Rusty I think the company behind Project Better Place wants to own and refurbish the batteries with the car owner on something like a phone plan. You own the car, they rent, replace or recharge the batteries for a fee. Whatever dollar amounts they might quote are sure to change. It doesn't seem like a winner as we head toward double digit unemployment. Nor for anybody who can remember what it was like to drive for hours on a tank of cheap fuel.

Taswegian,

Yeah. I get the point of the business model, but the things have to be worthwhile to the individual daily use owner before there is a definite profitable economy of scale available to the hire company.

Which brings me to my question of the viability of the battery itself. How many discharge cycles before performance drops below 50% (or whatever). Seen any ads for the eco-friendly recyling of lithium polymer cells? Does Toyota tell us what it intends to do with spent prius batteries. How much for a full new set? I'm sure the info is out there and is good, I just happenned to miss it.

Rusty.

Did some more looking on recycling of Lithium polymer cells.

They should be more recyclable and safer than the nickel based chemistries, but there are few satisfactory programs in place so far.

I would love a genuine expert to comment as I have no way of filtering the many hits available.

Any takers?

Rusty.

I am surprised that no one has picked up on the real problem
Different electric cars will have different operating voltages.
They also may have different battery types.
The banks of batteries will probably be distributed into different
parts of the vehicle to distribute the weight and keep the weight on
each axle close to the same.

Different types of batteries require different charging rate profiles.
Does the car have its own built in 240 volt mains charger ?

Swapping battery banks would immediately imply a small bank of cells.
These are just the first problems that I can think up.
It seems to me that the charging station at a shopping centre or
workplace should be 240 volt and that the car have a built in charger.
With switch mode chargers not too much weight would be involved.
Then there are no problems with battery voltage and type etc.

My question, what happened to the idea of stations , to change the electolyte in car batteries?
No heavy lifting, no worry re battery voltage, delivery similar to filling with petrol.
The danger of fueling with acid can be little different to fueling with gas.
fluff

Lithium battery tech is coming along nicely now that there is some serious investment. Hobby modelers have been responsible for a lot of improvement, but there is nothing like an oil price shock to get some serious investment happening.
Government, of course is still supporting last centuries factories to keep their mates happy and be seen to do something for employment. (They need to setup another factory to disassemble large steel 6cyl cars: that will guarantee even more jobs! We can put finance execs in charge to ensure maximum jobs with minimum actual "stuff happening"
:-) )
Toshiba now has Lithium cells that can be fast charged in under 5 minutes. Still a bit too long for a roadside stop, but getting there.
Costs are more a factor of finance than technology now: Lithium is abundant and cheap, recycling is feasible.
For the ultimate power supply: Existing Solar/thermal technology is perfect for Australia and can be implemented at about the current cost of coal. (This has been done large scale in Texas, of all places) (Forget "clean coal" as it is an absolute scam. Will never be cost effective!)
The "problem" of investment is actually a "solution" to recessionary unemployment, so it is just a matter of priorities and distribution. Our priorities have been outsourcing industry and building expensive homes for the last decade, now it is time to shift back to productive industries.
Battery leasing will not work because it is too much part of the cost/performance/range decision and so should remain part of the vehicle.
Government can do more: Registration for EVs should be free for the next decade to encourage innovation.
Another thing is to allow electric bicycles to have more than 3 wheels to bridge the gap between open-air e-bikes and the sub 80kph commuter.
Removing the barriers to innovation should be the governments main role as they are clearly not capable of leadership in this or any other technical area.