Abstract:

In Europe and Asia, where most people live in high-rise buildings, electric vehicles (EVs) powered by portable batteries overcome two major deployment issues. The first is a lack of power-charging infrastructure, which makes an American-style charging model that works in the garage of a detached or attached single-family home impractical. The second issue is range anxiety, as it is much easier to recharge portable batteries at nearby public facilities like restaurants and cafes. The modularity of portable batteries further enables better battery-to-vehicle interoperability across different auto makes brands, and manufacturers, thus, faster and easier EV deployment. In this paper, the authors show that such a portable modular battery development scenario for EVs can be accomplished, within the realm of current technologies, over the next few years. This can be done with the help of thin-film photovoltaic cells embedded in automobile windows and a carefully optimized charging strategy. The authors propose a modeling framework to plot the EV battery technology frontier, where such a scenario is feasible, and derive the optimal sizing of modular batteries.