SOLID-STATE BATTERIES ON THE WAY

While touting a 50% improvement in energy density from its nextgeneration batteries, Mercedes is already looking to the next step, with development under way on solid-state battery technology.

The firm has partnered Taiwanese battery developer Prologium, which claims to have supplied nearly 8000 solid-state battery samples to car manufacturers. The tie-up will usher in solidstate test vehicles in “the coming years” on the way to rolling out the hardware to production cars in the second half of the decade.

Mercedes estimates that these future batteries can nearly double the range of today’s conventional lithium ion packs and the EVS equipped with these units can be lighter, more spacious and cheaper to produce.