Following the lead of Nissan and NEC, which both recently have started down this track, the German carmaker is looking into lithium-ion batteries to improve its hybrids and electrics. It sounds like the Nickel-metal hydride (NiMH) batteries in their automobiles are both heavier and more toxic than the alternative. The Li-ion batteries would lower the weight […]

Following the lead of Nissan and NEC, which both recently have started down this track, the German carmaker is looking into lithium-ion batteries to improve its hybrids and electrics. It sounds like the Nickel-metal hydride (NiMH) batteries in their vehicles are both heavier and more toxic than the alternative.

The Li-ion batteries would lower the weight of the vehicle by hundreds of pounds, improving handling and mileage. You’ve already got them in your phones, media players, and so on, but adapting them for the high-capacity, high-throughput application of powering a car is a serious endeavor — which must be why Sanyo is pledging almost a billion dollars over the next couple years to developing the technology.

Via [crunchgear]

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This entry was posted on Sunday, May 11th, 2008 at 10:23 pm and is filed under Life Gadgets. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.