Check http://www.calcars.org/carmakers.html in a
day or two and you'll find that we've added
Hyundai to our table of 16 carmakers and auto
start-ups that are in at various stages of design
and evaluation of PHEVs. Below is the brief news
report about comments from an unnamed company
official -- until it's an official announcement, we're not expecting much.

We've received dozens of emails about Toshiba's
long-awaited announcement of its new long-lasting
lithium battery (the company announced plans for
this more than two years ago). It's important to
read the reports carefully -- this battery will
start with availability in 2008 for industrial
applications! It sounds promising; we've
excerpted several news stories -- the company
spokesman is not directly quoted but says the
version of this battery for deep-discharge
automotive applications, which is still in the lab, could be ready around 2010.

Hyundai Motor mulls developing plug-in hybrid car
Date: December 18, 2007
Korea.Net
http://www.kois.go.kr/News/News/NewsView.asp?serial_no=20071218005

Hyundai Motor, Korea’s largest automaker, said
Tuesday (Dec. 18) it is considering developing a
plug-in hybrid car, a move expected to follow
bigger rivals such as Japan’s Toyota Motor and
General Motors of the United States.

Hyundai is studying ways to develop the
next-generation hybrid car that can be recharged
at home electric outlets, but no decision has
been made yet, said a company official.

"We are just in the stage of studying the idea,"
the official said, denying a news report earlier
in the day that claimed Hyundai has already
started developing the plug-in hybrid car at its
research and development center in Hwaseong, 70 kilometers south of Seoul.

A hybrid car runs on both gasoline and electricity.

Hyundai lags far behind its bigger rivals in
introducing hybrid models. Currently, Hyundai has
no commercial hybrid models and plans to
mass-produce conventional hybrid vehicles in 2009.

Together with its affiliate Kia Motors, Hyundai
is the world’s sixth-largest automaker.


Toshiba to enter rechargeable battery market
AFP Dec 11, 2007
http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5i0EWhIDfsPrTfH071PXls-vPxAHQ

TOKYO (AFP) — Toshiba Corp. announced plans
Tuesday to start selling rechargeable batteries
next year, launching itself into what is seen as
a promising but increasingly competitive market.

Toshiba described the Super Charge ion Battery,
or SCiB, as a "breakthrough rechargeable battery"
that can be fully recharged in five minutes and
has a lifespan of more than 10 years if
completely run down and recharged once a day.

"The excellent performance of the SCiB will
assure its successful application in industrial
systems and in the electronic vehicles markets as
a new energy solution," said Toshiba vice president Toshiharu Watanabe.

Japanese firms are vying to develop lithium-ion
batteries that can be used in hybrid or electric
vehicles, but there are safety concerns following
recalls of millions of potentially flammable
laptop computer batteries made by Sony Corp.

Watanabe said Toshiba was satisfied that its battery was safe.

"The possibility of the battery catching fire is
extremely low and it will not explode even if it
ruptures," he told a press conference.

The company expects to start shipping the battery
from March 2008 and has set a global sales target
of 100 billion yen (895 million dollars) by the
year to March 2016, by which it aims to have a market share of 10 percent.

Toshiba hopes the SCiB will be used in
battery-powered bicycles, motorcycles, electric
forklift trucks and construction machinery, all
of which already use rechargeable batteries, Watanabe said.

It also sees potential for their use in
petrol-electric hybrid cars, pure electric vehicles and mobile telephones.

"Toshiba will ride with the trend set by
automobile companies. When hybrids and electric
cars become prevalent, the SCiB will probably be
applied to them," said Toshiba general manager
Shoshi Kawatsu, who oversees the project.

He declined to comment whether his company was in talks with car manufacturers.

"We will continue to advance development in this
area so that when other companies launch their
own batteries we will be ahead," he said.


Breakthrough battery for electric cars?
Toshiba promises 'energy solution' with nearly full recharge in 5 minutes
MSNBC staff and news service reports
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
updated 7:29 a.m. PT, Thurs., Dec. 13, 2007
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22240865/

TOKYO - A new battery that can be recharged to 90
percent capacity in under five minutes and lasts
10 years will start shipping in March, Toshiba
Corp. announced this week, hailing it as "a new
energy solution" for cleaner transportation.

Toshiba plans to initially make the
quick-charging Super Charge ion Battery for
electric bikes, forklifts, construction machinery
and other industrial use. It can work in
temperatures as low as minus 22 degrees Fahrenheit.

A newcomer in rechargeable batteries, Toshiba
said the lithium-ion battery could be used in
hybrid and electric cars by 2010, Mochida said.

Battery innovations are expected to be key in
making hybrid vehicles more widespread, because
lighter and easier-to-recharge batteries will
improve efficiency. They could also spark
mass-produced plug-in hybrids and and even
resurrect the idea of all-electric vehicles that use no fossil fuel.

"This is a truly innovative battery," said
Toshiba Corporate Vice President Toshiharu
Watanabe, emphasizing its potential "in the
electronic vehicles markets as a new energy solution."

Most lithium-ion batteries in use now, such as
those in laptop computers, require hours to
recharge to full capacity, with the fastest ones requiring about half an hour.

Toshiba also said its new battery, which is
estimated to last 5,000 charges, is unlikely to
rupture or catch fire, problems that have beset
some lithium-ion batteries used in laptops.

The Tokyo-based electronics maker expects global
sales of the new fast-charging battery to reach
nearly $900 million by fiscal 2015.

The Li-ion awakens: New lithium-ion cells are hardier and charge faster
Dec 19th 2007 Economist.com
http://www.economist.com/displaystory.cfm?story_id=10328039

<snip>
The SCiB is one member of a new generation of
Li-ion batteries. They are being made safer after
the recall of millions of laptop batteries in
2006, when some caught fire. But they are also
being made better. And that should allow them to
move out of the gadget market and into electric
bicycles and motorcycles, fork-lift trucks and
construction machinery. According to Donald
Saxman, who studies the battery industry for BCC
Research, they should be powerful enough for
cars, too, within five years or so. Indeed, they
are already being used in some experimental and
exotic electric vehicles, such as the 210kph
sports car developed in California by Tesla Motors.
<snip>

http://www.gizmag.com/toshiba-scib-super-charge-lithium-battery/8506/
Breakthrough lithium battery charges to 90% in just 5 minutes
Gizmag December 13, 2007

Toshiba have stunned the world with their
announcement of what's pretty much the holy grail
in Lithium battery technology – the Super Charge
ion Battery, which recharges up to 90% of its
energy in just five minutes, and has a lifespan
of over 10 years. Slow charging has been the key
hurdle to public acceptance of battery-electric
vehicles as viable distance travelers, so this
breakthrough has all sorts of implications for
the automotive industry as well as being a very
welcome upgrade to a whole host of other portable devices.

The first of Toshiba's groundbreaking SCiB packs
will ship in March 2008 to an industrial systems
market that Toshiba forecasts being worth 100
billion Yen by 2015. There's no mention of when
the technology is likely to hit the consumer
market, but with such rapid charging ability,
ultra-long life and high resistance to rupture
and combustion, the SCiB looks like the first of
a new generation of battery cells that will allow
electric vehicle drivers to top up their cells in
nearly the same amount of time a petrol vehicle takes to fill.

To this end, Toshiba is working on a
high-performance version of the SCiB targeted at the automotive industry.

The development of high-powered, long-lasting,
rapid-charge battery cells offers the automotive
industry a simple and extremely efficient
alternative to Hydrogen fuel cell vehicles, whose
competitive advantage thus far lies in their
ability to refuel in a similar manner to
petrol-powered cars. Batteries, it can be argued,
are much more energy-efficient, delivering as
much as three times more power from the
electricity grid to the wheels as fuel cell vehicles are able to.

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Felix Kramer fkramer@...
Founder California Cars Initiative
http://www.calcars.org
http://www.calcars.org/news-archive.html
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