EV technology has been touted as the future, swapping combustion engines and fuel tanks for electric motors and batteries.
Yet despite electric cars already making their way into the mainstream, the tech that powers them remains something of a mystery, with manufacturers offering very little explanation as to exactly how electricity from a plug socket is stored in your car and subsequently consumed and transformed into kinetic energy via the electric motors.
Porsche invited us to its battery development centre in Weissach to speak to its experts so we can cut through the fog and demystify EV technology.
How do EV batteries work?
Most electric car batteries are of the lithium ion variety, which is essentially a much larger version of the one found in your smartphone. A battery pack comprises several different modules, which contain a variety of cells; the Porsche Taycan’s 93kWh Performance Battery Plus, for example, boasts 33 modules, each accommodating 12 cells.
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Each cell has a positive ‘cathode’ and a negative ‘anode’; the former is typically made from either Lithium Nickel Manganese Cobalt Oxide (NMC) or Lithium Iron Phosphate (LFP), while the latter is usually made from graphite. These are split by a non-conductive separator, with a liquid ‘electrolyte’ solution surrounding it all, enabling lithium ions to be transferred between the positive and negative ends.
