BREAKTHROUGH FOR A MAJOR CHANGE?

THE ONE-MINUTE RECHARGE.

If automakers hadn't been so shortsighted and abandoned their battery electric vehicle programs, zero-emission, fossil fuel free cars and trucks that recharged in a minute would be available within a year or so.

Long recharge times were one reason automakers said consumers wouldn't flock to battery electric vehicles. But now with a breakthrough battery announced by Toshiba, battery recharging up to 80-percent will take one minute, with a full recharge only a few minutes longer.

One whole minute. Eighty percent recharge. That's it. The automakers should have guessed the breakthrough would eventually happen.

It would take less time to reenergize a battery electric car that used Toshiba's new lithium -ion Super Charge Batteries than it would to fill up the tank in an average-sized car. So much for long recharge times being hurdle to the success of battery electric vehicles.

Range, another problem, is also solved by the new product. Even on a long trip if an electric car only traveled 150 miles per charge the vehicle's battery could be recharged in less time than it took to stop for a cup of coffee.

Cost, the third big factor, is unknown with this breakthrough at this point.

Toshiba gives the success of the new technology to nanotechnologies and says in a press release that the negative electrode uses new nano-particles to prevent organic liquid electrolytes from reducing during battery recharging. The nano-particles quickly absorb and store vast amount of lithium ions, without causing any deterioration in the electrode.

In testing the battery loses only 1 percent of its capacity after 1000 charge and discharge cycles.

The company says that automotive and industrial sectors will be targeted first, particularly for hybrid electric cars.

In a hybrid the ability for a quick recharge will translate into more energy captured in regenerative braking. (A guess is that they would have said they would target the electric vehicle market first had electric vehicles been available, which they're not, of course, at least from major manufacturers.)

According to charts offered by Toshiba with their press release, the new technology performs better than other energy storage solutions, even ultracapacitors. For the full press release, specs and charts visit the Toshiba Japan website (in English) at http://www.toshiba.co.jp/index.htm