The Volt–the car we’ve all been waiting for–is going to be one of the big stories at the North American International Auto Show taking place next month in Detroit.
General Motors sent out an e-mail blast today stating that GM and government officials will make a landmark announcement regarding the Volt battery on January 7 at 9:30 EST. If you’ve never been to Detroit, early January truly is the best time of year to visit.
Much we already know. The Volt will have a 16 kilowatt/hour battery largely engineered by Compact Power, a joint venture that includes South Korea’s LG Chem. (Compact will make the cells–GM will fuse them into a battery pack in a plant in Michigan.) It has a lithium manganese chemistry, less volatile than those lithium cobalt batteries in your notebook, and it will be based around prismatic (or rectangular) cells instead of cylindrical ones to take up less room. Some experts claim that lithium batteries cost around $900 a kilowatt hour, but rumors percolate that GM and Compact will get close to the $500 range. Still, that would be an $8,000 battery, which partly explains why a Chevy will cost close to $40,000.
Source: seekingalpha.com
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