GAC seems to be in the thick of action taking place in the EV world. After it announced the breath-taking Space Concept Car that beats many other similar cars by its grandness and luxury, the company now seems to have mastered the art of producing LFP batteries at a competitive price. The alchemists within the GAC labs have concocted the perfected chemistry for these batteries.
The new SmLFP technology
These LFP batteries use the new, active cathode material and are “built on microcrystalline technology”. Though this hardly explains what changed in terms of the chemistry, GAC claims that the cells have “13.5% higher cell quality energy density and 20% greater volume energy density than regular mass-produced” LFP cells. Again, while we know that volume energy density is the proportion of Wh per liter instead of Wh per kg, one stays clueless about what the company means by “higher cell quality energy density.”
The higher volume energy density would allow to pack more capacity in the same space available. The new cathode material has reduced the charging by 50 % of that of the standard LFP batteries. One major issue with the current battery technology is the battery’s capacity retention at freezing negative temperatures. GAC claims that its new technology would allow for an improvement of 10% in the battery retention capacity at these sub-zero temperatures. There is also a significant improvement in the battery’s life where the company claims that the new technology would offer a life of 1 million miles.
The batteries match up very closely to the Li-Ion performance levels, yet would sell cheaper. This technology defines the kind of batteries that the future generation of Aion vehicles would use. SmLFP batteries would enter mass production next year. Other companies looking forward to using the LFP technology include Tesla which would bring it in its entry Model 3 cars, and GM and Ford.
