Owners of Electric vehicles (EV) may soon be able to swap their car batteries in as little as five minutes with new technology shortly to hit the UK.
Chinese car manufacturer Nio has launched the third generation of its Power Swap Stations, which allow motorists to replace their batteries in under five minutes.
As part of the Nio Power 2025 Battery Swap Station Deployment Plan, it aims to have 4,000 stations worldwide by the end of next year, with 1,000 of them located outside of China.
Across its network of Power Swap Stations, more than 20 million swaps have taken place as Nio begins its international expansion into Europe.
The company claims that all of its electric vehicle models are able to use the battery swap technology, with more than 56 per cent of charging for Nio models coming from battery swaps.
Nio, which is based in Shanghai, operates in Norway, the Netherlands, Sweden, Denmark and Germany, with 13 swap stations available. So far, more than 12,000 swaps have been completed.
The new swap stations allow drivers to have their vehicle battery swapped in just four minutes and 40 seconds – much quicker than charging an electric vehicle.
The mechanical process takes around two and a half minutes with the other two minutes seeing safety checks and vehicle positioning take place.
In its third generation, the battery swap stations can store 21 batteries, allowing many drivers to save time by avoiding needing to sit and wait for hours to let their vehicles charge.
Nio already has an advanced engineering research and development centre located in Oxford and has primarily been responsible for early concept development.
The company estimates that by 2025, 90 per cent of Nio drivers will be living less than 2 miles away from a battery swap station.
