
But it's not like the demand for electric cars is getting any lower, interest is steadily climbing...
So even though Tesla loses some money from Panasonic, it probably is an indicator they have even a larger leg up on the electric car market than previously thought as car makers struggle to get near what Tesla is doing at scale.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
the intermediate and long-term goal for the factory was to pump out high-capacity batteries that would let residential and commercial solar users finally get off the grid permanently
The PowerWall is available already. And they have been used in large installations as well, in Australia and other places.
I've thought about getting one just for backup power for the house but it really makes more sense with a solar system, just waiting to see if solar shingles work out long term or what as I would prefer that form factor...
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
... boring as hell...
No, that would be this one https://www.boringcompany.com/
Volumetric density still matters somewhat because that determines costs for housing, connections & cooling. Also, at the moment, lithium ion has one of the highest round-trip efficiencies.
Lithium ion also has one of the highest potentials per cell so getting enough voltage to convert efficiently takes fewer cells, which also helps lower costs. And a major issue in utility needs is rapidly responding to loads and lithium batteries can easily do this.
In long run for longer term storage past a few hours, e.g. days or weeks of energy, we will need big flow batteries which decouple power from energy capacity.
For utility applications, maybe Aluminium-ion may prove less costly. Power isn't as good as lithium ion but may end up cheaper.
The cost of lithium ion batteries is to a major degree the nickel and cobalt. There's no fundamental physical necessity that those elements are used in batteries.
The initial plan was to produce 35GW when the Gigafactory 1 is finished. Right now the plant is far from finished, with only a fraction of the whole building built, and yet it is expected to reach 35GW this year and when finished to be at 3 times the originaly planned capacity - at 105GW, and on top of that to have enough space to produce battery packs for model 3 and soon Y, S and X, without expanding the plant size. All this is happening because of advancements in production efficiency and battery power density. So it's not surprising Tesla chose to optimize efficiency and density instead of adding new lines. Their recent purchase of Maxwell Technologies is also an indication of that. I don't get why everybody is acting surprised and spells doom and gloom.