RIO DE JANEIRO — Brazilian mining company CBMM has began to test on Volkswagen electric trucks a niobium-based battery that it claims could be charged way faster than the others available in the market, the businesses said on Wednesday.
CBMM, backed by Brazilian billionaire family Moreira Salles, which also runs lender Itau Unibanco, hopes the project could help it reach its goal of multiplying nearly ninefold its battery unit revenue, to $100 million by 2026, its executives told Reuters.
The corporate sells niobium products to steelmakers as its primary business, but CBMM has been seeking to diversify its revenue sources.
It launched on Wednesday at an event in its Araxa plant a prototype of the brand new ion battery, developed alongside Toshiba and made with lithium and niobium.
CBMM’s executive industrial manager on the battery division, Rodrigo Amado, told Reuters the technology utilized in the battery allows it to be fully recharged inside 10 minutes when utilized in a electric bus.
A standard battery takes three to eight hours to be fully recharged, in line with the executives.
For now, the product might be tested in only one electric bus from Volkswagen Caminhoes e Onibus, a Brazilian unit from Volkswagen truck division Traton, they said.
The truck within the tests has a spread of 60 kilometers (37.3 miles) and would carry 4 batteries.
CBMM said it intends to sell the product available in the market as early as next 12 months.
Executives from the businesses involved within the project said the battery could even have an useful lifetime of as much as thrice longer than conventional batteries, as its techonology would operate in lower temperatures.
This Article First Appeared At www.autoblog.com
