tooltalk

Accubattery pings, but doesn't actually stop charging. Some Android, Samsung Galaxy for instance, now has "battery protection" mode that stops charging at 80%.

>> Additionally, 0% SOC may be set as high as 20% capacity. <<

I think that was the case for GM Bolt years ago, but batteries cost a lot of $$ and you won't see more than 5% reserved for buffer these days -- or 95% usuable capacity.

Tesla also had software lock limiting access to extra battery capacity on the Model S -- 70KWh instead of 75KW, or about (7%?). No point in carrying around extra weight that costs $3,000 to unlock, but it probably helped prolong battery life.

No, I think they are about equal.

The US already has been countering China's every anticompetitive, discriminatory policy measure by more or less equal response: for instance, eliminating all subsidies on EVs with critical minerals sourced from non-free trading nations and banning Chinese EV/battery companies, and so on -- or otherwise known as Biden's IRA (vs Xi's Made-In-China 2025).

I'm not necessarily taking sides, but if you feel that the US's policy is bad, that's probably because China's original policy was also bad. If you were ok with China's exclusionary EV policy since 2016, you probably shouldn't be crying about the US's policy today since it's designed to mirror China's.

Do note however that, in March, China did file a WTO complaint accusing the US (IRA) of doing what China has been doing past decade under MIC 2025 -- misusing subsidies to force local content, local production (aka, in international trade lingo, it's called "local/domestic content requirement"). So I'm a bit troubled by China's double-standard.

China, South Korea, and Japan really don't have the best diplomatic/trade relationship.

South Korea has in particular suffered a great deal undr China's economic coercion since THAAD in 2017 -- their global giants like Samsung, Hyundai lost over 90% of their sales in China and they have likewise removed much of their manufacturing footprint in China. Not all too sure they want to jeopadize otherwise collaborative relationship with friendly ally, the US, for a hostile trading bully next door, China.

The US is the second largest by units sold (30M vs 15M) and the largest by value. The average selling price of a new vehicle in China is about $20K vs. US $50K.

China's EV subsidies have existed in various shapes and forms since 2009 -- they are always phasing out; then renewed, extended every 3-4 years. The last "direct purchase" subsidies ended on Jan 1, 2023; it was however extended as a "tax credit" in June 2023 for another 4 years with $72+B budget. This is also in the same article you cited (see translated below):

  Extension of the preferential tax policy for car purchases The total reduction and exemption is expected to reach 520 billion yuan —— Precision to provide assistance to the expansion of new energy vehicles 2023-06-21

  The Ministry of Finance, the General Administration of Taxation, and the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology recently issued a joint announcement to clearly continue and optimize the tax reduction and exemption policy for the purchase of new energy vehicles to support the development of the new energy automobile industry and promote automobile consumption. According to preliminary estimates, through the implementation of the extension policy, the total scale of vehicle purchase tax relief from 2024 to 2027 will reach 520 billion yuan.

Now, in addition to this, there also various industry subsidies, export credit/refund/rebates, and other financial instruments by gov't that are difficult to account for (because they are not public info).

It's called predatory pricing -- you buy cheap now, pay later when they come to recoup their cost. It won't drain their bank if they end up undercutting/destroying all local competitor and we become dependent on them.

This is not necessarily a problem if we can all peacefully coexist. China has a history of weaponizing their dominant market position to settle geopolitical/market disputes -- eg, rare earth metal ban against Japan in 2010; China's recent graphite "export control" to protect Chinese EV companies' business in markets abroad.

The fact that China practically banned all foreign EV battery makers from local EV market and forced EV OEMs to use locally made batteries by local battery makers to dominate the global battery market since 2016 under Xi's Make-In-China 2025 adds to the view that this isn't purely about saving the planet or making affordable EVs for the rest of us.

wow you seem super emotionally, mentally unstable.

After the fall of the Berlin Wall and the total collapse of China's centrally planned economy decades earlier, China begged to join the world order created by the West and for their own interests. China was refused first, not least because of their human rights violation, but also not everyone believed in China's fake sincerity in adhering to the Western liberal value system, however imperfect, and many had also presciently warned that China would abuse the system to their advantage.

China was finally allowed in under the Clintonite charlatans' flawed narrative under the faux "globalization" banner that if we make China rich, China would become a liberal democratic China and we could all coexist and trade in peace. And you know the rest of the story. China, for its part, just had to keep its head down and get rich; and as Deng Xiaoping once advised, bide its time as the Western societies starts falling apart, but your dear leader Xi got too ambitious and too greedy.

It's just too bad that Xi reared its ugly head too early. There were some early warning signs how China wanted to equalize its historical century of humiliation and restore its former glory -- by weaponizing their dominant market position in critical global industries such as the rare earth metal supplies; and now green energy industries. But I digress.

Now to answer your questions, no China doesn't get to dictate terms. If you haven't noticed yet, de-coupling is real and already started several years ago. While it's going to take some time, the train has already left.

USMC -- but it's no Ten Commendments or set in stone. It can be amended as the US sees it fit. The US would find a way to keep them out of the US market.

BYD's competitiveness comes from their gov't protectionism and illegal subsidies.

(see my above comment on how the Chinese gov't eliminated foreign competition to protect CATL/BYD since 2016).

the average cost of EVs has been declining without Chinese EVs in the US market and they would continue to decline with or without Chinese EVs.

You are missing the big picture. This isn't necessarily about the price level, but China's coercive, illegal trade practice to gain market advantage.

For instance, look at how they came to dominate the battery manufacturing. Foreign battery makers still have limited acccess to China's local EV market after the Chinese gov't forced them out under Xi's Made-In-China 2025[1]:

  ... China requires auto makers to use batteries from one of its approved suppliers if they want to be cleared to mass-produce electric cars and plug-in hybrids and to qualify for subsidies. These suppliers are all Chinese, so such global leaders as South Korea’s LG Chem Ltd and Japan’s Panasonic Corp. are excluded.

  ... Foreign batteries aren’t officially banned in China, but auto executives say that since 2016 they have been warned by government officials that they must use Chinese batteries in their China-built cars, or face repercussions.  That has forced them to spend millions of dollars to redesign cars to work with inferior Chinese batteries, they say.

  ... “We want to comply, and we have to comply,” said one executive with a foreign car maker. “There’s no other option.” 

1. Power Play: How China-Owned Volvo Avoids Beijing’s Battery Rules Car maker is allowed to use high-end foreign technology, while rivals are squeezed into buying local, Trefor Moss, May 17, 2018, WSJ

>> Since 2022, the majority of EVs manufactured have no cobalt in their batteries. << This is not true at all. Most EV OEMs don't use LFP: even in China, LFP's market share just passed 50% in 2022. Outside China, it's overwhelmingly NCM/A.

LFP is a low-end battery most suitable for small/compact EVs with "urban" range.

The industry trend is to minimize the use of cobalt as much as possible. While the early generation of lithium ion batteries had high cobalt content, the most cutting edge ones -- eg, NCM/A-9 -- has already reduced the cobalt content by 50%-80%. SK On who supplies such batteries with high energy/nicke and low cobalt to Ford (F-150), Hyundai/Kia (Ioniq5/6, EV6/9). They also announced zero-cobalt NCM9+ -- meaning less than 1% in cobalt content.

Lithiums are highly reactive and are never found in their pure form in nature.

You can't talk about LFP without longevity and affordability. I can't help noticing that there is no mention of price or cycle rating, can someone fill the gap?

>> New plants are set up to recover lithium because the price of lithium has increased, but old plants don't. <<

The price of lithium has collapsed by as much as 85% since 2022 Nov peak and is expected to drop further all the way through 2030. Other valuable raw materials in the cathodes have declined quite a bit past year.

I wonder how that's going to affect the future of battery recycling.

I think this is a big problem in the EV race. Most Western companies are still unwilling to get their hands dirty, even as China's grip on raw materials and refining has become a serious geopolitical threat.

You are not wrong. LFP is mostly for small, compact low-range EVs, so its low energy cell density under ~160Wh/kg is sufficient.

Most mid/high end EVs with longer range or power needs use high-nicke/energy NCM/NCA. de facto standard such as NCM811 has over ~270Wh/kg while the cutting edge ones, NCM9, from SK On ~300Wh/kg and already deployed in Ford F-150, Hyundai Ioniq and Kia EV9.

Hyundai Ioniq 5 2024 Refresh just received the chemistry upgrade from NCM811 to NCM9 (or in this particular instance 88% Nickel) which in turn increased the capacity by 10%.

As for Tesla's 4860, it seems like they are still struggling with low production output. Tesla had promised much better efficiency figures years ago, but doesn't seem to live up. LG is however rumored to have finished developing their 4860 and will produce them later this year (alledgedly for Tesla).

>> What smartphone is made anywhere else? <<

smartphones are "assembled" and "packaged" in China. Most components, or over 90%, in Apple iPhones are sourced from non-Chinese sources; then imported into China for assembly and packaging; then exported out to the world.

The world's largest smartphone maker, Samsung, pulled out of China and closed the last factory in 2019 -- they are either made in Vietnam, India, or South Korea.

>> Unrelated but I’ve taken a very hard stance personally on buying anything Chinese and have just accepted that it may mean being stuck with inferior technology.<<

LFP is mostly for cheaper, low-range EVs or stationary energy storage systems (ESS). The rest of the world already have access to high-energy/nickel lithium batteries, namely NCM/NCA, for mid/high EVs. LFP is like old spindle drive HDD (LFP) vs SSD (NCM/A).

That being said I'm not opposed to LFP -- it makes sense if you could get a cheap EV or ESS based on LFP.

LFP is for base, low-range models; Panasonic's NCA for the mid/perf trims and the MY in the US.

Tesla's QC problem is serious and still affects all EVs made in the US -- the batteries in these EVs have little to do with it.

Yep. I'm using Linux on a XPS 13 and Dell provides Dell Command Configure, aka, cctk. I set mine to 65%.

https://www.dell.com/support/kbdoc/en-us/000178000/dell-comm...

The US had its own LFP manufacturing pioneer, A123, but the company struggled with mass production and was sold to a Chinese company after factory fire and manufacturing defects, which IMO would have been tolerated in China.

So it's not just the patent system that is holding back the West. China was also able to get ahead in the battery race by blatantly ignoring the international trade rules under China's WTO obligation against illegal gov't "export subsidies," "local content rules," "forced IP transfer" via "forced joint venture," or outright ban on foreign competitors to protect local, weak players like CATL/BYD. China hasn't necessarily been too shy about their mercantilist ambition past 10 years, aka Made-In-China 2025.

>> I thought Tesla made its own batteries? <<

Tesla doesn't make their own batteries -- the company instead sources them from Panasonic (NCA), CATL (LFP), LG (NCM), and BYD (LFP).

>> So how does it benefit from some other company making cheap batteries? <<

Tesla doesn't really directly compete in the battery market despite all the hype about Tesla revolutionazing batteries, and is happy to buy from whoever is wiliing to offer the best price.

Tesla has used Panasonic's NCA since 2010's because of their high energy density and low $$/KWh; then came the Chinese LFP around 2020. The Chinese battery makers have enormous price competitive advantage b/c they dominate the raw material supply-chain (ie, mines, refineries). LFP's are however mostly limited to Tesla's base/standard range trims due to their low energy density and weight.

>> The percentage of cobalt in modern lithium ion batteries (ie: tesla/panasonic's nmc-811 cells) <<

Tesla uses Panasonic's NCA-9 mostly for North America; LG's NCM811 for Europe/China. Recycling nickel-based batteries are already profitable[1].

[1] Financial viability of electric vehicle lithium-ion battery recyclingVolume 24, Issue 7, 23 July 2021, 102787, Journal home page for iScience

>> Chinese leaped ahead once the US banned exports to certain Chinese companies, <<

hate to nitpick, but this was actually well underway before the US sanction kicked in. SMIC's 7/5nm was already completed by former head of R&D at TSMC in 2020, which was more or less a replica of TSMC's 7nm. It certainly didn't help that the US dept of Commerce allowed over $100+B worth of export licenses to China, 1/3 of them to "blacklisted" entities, in 2022. The Dutch gov't export restriction likewise didn't really start until few months ago, which also allowed latest DUVs capable of 5/7nm.

I guess compared to other competing family EV-SUVs in the segment it's not too expensive. Come to think of it, there isn't any. The Rivian R1S comes close, but way more expensive and isn't really a family SUV. The EX90 is also more expensive and according to some it isn't even nearly premium.

GM forecasted $87/KWh for Ultium cells by 2025 early last year. Then, just 9 months later, the company also reported 40% decline in cell cost YoY in 3Q of last year.

The price of lithium has fallen by 80+% since the 2022 peak: there isn't some CATL and BYD rivalry that some make it out to be.

80% of cobalt mines in Congo are owned and operated by the Chinese battery companies, such as CATL, the largest producer of LFP.