The specter of Better Place hangs over battery-swap efforts at the moment, however de Souza says Ample’s method addresses points that sank earlier iterations of the expertise.
For a third-party firm like Better Place or Ample to achieve floor, it should discover a technique to be appropriate with automobiles hitting the highway. But getting automakers to converge on a battery is a problem: corporations are more and more selecting totally different battery designs and chemistries for various fashions.
Ample’s resolution is a modular system. Rather than take the entire battery out without delay and screw on a recent one, the startup plans to suit a number of smaller packs right into a battery body. This cuts down on the price for equipment wanted to maneuver batteries, for the reason that items are smaller, de Souza says.
And crucially, the modular design may make it simpler for automakers to signal on, de Souza says. Ample’s imaginative and prescient is for automobile makers to ship their vehicles with an empty area the place the battery ought to be. Ample can then construct an envelope for that particular automobile and plug in as many modules as will match.
The variety of modules will be custom-made each to the scale of the automobile (a compact automotive will maintain fewer than a big SUV) and to driver wants—somebody would possibly set up just some modules for each day driving however load up when occurring an extended journey, de Souza says.
So far, Ample’s swapping stations are appropriate with two automobile fashions which have the corporate’s particular batteries put in: the Nissan Leaf and the Kia Niro. According to de Souza, the system works with 13 automobile fashions, although no different automaker companions have been introduced.
Some consultants are skeptical that even this altered imaginative and prescient of battery swapping is sensible. “I think battery swapping is unlikely to be the primary way that we manage batteries for the general vehicle fleet,” says Jeremy Michalek, a professor of engineering and public coverage at Carnegie Mellon University.
Every make and mannequin of electrical automobile on the highway at the moment has a special battery design, form, and chemistry. Swapping requires standardization, and even when modules can present some customization, they’d nonetheless be a significant constraint for automakers. “Putting the same size modules into different vehicles is very limiting,” he says.