The union minister said that India has no control over lithium and other raw materials needed to make batteries for electric vehicles.
- Different research is going on regarding the usage of sodium-ion and zinc-ion.
- Singh said India is working on hydrogen fuel cell technology, which has a lot of potential.
- At present, majority of electric vehicles sold in India use lithium-ion batteries.
India needs to move away lithium-ion battery technology for electric vehicles (EV) at the earliest, as the country has no control over the raw materials needed to build such batteries, Union minister V K Singh said on Wednesday. The country could also graduate to hydrogen fuel cells in its journey of green mobility, and players in the sector need to work simultaneously on these technologies from now onwards, the minister of state for road transport and highways, Singh, said at the inauguration of EV India 2022, an electric vehicle motor show.
He said there is a lot of work happening in the battery segment in India on how to reduce dependency on lithium-ion batteries.
Different research is going on regarding the usage of sodium-ion and zinc-ion “because we would like to get away from lithium-ion”, he added.
The minister said India neither produces lithium nor has control over it; the country has to import it.
“There is a problem where lithium is concerned, and the earlier we get out of it, the better it is,” Singh asserted.
At present, the majority of electric vehicles sold in India use lithium-ion battery technology, although some electric rickshaws are still powered by lead-acid batteries.
The minister said India is also working heavily on hydrogen cell technology, which has a lot of potential.
“We are at par with what is happening in Japan (in hydrogen fuel cell),” he said, adding India’s biggest advantage is that the cost is the lowest as far as green hydrogen is concerned because of low solar energy cost.
“In future, probably we are going to graduate from electric to hydrogen,” Singh said.
At present, there are no hydrogen-powered passenger vehicles on sale in India. In a bid to evaluate the feasibility of hydrogen fuel being used for road-going vehicles in the country, Toyota and the International Center for Automotive Technology (iCAT) joined hands to run a pilot project, earlier this year.
As part of this initiative, the carmaker and the agency are putting the Toyota Mirai fuel cell electric vehicle (FCEV) to the test in Delhi, to see how it fares on Indian roads and in local climatic conditions.
SOURCE: news n,ne
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