It's becoming pretty clear that, for many battery manufacturers, one of the best ways to promote their products is to take part in various eco-challenges around the world, such as the Global Green Challenge (GGC) to be held in October 2009 in Australia. And that's exactly the case with Japanese company Panasonic, which has just announced its support of the Solar Electric Vehicle Team at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT SEVT), which will consist of supplying the team with its high-capacity (2.9 Ah) lithium-ion batteries.

Panasonic is providing the team with its 18650-type cylindrical high-capacity lithium-ion battery cells that are then mounted in arrays within a storage battery module. The same type of battery cells are widely used in laptop computers. Since this type of battery, featuring the highest level of energy density, is light and high capacity, it lasts longer and enables making battery modules lighter.

Now, let's take a quick look at some pieces of information regarding the race MIT's team will be involved in. The Global Green Challenge evolved from the World Solar Challenge, a solar car race first held in 1987 in Australia. Today, the Global Green Challenge includes the World Solar Challenge for solar-powered cars and the Eco Challenge for other types of environmentally conscious production cars, including fuel cell, electric and hybrid vehicles.

Teams from universities, corporations and other groups from around the world will compete, driving across the Australian continent from Darwin in the north to Adelaide in the south, over a distance of 3,021 km.

Besides the MIT team, Panasonic is separately sponsoring another, that of Japan's Tokai University, which will be competing in exactly the same category as MIT's vehicle. So, this is quite a “let the best solar-powered vehicle win” type of situation for Panasonic.


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