A Battery Variable for PHEV game

Lithium-ion batteries are not a stable technology yet. Batteries would be an important part of a PHEV game simulation. Producers need to get their price points down to attract customers but that means bringing the price of the battery packs down. Lower priced batteries require engineering breakthroughs which have, historically, made the batteries more vulnerable to fire.

...

Cost reduction isn’t the only driving force behind the evolutionary march of Li-ion batteries. The desire to extend battery life, achieve higher energy densities and faster charging times, and improve reliability has led to a constant tinkering of the technology. Energy densities are double what they were five years ago, for example, and new surface coatings are being applied to make the batteries more stable and reduce their reactivity rates.

Ever-Increasing Demands, More Trade-offs

The trade-offs inherent in these often mutually exclusive goals make for a diabolical design challenge: You can make a Li-ion battery that has high performance, for example, but the trade-off is a shorter life. And as every design engineer knows, making the right trade-offs and getting everything right takes time, experience, and a bit of finesse.

“A problem doesn’t necessarily pop up during the first generation of cells,” says Miller. “Things may look fine in the lab and then when you go to production you find that the technology behaves in a slightly different way, which means things can and do go wrong.”

...

- http://www.electronicsweekly.com/blogs/engineering-design-problems/...

The battery will be a key component in a PHEV simulation game.