Nyobolt’s electric sports car shows 5-minute fast charging function in action

If there were reliable, high-performance electric vehicle fast chargers everywhere and you could get a range of about 100 miles in four minutes, would you really need such a large battery?

While Cambridge, UK-based Nyobolt’s very fast-charging battery cells aren’t the solid-state cells so eagerly awaited as a potential game-changer for electric vehicles, they raise some of the same questions. Without so much worry about charging rates, automakers might be able to curb the bloat of ever-larger battery packs – leading to lighter, greener electric vehicles.

Prototype of the electric sports car Nyobolt

Nyobolt says its 35-kWh battery pack is compact enough to power a very lightweight 2,750-pound sports car, within 100 pounds of the weight of the original Lotus-based Tesla Roadster. The company has built the battery pack into a prototype from Callum, the electric-vehicle startup run by former Jaguar design chief Ian Callum.

While the electric sports car concept was unveiled last year, it is now a drivable vehicle. The company says this prototype will “advance real-world testing of the technology and allow OEMs to experience Nyobolt’s ultra-fast charging technology firsthand.”

Prototype of the electric sports car Nyobolt

Prototype of the electric sports car Nyobolt

Prototype of the electric sports car Nyobolt

Mathematically, charging from 10-80% in under five minutes means the Nyobolt pack is charging at nearly 350kW for much of that time. Nyobolt says the first four minutes of charging the pack – on a CCS port – is maxed out at a constant current of 500 amps, adding 120 miles of WLTP range (probably nearly 100 EPA-equivalent miles) in that time.

Nyobolt points to its niobium oxide anode materials as the key to how its low-impedance lithium-ion cells avoid the cell degradation concerns that typically accompany such charging rates. The company says these 24.5Ah cells completed deep discharge cycles with fast charge cycles equivalent to more than 600,000 miles.

Prototype of the electric sports car Nyobolt

Specifically for this application, Nyobolt’s battery cooling circuit includes a chiller and an AC compressor/condenser to maintain the battery temperature at 60°C (140°F) or less.

Nyobolt says it could start producing its cells in small batches in a year, making 1,000 packs possible by 2025. It is also in talks with eight different automakers about using its technology in high-performance electric vehicles. Whether this will lead to electric vehicles that are truly lightweight depends on charging, now more than ever.