Holy grail EV tech hype bubble bursting

The saviour of electric cars may have come crashing down to earth before it’s even risen.

Solid-state batteries have been hyped as the silver bullet or holy grail of electric cars. These new cells were tipped to be smaller, more energy dense and less fire prone than current power units.

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Chinese brands were the first to spout claims about solid state batteries appearing in vehicles, with some claiming they would be fitted to production cars by 2025. Solid-state batteries cannot be found in any car or any product yet.

Now a major Chinese car company executive has voiced concerns the tech is nowhere near ready and may not be the answer to all EV problems.

Vice President of Chinese maker Changan, which owns the Deepal brand that is sold in Australia, and Chairman of DeepBlue Automotive Technology Deng Chenghao said the tech will not be commercialised this decade, according to Chinese media reports.

"Large-scale commercialisation in 2030 is definitely the most optimistic expectation, and my judgment is that it may be as late as 2035,” Chenghao said.

“I think there’s a lot of misinformation circulating online. Every small breakthrough in solid-state batteries or materials is amplified to an extreme degree, with everyone thinking it’s saved the world and brought about a new technology.

“That’s not the case. We need to view the development of solid-state batteries objectively and rationally. We still have a long way to go, so I don’t think we can force it,” he said.

Chenghao cast doubt on whether solid-state batteries will be the final answer for electric car power.

"Whether solid-state batteries are the final technological form is a huge question mark," said Chenghao.

"Whether all-solid-state batteries can be successfully developed, whether they can truly solve our pain points in the future, or whether mass production might bring more pain points? There are no conclusions yet."

These comments join the chorus of other established carmakers who have cast doubts on the tech.

Hyundai Group's head of global product planning Spencer Cho told US publication Automotive News earlier this year the technology is more complex than many realise.

“I don’t think we can commercialize these batteries before 2030,” said Cho

“There is a lot of uncertainty about the progress of solid-state batteries,” he said.

It echoes similar comments made to CarsGuide last year by one of Audi’s senior drivetrain engineers, who said the technology wasn’t likely to be feasible for ‘everyday’ cars in the foreseeable future due to the minuscule manufacturing margins of error required.

Toyota Executive Vice President Hiroki Nakajima has previously warned that there was no certainty the company would be able to develop solid-state batteries on scale.

“...development is always unpredictable. Frankly, there’s no telling if it will work out or not,” said Nakajima.

"I always take encouragement from Chairman Toyoda’s reminder that, ‘It’s okay to fail’.”

Toyota has previously said it was aiming to install the batteries in cars by 2027.

 BMW, Chery, GWM, Honda, Mercedes-Benz and Nissan are just some of the big names investing heavily in the future tech.