Nio seems to be the one making waves that no one in NZ has heard of as they don't operate here. They are doing the Tesla promise of swapable batteries for real life, with a network of swap stations. Imagine buying a car and knowing you can in future swap the battery for a longer range one, one with better health, not to mention long range batteries from empty to fully charged in minutes.

[–] eagleeyedtiger 4 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago)

The only reason I've heard of Nio was because I bought shares in them a couple of years ago. I sold when I doubled my money, which looks like it was a good move considering how low it is now!

[–] stoy@lemmy.zip 3 points 9 months ago (2 children)

Tom Scott made a video where he tested an automatic swap station:

https://youtu.be/hNZy603as5w

[–] thevoyagekayaking 3 points 9 months ago (1 children)

He also mentions the company is hemorrhaging money at the moment.

[–] stoy@lemmy.zip 4 points 9 months ago

Yeah, that is normal for a VC funded company

[–] Dave 1 points 9 months ago (1 children)

That's awesome! I hadn't seen that video before. Looks pretty impressive, though I'd be curious for more details about the subscriptions. Do you get charged for use or whether you use it or not?

[–] thevoyagekayaking 2 points 9 months ago

You lease the battery pack from them, from my understanding, so yes.

[–] thevoyagekayaking -1 points 9 months ago (1 children)

This is a stupid idea, and there's a very good reason why nobody but them is doing it.

Both swappable batteries and hydrogen are dead end technologies, at least as far as road vehicles are concerned. The economics of hydrogen will never compare to an EV, the range is only similar, and the charge rates of modern EVs have made the refuel time less significant.

With battery swaps, the logistics and capital required to build a charging station, which any EV can charge at, compared to a battery swap station which only one model of vehicle can use, mean this will never be widespread.

Meanwhile, most EVs will go from 10-80% capacity in about fifteen minutes.

[–] Dave 2 points 9 months ago (1 children)

Hydrogen is already being used in diesel / hydrogen hybrid trucks, but in terms of cars I don't think the technology is going anywhere fast.

In terms of battery swap, would the simple answer not be to have an open standard that different manufacturers can all use?

Meanwhile, most EVs will go from 10-80% capacity in about fifteen minutes.

I normally see this quoted as 30 mins?

[–] thevoyagekayaking 3 points 9 months ago (1 children)

Try and find out the cost per KG for hydrogen, it's almost impossible. If you lease a hydrogen car, the fuel is included in the lease, and I've found it very hard to find a retail price for the stuff, but every price I have seen indicates it's phenomenally expensive, meaning a hydrogen vehicle is more expensive to run than a petrol vehicle.

https://www.hydrogeninsight.com/transport/analysis-it-is-now-almost-14-times-more-expensive-to-drive-a-toyota-hydrogen-car-in-california-than-a-comparable-tesla-ev/2-1-1519315

Here's some actual numbers, $200 usd to fill a Mirai, which will give you about 600km of range.

As to the battery swap thing, it took decades, and an EU ultimatum, for everyone to agree on a charging standard, what do you think your chances are of everyone agreeing on a battery design?

[–] Dave 2 points 9 months ago

The truck companies I've seen doing hydrogen are generating the hydrogen themselves with water and electricity. I'm not sure whether it's financially viable or not, they seem to be doing it for the reduced carbon emmisions.

And yeah, you're right, a common battery standard will probably only exist if say GM or some group of Japanese car companies uses a standard across all their brands and allows this to be used by others. In other words, chances are probably pretty slim.