Yes, and unlike what has been done in the Prius, these were large-format cells. The patents on them ultimately ended up sold to a Chevron subsidiary, which would only license the technology under absurd terms. They assumed that lithium-based battery technologies wouldn't be suitable. Oops.
Yes, the exact same battery technology Toyota was already using in their Prius, which is still in-use in many Toyota hybrid models still on the road. The battery was not the problem.
Prius had 0.91 kWh battery and the EV1 had 26.4 kWh with NiMH. The EV1 was expensive, $80k to produce in 1996 money. A large part of that had to be the battery.
And despite that expensive battery, it could only go about 100 miles on a charge. For a point of reference, my old Tesla has a nominal 85kWh battery, which I think is actually about 77kWh usable, so about 3x the capacity. And its range is somewhat weak compared to what's typical today.
It's a pretty decent approximation to say that the battery is the only problem for EVs. Everything else is either standard car stuff, or small/cheap/simple enough not to be a major problem. Nearly all of the progress in EVs that we've seen since the EV1 has been down to battery improvements. Take the EV1 and give it a modern battery and it'll be pretty decent. Take any modern EV and give it a 1999 battery and it'll be absolutely awful.
I used to have a '16 Ford Focus EV and it could only go about 80 km on a charge. This turns out to be plenty enough to drive kids to school, drive downtown from the burbs, work a day, drive home, and have maybe 15-20km left on the thing for an emergency. As a second car alongside a gas SUV that got used maybe once a fortnight, it was fantastic; I honestly believe that there's a huge potential for smaller, lighter, simpler EVs that don't need the 3500 pound battery my new EV rides on top of.
There is a big market for it, but I don’t think that market exists until you go another 10+ years down the road. And then that market will likely be largely filled by used EVs.
The problem I see is that many people are skeptical of EVs, most people don’t have experience with EVs or any existing EV infrastructure (a charger at home), and having an extra car kind of sucks (parking, registration, insurance, etc).
Car buyers don't give you a mulligan for being great compared to existing tech. There's a reason EVs didn't start to really catch on until about 20 years later. 100 miles is great for late 1990s EV, but craptastic for a late 1990s automobile. Especially for a cheap-looking two-seater that cost as much to produce as a decent luxury sedan.
The first Nissan Leaf models had a comparable 24kWh (Li-ion) battery, for comparison. They can still be viable used cars for city driving and affordable to drive (particularly right now). Until earlier this month we had a business in our city which restored and recycled, primarily, Nissan Leafs and their batteries. The loss of EV incentives with the Trump administration may have been the primary reason for their recent closure.
You couldn't go far on those early Prius batteries. I had a circa-2009 Prius and semi-intentionally ran out of gas to see what happened. I was able to drive a couple of miles to a gas station, but the battery was depleting extremely quickly, and I doubt it would have lasted ten minutes.
