Porsche will build a new kind of battery cells for electric race cars

Racing is a significant part of Porsche's heritage, and gradually adopting electric technology isn't going to keep the firm away from the track. It announced a joint venture called Cellforce whose task will be to design and manufacture battery cells suitable for high-performance race cars and a handful of high-end, racing-inspired production vehicles.

Powering a race car with batteries is difficult because the technology adds weight and requires more time to charge than it takes to fill up a fuel tank. Porsche is out to solve these issues, and it believes it's on the brink of a breakthrough. It's working on battery cells that rely on silicon as the anode material, a solution which should allow its engineers to boost a battery's power density and in turn decrease its overall size and weight to benefit performance. And, the new chemistry reportedly reduces a battery's internal resistance, meaning the pack takes less time to charge. It can also withstand higher temperatures than the technology found in electric cars in 2021.

Porsche warned this new battery isn't the tipping point that will make EVs mainstream. It doesn't perform well in freezing temperatures, and it's not designed to withstand years of use and abuse. This is perfectly fine on the track — races are rarely held when it's 10 degrees below zero, and race car components are replaced on a regular basis in pursuit of reliability. But the technology would be problematic if put in the hands of, say, a police department in Michigan.

Michael Steiner, the head of the German carmaker's research and development department, also clarified this isn't an answer to Tesla's Gigafactories. It's considerably smaller because it's primarily a racing-oriented project.