So how many extra batteries will be required to stock ‘swap stations’, and how will the current shortage of raw materials for battery production affect pricing and stock?
Current industry standard is that battery degradation of up to 30% is acceptable. Would you be happy to have your near new 95% capacity battery swapped for another with 80%?
Are customers happy to lease their battery? This is the talk from Chinese industry: Drivers purchase a car but lease the battery, bringing cost of vehicle purchase down significantly and complaints of battery swaps down.
Are you willing to enter into a battery leasing agreement over the lifetime ownership of your vehicle?
It is an interesting concept and it isn't without precedent, people lease and swap out their their gas bottles. This ensures they are pressure tested when required, even the 9kg caravan bottles are now a swap out system, where 20 years ago people owned the bottle and when it expired it wasn't allowed to be refilled.
So in a lot of ways a battery swap system is quite a good idea, it ensures that the battery remains the property of a responsible entity, who ensure that it is always fit for purpose and is either recycled or disposed of correctly.
Once an E.V battery has died, there is every possibility the car may have its number plates removed and be abandoned, as happens now, when repair costs are more than the residual value of the car.
It is like many new appliances that come to market, it takes several years and compromises by the manufacturers, before efficiencies and cross product sharing occurs.
But having a standard range of common batteries, that cater to the various consumers requirements i.e multiple KWh sizes, makes a lot of sense IMO.
A bit like having common socket and voltage/amperage batteries for hand held power tools, rather than as now where the batteries are specific to a certain manufacturer, this is extremely inefficient.
Someone who only wants to use a drill once a year, has to buy a drill and a battery and a charger, so they buy the cheapest drill anyway.
A tradesman who uses the drill 7 days a week putting up patios, wont buy the same drill, but there is no reason that the batteries/chargers shouldn't be interchangeable.
The wastage must be unbelievable, if the batteries were interchangeable, you could rent them off somewhere like Bunnings etc maybe $1 a day for example, that would mean the batteries aren't going dead in the handyman's shed and the tradesman can either buy or rent depending on his job.
He may not have a lot of work on, so he has the one he buys for convenience and when work picks up he rents or buys extras.
As the battery materials are a finite resource, it makes sense to use them in the most efficient way, with car batteries they could be produced so that the same socket/holder is used at the house.
Then when they are toward the end of their useful life for the E.V, the remainder of its usable life can be just used by slotting it into a house as an exchange for one that needs recycling.