As a way to circumvent current supply chain shortages and skyrocketing raw materials costs, FoMoCo will soon be switching at least some of its Ford Mustang Mach-E and Ford F-150 Lightning models – though not the E-Transit, at least for now – to lithium-iron phosphate (LFP) batteries, which don’t use nickel or cobalt in their construction, and are generally cheaper, safer, and can be charged to 100 percent without worrying about speeding up battery degradation, though they’re also not as energy dense as lithium-ion batteries. In the case of vehicles like the base, rear-wheel drive, LFP-equipped Tesla Model 3, this results in a decrease in range, but it’s possible that EVs utilizing Ford LFP batteries may actually offer similar range to current models equipped with Lithium Nickel Manganese Cobalt Oxide (NCM) units.
“If you think about our current offerings standard range, the LFP batteries will come in at that standard range,” Lisa Drake, vice president of EV industrialization, Ford Model e, said while speaking at the media event announcing the new BlueOval Battery Park Michigan plant. “On the price, the whole point is to make EVs more affordable and accessible. We can’t give any specific pricing right now because that will depend on the market.”
Drake previously stated that Ford LFP batteries may only be utilized in standard range variants of the Mach-E beginning this spring and the F-150 Lightning starting in 2024. This could mean that extended range versions will continue to come equipped with the existing NCM batteries, though that’s unclear at the moment.
Regardless, Ford LFP batteries – which will be supplied by CATL initially before production begins at the BlueOval Battery Park Michigan in 2026 – will continue to be used in the automaker’s EVs through at least the end of this decade, and are expected to be at least 10 percent cheaper than comparable NCM packs.
We’ll have more on Ford’s switch to LFP batteries soon, so be sure and subscribe to Ford Authority for ongoing Ford news coverage.
Comments
Will the fire hazard increase too?
there were no fewer than 60+ LFP fires in China last year
In 2022 about 6m BEV were sold in China with LFP share approaching 60%.
This battery type has been taking increasing share of new BEV sales in China.
I’d imagine there are around 10m LFP cars on the road in China (this is just a rough guesstimate for chalktalk) if that’s the case, but given that, that mode is a 0.001% failure rate.
>> In 2022 about 6m BEV were sold in China with LFP share approaching 60%.<> This battery type has been taking increasing share of new BEV sales in China.<> I’d imagine there are around 10m LFP cars on the road in China (this is just a rough guesstimate for chalktalk) if that’s the case, but given that, that mode is a 0.001% failure rate. <<
Sure, 95% of all LFP EVs exist in China and we don't really get to hear anything about LFP EV fires in China. In one highly publicized accident earlier this year, a local judge in Cenxi, China was trapped and burned alive in a BYD HAN with LFP Blade on April 5, 2023, for instance.
SchlockAnd Blah: Will it make your comments any more relevant or any less less silly?
If the switch to LFP batteries is as Ford says…”cheaper, safer, and can be charged to 100 percent without worrying about speeding up battery degradation”…..why didn’t Ford start with this in the first place? This whole discussion is more focused on what is best for Ford, not their customers or the market place. Even less comfortable is the discussion around the ‘real costs’ to build batteries that is continually denied, deflected and deferred by the gaggle of BEV supporters. If it sounds too good to be true… be wary. BEV may well be the biggest con job of the century motivated by everything except real concern for the environment.
>> why didn’t Ford start with this in the first place?
b/c they are also heavier and have lower-density (ie, shorter-range). They are ok for non-moving stationary energy storage and low-end, short-range EVs.
LoL. You don’t ever call out the bad faith actors and their quotes for new battery replacement costs that no one in normal use will likely ever face.
You have gone full Big Oil K-street with your “con job unrelated to the environment “ nuttery.
I like how you now, much like Joe are engaging in reverse projection and are using elements of my brushback (my mention of Big Oil’s playbook of: Deny, Doubt, Delay), and clumsily reformulate it as “denied, deflected and deferred”.
And the “real this, real that” lines of argument you bring is just as sophomoric as it is silly.
As for why now? Perhaps it wasn’t possible to license the IP until now.
>>As for why now? Perhaps it wasn’t possible to license the IP until now. <<
It was never "impossible" to license LFP. They were already granted to China royalty-free for domestic use since early 2010's and was promoted as the CCP's state industrial policy (eg, no EV subsidies for non-LFP EVs by domestic battery makers to make sure nobody else can compete in their EV market). The key LFP patents however expired in 2021 which allowed China to export LFP batteries and EV's without paying any royalty.
We also must circle back to LFP's technical shortcomings and why even in China until 2022 last years the majority of new EVs sold were in fact NCM — they are low density, heavy and lose a lot of capacity in cold. LFP is excellent for entry-level, low-range EVs like the Hongguang Mini with just over 10kWh capacity, China's most popular BEV, which probably won't pass as a legal vehicle in the US.