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Report: Japanese Firms Increasing Production of Materials for Hybrids
10 January 2008
The Nikkei reports that Asahi Kasei Corp., Showa Denko KK and other Japanese companies are moving to increase production of materials used in hybrid vehicle components, such as batteries and motors, on expectations that the global market will grow sharply on the back of high crude oil prices.
Among the increases outlined in the report are:
Asahi Kasei plans to invest several billion yen to double the annual production capacity of separators for lithium-ion batteries.
Sumitomo Chemical Co. intends to spend ¥10 billion to increase output capacity of separators for lithium ion batteries by 2009.
Showa Denko plans to spend about ¥1 billion to raise annual output capacity for magnetic alloys used in motors by 25% to 10,000 tons.
Denki Kagaku Kogyo KK hopes to double capacity to produce metal parts used to dissipate the heat from motor controllers.
Nippon Steel Corp. and JFE Steel Corp. are expanding facilities for making high-grade electrical steel sheet used for motor cores.
Controlling a roughly 60% share of the market for digital equipment materials, which exceeds ¥6 trillion (US$54.7 billion) a year, the Japanese materials industry is now poised to take the lead in the hybrid vehicle arena by setting up production facilities ahead of foreign competitors.
January 10, 2008 in Brief | Permalink | Comments (4) | TrackBack (0)
Comments
Posted by: kert | January 10, 2008 at 06:13 AM
The developement of these parts can be used both in the electric as well as hybrid vehicles. They can also be used in the production of hydrogen/fuel cell vehicles which are basically electric.
The increased production, leverages the knowledge base of what they have done in the mass production of hybrids already and gives them them a base to jump into various future markets if the market turns in that direction.
Kudos for them. Too bad the North Am firms looked into short term profitability rathr than what would happen (ie high priced oil like '73).
Posted by: aym | January 10, 2008 at 09:24 AM
PHEV and EV are the only way to go in the future. Nuclear and geothermal energy will generate the electric power to supply the "plugs" for the plug-ins of the future. Zero CO2 and unlimited power in all weather, including cloudy and windless days. The Japanese have their eye on the prize for the future.
Posted by: Larry | January 11, 2008 at 05:40 AM
This is electrifying.
Posted by: gr | January 11, 2008 at 11:18 PM
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Hybrids ? Japanese firms are planning for fullscale EV commercialization, with only intermediary sidestep for PHEVs perhaps, take a look at their integrated roadmap here:
http://www.electricdrive.org/index.php?tg=fileman&idx=get&inl=1&id=36&gr=Y&path=&file=Ishitani.pdf
Very much up to date, describes all technology development, vehicle development and infrastructure development, and also mentions 2009 commercialization targets, that some of the manufacturers have set.