TOKYO – Toyota announced it is joining forces with the Japanese energy company Idemitsu Kosan Co., Ltd. to bring its goal of solid-state battery production to fruition. The companies will work on developing the solid electrolyte technology and creating the necessary supply chain and factories that will lead to commercialization and mass production by 2027-2028.
This partnership brings two heavyweights in the solid-state space together, as Idemitsu has been working on the technology since 2001 and Toyota since 2006. Toyota holds more solid-state patents than any company in the world, meaning this partnership is ready to see a decades-long dream come to fruition. The partnership will focus on sulfide solid electrolytes and will be realized in a three-phase plan.
Phase one will see the two companies come together to create better sulfide solid electrolytes. Solid-state batteries offer many benefits over the ones we currently have today, thanks to the solid electrolytes that allow for faster ion movement. They charge faster, weigh less, and offer better range than anything currently on the market. They’re pivotal to Toyota’s plan of offering a 600-mile range and 10-minute charging EV by 2027, but there is one major drawback.
Repeated charging and discharging can lead to cracks between cathodes, anodes, and solid electrolytes, thereby ruining the battery. The two companies had been working on a solution well before they established this partnership and have apparently created a crack-resistant solid electrolyte with high performance. The product still needs fine-tuning and brought up to scale, which leads us to phase two.
Phase two will see Idemitsu create a large pilot facility to start the mass production of the technology while Toyota promotes it and ensures the market launch of its BEVs with the technology by 2027-2028.
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