Elon Musk: Our (= Tesla) cells have been in cars for several months. Silicon anodes ?! 4680 ?!

Elon Musk tweeted three sentences that clearly define the message of Battery Day. During the conference, Tesla's boss announced and promised, meanwhile, as it turned out, "Tesla cells [4680] in packages have been in cars for several months." But this statement is part of an even larger and more interesting whole.

4680 cells are already in prototypes, they will be in a Tesla Model Y from Berlin, probably New Mexico.C by LG Chem

Table of contents

• 4680 cells are already in prototypes, they will be in Tesla Model Y from Berlin, probably NMC from LG Chem
  • Large energy storage from LFP, smaller and cars from NM, largest cars from hN
  • News # 1: Are NCA cells gradually marginalized, including Panasonic?
  • Newsletter #2: What do these “Providers” tweets mean?
  • News No. 3: 4680 cells in new packages are already in motion
  • News item # 4: European Tesla Model Y will have 4680 cells

Let's start with Twitter. The conversation there must be fully translated and then put into context in order to understand its meaning. So here it is (source):

The entire catalog of Mars: Elon, are you making 4680 cells with three different cathodes [graphite, silicon and nickel]? Or, when you talked about graded approach, were you talking about outsourcing?

Elon Musk: Suppliers. We're only dealing with high-energy nickel, at least for now. Also, it may not have been clear from the presentation that we actually had our cages in a pack of driving cars for several months. Prototypes are trivial, mass production is difficult.

Large energy storage from LFP, smaller and cars from NM, largest cars from hN

The conversation revolved around a slide where different types of cathodes matched different needs. Left:

• LFP cells, with lithium iron phosphate cathodes (no cobalt) go to places where price matters, i.e. Tesla Model 3 SR + (and others), new Tesla, energy storage devices,
• NM cellswith lithium-nickel-manganese cathodes (NM67?) they go where range is important, that is, a good capacity to mass ratio; in the picture we have Powerwall (home energy storage), Tesla Model Y, Tesla Model S and Tesla Model X,
• hN cells, with high-nickel lithium-nickel cathodeswithout other elements?, will be used where the highest energy density is needed, such as the Cybertruck and Tesla Semi.

Let's read this information carefully:

News # 1: Are NCA cells gradually marginalized, including Panasonic?

Until now, Tesla has used lithium-ion cells with NCA cathodes, [lithium] nickel-cobalt-aluminum. The approach was slightly changed in China, where NCM and LFP cells appeared, but in the Middle Kingdom it looked only like a preliminary experiment. Moreover, Panasonic recently boasted that it is improving NCA cells, and it is planned to get rid of cobalt only in a few years.

Meanwhile, the presentation shows that the future of NCA cells is in question. They are definitely not on the left side. They may be right, but Tesla played a role. Internally, they are displaced by NCM cells.

An open question: how is the collaboration between Tesla and Panasonic going?

Newsletter #2: What do these “Providers” tweets mean?

As Elon Musk explained, Tesla deals with the right side of the presentation, and leaves the other two to suppliers. Seen from the left, you can even roughly quote the names: CATL / CATL and LG Chem / Tesla (and Panasonic?).

This knowledge will be useful to us in news # 4.

News No. 3: 4680 cells in new packages are already in motion

Tesla cells in packages are on their way. Our Elements can be composed of 4680 cells as well as high nickel cells with silicon anodes. And probably both, because the Tesle Semi prototype and at least one Cybertruck are actually already working. That is, they have been tested for resistance to stress, degradation during charging, etc.

Cybertruck (c) Tesla Owners Online / Twitter

An open question: do they also drive ordinary civilian cars, for example, in the form of nested modules?

News item # 4: European Tesla Model Y will have 4680 cells

During the Q&A session, Elon Musk announced that "they will be producing cells in Berlin." Statement maybe In terms of production as a whole, the plant will produce the elements, but Panasonic has not yet boasted that it is opening its lines there (those in Nevada are owned by the Japanese).

It looks therefore, the fact that "we will be producing cells in Berlin" should be understood more broadly: "Tesla will build its own cells in Berlin ".

And since Tesla is immediately tuned to 4680 links, since they provide higher structural strength, those from Berlin will either flow across the ocean to the Cybertruck and Tesla Semi, or European Tesla Model Y will have 4680 cells.

The latter makes sense, but the middle section of the Tesla Model Y slide is nickel-manganese (NM) cells, not high-nickel cells. Meanwhile, statements show that Tesla is currently focusing on high-nickel cells (working we marked them as "hN"). Hence, we draw the following conclusions:

• considering that there will be a battery factory in Giga Berlin, we expect that Tesla Model Y will sooner or later receive a structural battery based on 4680 cells.so that everything is in place,
• Since the Tesla Model Y will have a 4680-cell structural battery and Tesla is focusing on high-nickel cells, this means that other suppliers (LG Chem!) will manufacture 4680 cells with nickel-manganese cathodes..

> Completely new Tesla components: format 4680, silicon anode, “optimal diameter”, series production in 2022.

Note from the editors of www.elektrowoz.pl: As Elon Musk himself noted on Twitter, the presentation, like the presentation, allowed numerous interpretations. Not all of the above conclusions may be correct, although on the whole everything seems logical to us.

Story about cathodes from 1:33:21:

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