China EV battery race: Tesla’s rivals join NIO in efforts to achieve 1,000km driving range on single charge target

NIO was the first to put the 1,000km range on its ET7 sedan specification, to be fitted with a 150kWh solid-state battery when it goes into production in 2022

Chinese partners of General Motors, Toyota and Honda have also announced efforts to develop cutting-edge batteries that can go the distance

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A view of the electric car assembly at Xpeng’s factory in the Guangdong provincial city of Zhaoqing on November 19, 2020. Photo: Iris Ouyang

Published: 8:00pm, 20 Jan 2021Updated: 3:31pm, 26 Jan 2021

China’s electric car assemblers and battery producers are setting a new goalpost in their battle for supremacy in the world’s largest vehicle market: a driving range of up to 1,000 kilometres (621 miles) on a single charge.

Their new weapon is the solid-state battery, deemed a better option because the electricity from solid electrodes and a solid electrolyte is safer, more reliable and more efficient than the liquid or polymer gel electrolytes found in existing lithium-ion or lithium polymer batteries.

“A battery that can power for 1,000km on a single charge will be of great significance to the EV segment,” said Wang Bin, a Credit Suisse analyst. “Range anxiety has long been a stumbling block to the rise of EVs, and the industry now sees a ray of hope from these new batteries.”

NIO, the Beijing-based challenger to Tesla, was the first to put the 1,000km range on its product specification, announcing on January 9 that the Extended Edition of its ET7 sedan would be fitted with a 150 kilowatt-hour (kWh) solid-state battery that can go the distance on a single charge when it goes into production in 2022.

Range anxiety of existing EV models in China. SCMP Graphics

Following closely, Shanghai-based Zhiji Motor announced that it was working with China’s biggest producer of automotive batteries Contemporary Amperex Technology Limited (CATL) to develop a silicon-doped lithium supplement battery cell with a 1,000km driving range.