crookedriverguy t1_j23bzi2 wrote
Reply to comment by Loki-L in ELI5 why do electric vehicles have one big battery that's hard to replace once it's expired, rather than lots of smaller ones that could be swapped out based on need (to trade off range/power/weight)? by ginonofalg
Well, you're overlooking a concept here that *might* work:
Car maker Nio offers battery swaps for customers with a "battery as a service" deal. A swap at designated stations are claimed to take 5 minutes
2ByteTheDecker t1_j23sqh9 wrote
That's making a huuuuuuuge presumption about logistics. It would be very expensive to roll out on a scale that would make adoption reasonable.
Tesla Superchargers are barely that widespread and that's a much lower impact solution than swapping our hundreds of pounds of battery cell, and has alternate options like charging at home.
biggsteve81 t1_j24h5fq wrote
A company called Better Place tried that in Israel. It did not work well. Also, DC Fast charging can work on any EV, while a battery swap will only work on one specific brand of vehicle. Imagine if a Ford could only be refueled at a Ford gas station.
maowai t1_j24ws26 wrote
I think swappable car batteries work fine in some areas and circumstances, but I don’t think that it will ever take off or be necessary in the US. I own an EV and I do 99.9% of my charging at home. Swapping is less convenient than that, I don’t want to pay a permanent subscription on top of the price of the car. Fast chargers along highways are also far less labor intensive and much more mechanically simple than any sort of human operated or automatic battery swapper.
As soon as you own an EV, you realize how bad and unnecessary of an idea battery swapping seems.
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