General Motors will start making battery fixes to over 140,000 recalled Chevrolet Bolts EVs and EUVs beginning in mid-October. Every GM Bolt ever made and every Hyundai electric Kona ever made have been recalled because the battery packs can catch fire. There needs to be a $11000 to 12000 fix for each electric car. There were about 142,000 GM Bolts and 82,000 Hyundai Kona’s impacted.
The 2017-19 model year Bolt EVs will get five new battery modules, essentially getting an enhanced battery pack. The 2020-22 Bolt EVs will get all new modules too, unless GM can finish developing software that will allow it to identify whether they have defective modules that need replacing.
LG Chem has restarted production at LG’s plants in Holland, Michigan, and Hazel Park. They have been down since August.
LG’s first 5GWh US battery production plant opened in Michigan in 2012, which LG said required an investment of around US$600 million. LG is also adding capacity to the plants so it can make more cells as needed by GM.
Through a joint venture (JV) agreement with carmaker GM, it is now building a 35GWh plant in Ohio, worth around US$2.3 billion and expected to open in 2022.
The Bolt EV has about a 60 kWh battery. The 5 GWh factory would take over two years of production to replace all recalled battery packs for GM and Hyundai. If the new LG Ohio battery factory opens in 2022, then increased battery production could accelerate completing the battery repairs earlier in 2023. Otherwise, it could take until early 2024 to complete the recall repairs.
GM and LG confirmed the root cause of reported battery fires. There are two manufacturing defects called a torn anode and a folded separator. Both defects in the same battery cell cause a fire to occur. GM confirms that 13 Bolts have caught fire while parked, causing three injuries. Eleven of those fires were in the U.S.
GM has told Bolt owners to not park within 50 feet of a building and not to charge over 90%.
In about 60 days, there should be battery pack analysis software to determine if the battery defects are present in a particular vehicle.
Tesla has to watch out as the electric car competitors are on fire.
SOURCES- Detriot Free Press, GM, LG, Energy Storage News
Written by Brian Wang, Nextbigfuture.com
Brian Wang is a Futurist Thought Leader and a popular Science blogger with 1 million readers per month. His blog Nextbigfuture.com is ranked #1 Science News Blog. It covers many disruptive technology and trends including Space, Robotics, Artificial Intelligence, Medicine, Anti-aging Biotechnology, and Nanotechnology.
Known for identifying cutting edge technologies, he is currently a Co-Founder of a startup and fundraiser for high potential early-stage companies. He is the Head of Research for Allocations for deep technology investments and an Angel Investor at Space Angels.
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O'Neill Cylinders will mostly be at Lagrange points where they will never be in shadow. They won't need a lot of battery backup. Redundant PV arrays will work fine.
Eh, it's a sick burn…
It's favorable in the case of a fire sale, but that naive $235.15B GM suggest there is a bit more than wind beneath their wings, vs pure sentiment in the case of Tesla. GM's overall financials does support their valuation as currently undervalued, Tesla is NaN on that plot.
"bubblicious right now", well, we are at the start of a gold rush. Tesla factory building, esp in Space, would seem the ideal tech to have right now. GM has robots too. NASA has freed O'Neill projects from Mars yoke. Musk is about to launch BFBooster. Musk sees no reason to go into orbit, however. GAK!
Batteries are needed, even for H cars. Capacitors, batteries and fuel cells are similar, but different in whether there is a substance providing the charge, whether the substance can move independently of the electrodes, and whether O2 from the atmos can be used to save weight. The Sutter asteroid survey may have more to do with what happens here than anything else. What are these things made of? I would not bet too heavily on any particular thing, as they all provide something simple, electricity. Pretty sure there will be a lot of H, however.
Don't use LG batteries in O'Neill Cylinders. LFP cathode batteries are far less prone to fires and are cheaper per unit of storage. LFP energy density is improving. Chinese companies CATL and BYD dominate LFP manufacturing. The US had better work to get LFP manufacturing. I don't expect Sleepy Joe, Turtle, Orange Man, or Ancient Nancy to advocate for this because industrial policy is for "commies".
I think it works out more rationally if you count NET assets. Assets minus debts.
Especially if you count "off the books" debts like long term contracts and underfunded pension obligations. The only reason those are off the books is that accountancy rules are not designed for judging company market value, but are used as such anyway.
(Alternative explanation: Accountants want those numbers to be highly misleading, it results in more need for big dollar accountants.)
This is not to say that Tesla isn't seriously bubblicious right now, but GM is not worth what a naive $235.15B in assets would suggest.
I wouldn't worry about the recall. Even if GM burns, it has $235.19B in assets and a market cap of $75.82B.
Tesla has $52.15B in assets and market cap of $766.66B
"Tesla has to watch out as the electric car competitors are on fire."
har har
Brian made a funny.
"Tesla has to watch out as the electric car competitors are on fire." It is batteries that burn like this. Tesla should join the H revolution.