How the Lithium Ion Battery Pack Will Change the Prius:
Feeling the Pinch
With gas prices seemingly on an unending trend upward, many consumers have turned to hybrids to lessen the pinch. While the Prius has far and away been the most popular and mainstream hybrid car ever produced, it appears that there’s still plenty of room left for improvement!
Out with the Old, in with the New
One of the most talked about changes in Toyota’s newest Prius will be the addition of a lithium-ion battery pack. Often used in other devices like laptops, the battery has yet to be deployed in a project of this scale.
Toyota has said that it is hoping to eventually replace the old nickel batteries with the lithium ion, as a recent article in Businessweek states: “Yet Toyota should soon be giving the environmental lobby something to cheer about. In an interview with BusinessWeek on Feb. 16, Chief Executive Katsuaki Watanabe confirmed that Toyota's third-generation hybrid cars, due out in late 2008 or early 2009, will use lithium-ion batteries.”
Growing pains
Citing safety concerns, Toyota has thus far delayed making the switch. But what improvements will the new battery make to the Prius? To get an idea we did some searching for aftermarket conversions to a lithium ion battery, and were pleasantly surprised with the results. A battery made by Hymotion and A123 systems created an aftermarket kit that converts the car into a plug-in hybrid, allowing it to go up to 40 miles at the beginning of a trip on electric power alone. With the kit installed, this shoots the mileage of the Prius upward, with company representatives claiming that drivers can expect 150 MPG city and 100 MPG highway.
The installation of the battery is supposedly very short, about 4 hours, and owners can charge up the vehicle with a 110 or 220 volt cord. That’s all well and good of course, but the average Prius owner is unlikely to make the somewhat risky switch over to Lithium Ion without Toyota’s official goahead. The technology certainly looks promising, and I for one hope to see Toyota step up to the plate and embrace lithium ion batteries when it’s ready to be deployed. For now, we’ll have to wait and see.