Volkswagen Lithium-Air Technology as good as Tesla ?

Fossil fuels may not be the cleanest way of powering us between two points on a map, but there's little doubt they offer convenience.
So far, scientists have struggled to find batteries for electric cars that match the huge amounts of energy stored in a gallon of gasoline or diesel. As a result we get big, heavy batteries with relatively short range.


Volkswagen thinks it may have found a way to triple that storage capacity though, with the latest generation of lithium-air battery technology.

The new chemistry could mean a battery of equivalent physical size to that used in the new 2015 Volkswagen e-Golf--currently 24.2 kWh--could hold 80 kWh of energy, more like that of a top-end Tesla Model S.


That, in turn, would give some impressive numbers for electric-car range, pushing it well into triple figures rather than the 70 to 100 miles of most electric vehicles on sale.


The precise chemistry, reports The Telegraph, has not yet been revealed. VW is understandably keeping it under wraps while it's in development, but Dr Heinz-Jakob Neusser (Volkswagen Group board member responsible for development) confirms it's a lithium-air unit.