ANDRICHROSE:

Don't forget that BYD currently manufactures almost 50% of all the Nimh and lithium batteries in the world. As the major battery maker, it may have an hedge on Toyota in that field, especial with much lower mass production cost.

Eventually, China and India should produce the lowest cost PHEVs and BEVs for their own growing market and for export. Those two very large nations don't have the fossil fuel nor the agrofuel (potential) in large enough quantities for one billion gas guzzlers. Accellerated vehicle electrification is by far the best way to go for them. Let's hope that some of their lower cost future PHEB + BEV production will be exported to the Americas without undue restrictions.

This sounds great - but should we be slightly cautious about safety, quality, ability to deliver?? And from a global economic perspective - you don't need a degree from Wharton to know single source supplier economies crash and burn. Especially where political disfavor threatens to collapse investment.

But forget my opinion - let's see what Mike, Editor of Green Car Congress has to say about future lithium battery makers:

http://energytechstocks.com.previewmysite.com/wp/?p=164

If I read it correctly, the Americans and Japanese get the "A" and China... is no where to be found. Hmmm.

It is what I have been saying about vertical integration. Some comments said that car makers would just buy the batteries and everything would be fine. When they are such a key component to EVs I think it pays to be a battery manufacturer.

The fact that China produces electricity in lots of coal fired power plants is a concern. That is not exactly clean and green, but one step at a time. It would clean the air in the cities and then maybe they would get scrubbers and then maybe IGCC. People in China want cars, refrigerators and TVs. It is not all that much different than the U.S. in the 50s. It took us 20 more years to have an Earth Day. Maybe China will have their Earth Day some time after the Olympics.

Herm:

Why is it OK to use Chinese built HDTV, Computers, Cameras, Cell phones, Radios, GPS, Sound systems, refrigerators, stoves, washing machines etc and just about everything we wear but it would not be OK to use Chinese built cars battery packs? We may not have much of a choice, because the majority will be built in China, India, Japan or Korea. North American built units will be too expensive for affordable PHEVs and BEVs.

How loud will the crying be when the numbers on pollutants per unit arrive?? Will there be any proponents of higher cost manufacturing with low carbon footprints?

Harvey, I was just joking.. I'm sure any selling of chinese cars in the US will have to meet all the requirements of warranty and parts availability. A lot of the stuff we buy from China tends to be disposable, but not cars at $20k

Would you buy one if the battery had a 1 year warranty?, 2 years?, 5 or 10?.. there may be a lot of money tied up in that huge battery pack.

sjc:

It is too bad that a few billion $$, being wasted on oil wars, cannot be used to supply the initial investment capital required to build 20 to 30 highly automated factories to mass produce lithium batteries and efficient electric drive trains.

However, that may go against many free market and free enterprise principles.

Direct large investments into our own industries can only be done in war time. Wars have been faught for many reasons. Will electrification of ground transportation vehicles and fossil liquid fuel consumption reduction and huge multi-year trade deficits provoke trade wars?

Toyota probably couldn't just start up a competitive battery company at this point in the game. Buying one wouldn't be a bad idea.

I often wonder why we never hear about energizer or Duracell coming up with PHEV batteries.

Elliot:

Duracell and Energizer produce huge amounts of disposable batteries here in America, but for some reasons totally outsourced their rechargeable batteries manufacturing to China. About the same with other big battery producers in N.America. Batteries are produced on fully automated/robotic lines, designed and produced predominantly in US, and production cost for individual cell is the same in US, Japan, China, or elsewhere. Cheaper labor begin to weight in at the stage of packaging individual cells into assemblies.

US is second to none in development of new advanced batteries. Kind of strange situation (many economists tried to explain it, but to no avail): US develop best new rechargeable batteries, produce extremely expensive robotic lines for cell manufacture, then sell know-how and manufacturing lines oversea (for rechargeable batteries!), and then buy back bulk of the batteries.

And it is not just stupidity: looks like there are real economical factors involved in such “specialization”: America does what it does best, China, Japan, and Korea are doing the rest. Same story with computer chips: “developed in US made in Taiwan”.

building a battery factory in the US is probably difficult, with environmental and labor laws.. it may just take more time and paperwork and that cost lots of money to a manufacturer. Sort of like construction of Nukes was stopped in the US thru legal delays and permits.. all that cost money.

So, companies go where they can make the highest profits. There is nothing new there and that should come as no surprise. The U.S. can reduce benefits, wages and standards of living for working people and it will not benefit workers in developing countries all that much. The money that goes to contractors making products goes to the contractors and the workers get $1 per day in Viet Nam making Nike shoes.

Some politicians will tell you that this is good for the consumer, they get lower cost products. But the consumer has to have money to buy the products. Henry Ford had the right idea paying his workers $5 per day in the early 1900s. He wanted his factory workers to be able to buy the products that they produce. Henry was not a well educated man, but he had more common sense than most folks do today.

It is a real lose lose situation. Global economies make the rich richer all over the world. I think some of the grand plan rhetoric is that it will improve the lives of people around the world. Look at a decade of NAFTA and Mexico. I do not see flourishing prosperity for the masses there, but you do see a few very rich people becoming richer.