ERRA plans lightweight EVs with nickel hydrogen batteries

San Antonio, Texas-based ERRA is looking to build affordable electric vehicles using battery technology pioneered for outer space.

The startup is taking a unique approach in the highly competitive EV market by using nickel hydrogen batteries to power ultra lightweight vehicles—a combination ERRA says surpasses competitors' products by offering a 300-mile range and more than 3,000 recharge cycles, CEO Jim Hogarth told the Cleantech
Group. 

ERRA is seeking $105 million in a Series A round to integrate its technologies, launch a pilot manufacturing facility, and deploy infrastructure for its lightweight EVs. The company previously raised $1 million in two rounds from family and friends.

"We have two enabling technologies: the batteries and the lightweight structures," Hogarth said. "The lightweight structures are key because vehicles weigh 50 percent less, so they will go twice as far on the same battery."

In the mid-1990s, Hogarth was a transportation engineer at utility Boston Edison under Bernard Reznicek. Reznicek tapped Hogarth to work on the Sunrise Project, which received grants from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency to develop a structural composite vehicle using no metal. The resulting vehicle went 377 miles on a charge, but Hogarth says he lost funding for his project after Reznicek retired.

Two years ago, Hogarth formed ERRA to again build structural composite vehicles, and ERRA bought battery technology used to power satellites. Nickel hydrogen batteries offer decent power and energy densities but have the advantage of not corroding because hydride has been removed from the battery, Hogarth said.

The technology is typically expensive, but Hogarth said ERRA has brought the cost down to $600 per kilowatt hour when building it by hand, while lithium ion batteries are about $1,000 per kWh. Hogarth said the company plans to further cut the cost to about $200 per kWh with mass production.

ERRA expects to develop 10 to 12 prototype vehicles to begin securing fleet contracts. The manufacturing line is planned for a 370,000 square-foot existing building in Somerset, Ky., which the state has offered to lease to ERRA for $1 a year for the next 20 years in exchange for moving its headquarters there. The facility is planned to produce about 6,000 vehicles a year for the U.S. market, but ERRA is in talks with potential partners in China, Canada, and Italy.

Hogarth declined to reveal details of the infrastructure plan for charging the EVs, but he said ERRA is developing a relationship to use another company's proprietary charging technology capable of recharging a battery in less than 10 minutes. Similar claims have been made at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (see Scientists discover 9-second lithium-ion recharge).

ERRA holds 15 U.S. and international patents on its technologies. ERRA is in the process of acquiring New Jersey-based technology development company Ergenics, which developed the battery technology ERRA has purchased. ERRA has three employees.

ERRA is one of 20 potential new global investment opportunities that the Cleantech Group added to its dealflow database this week—available exclusively to members of the Cleantech Network. Members can click here to search the dealflow database. 

Interested in electric vehicles? Here are two other EV companies from the Cleantech Group's dealflow database also looking for funding:

• Southern California-based Miles Electric Vehicles is seeking $40 million to get its highway-speed electric sedan to market by 2010 (see What economic slowdown?). The company says the funding could help it reach profitability. Miles previously raised $39 million (see Converting cellulosic ethanol into cash). Miles says it uses cash efficiently by outsourcing manufacturing and assembly. The company is retaining control of the branding, design and intellectual property. The electric sedan is expected to travel 100 miles on a charge.
• Austin, Texas-based battery maker Valence Technology (Nasdaq: VLNC) is seeking $608 million in expansion funding to finance the construction of a new manufacturing facility to be located in Central Texas. The $760 million facility is expected to produce lithium iron magnesium phosphate batteries for hybrid and all-electric vehicles. At full capacity, the facility could supply batteries for 250,000 vehicles a year.

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Browse previous pitches here.

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