An electric vehicle battery that doesn’t need electricity for charging

08 Apr 2021

What if you no longer had to plug your electric vehicle (EV), which uses expensive and heavy Lithium ion batteries, into an electrical socket for charging?

What if there was a much lighter, cheaper and greener battery that use just air, water and the metal aluminiun to generate electicity and does the job more effeciently by giving a driving range that's more than double that a Li-on battery offers, that too without the need for electricity to charge it?

This could become a reality in the country a year or two down the line thanks to state-run oil marketing giant Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) and Israeli clean energy startup Phinergy that are working on commercialising Aluminium-Air (Al-Air) batteries for EVs in India.

A prototype has been developed with 25 Al-Air cells stacked in a series and is being tested in electric cars with Maruti Suzuki, in electric trucks and buses at Ashok Leyland and in electric three wheelers with Mahindra amp; Mahindra.