Politicians have decreed that Europeans will have to adopt electric cars and, to ensure this, seek to force early retirement of internal combustion engine (ICE) cars. But the scarcity of a key battery component, lithium, can simply sabotage this plan and force automakers to return to the drawing board.
Experts say existing lithium materials are good enough for the percentage of the existing global electric car market of around 2.6% and will most likely remain at the expected expansion speed of around 14% in Europe until 2025. But after this request you will pass the source and avoid the expected hard. accelerated sales of electric cars.
Some passionate politicians, activists and experts expect sales of electric battery cars (BEVs) to succeed in about 50% of the global market by 2030, but lithium materials are unlikely to be close to demand for required batteries.
The European Union (EU) has passed a law that insists that car brands accumulate the average fuel power of new cars over approximately 57 miles, consistent with the US gallon from 2020/2021 to 92 mph by 2030. This would require a large majority of VTE, unless the EU can be consistent in order to dilute the requirements, which some say will wreak havoc in the European car industry.
This raises questions about the policy of automakers, who are relentlessly adapting to the strength and diversity of ICE cars. This meant the use of massive batteries, which question one of the main reasons why electric cars are in the first position: their own quality and without carbon dioxide. As demand for electric cars accelerates, the value of some key minerals used in batteries such as cobalt, copper, nickel and, of course, lithium may be forced to rise, questioning the entire direction of the design.
It would be wiser to try another strategy and produce a simple electric vehicle with much smaller batteries, simply smart for locals and shopping, a truly glorified golf car, which can charge a fraction of the value of a general one. ICE car: say $6,000 compared to the existing value in Europe for a small electric sedan of about $40,000. This would force politicians to settle for ICE-powered cars to be there for many years to come.
During the 2030s, when some European countries claim to have eliminated the new ICE cars, some forecasters claim that up to 80% of new cars will continue to run on fossil fuels. Gautam Kalghatgi, visiting professor of mechanical engineering at Imperial College London and engineering sciences at Oxford University, says more than 85% of UK shipments will continue to operate through ICE by 2030. Britain is probably a typical European country and said it would ban sale. ICE cars until 2035 and postponed it until 2032.
Meanwhile, advances in the lithium market can take those decisions to a critical level.
Pedro Palandrani, a research analyst at Global X in New York, said lithium materials are likely to be good enough until 2023 and 2024.
“But I find it hard to see how there will be enough (lithium) materials through 202 and five. There is still time for miners to invest in lithium production, but it takes between 4, five or 6 years to put a mine on the market and a lot of time and knowledge. It’s not like, for example, the oil market, when in less than 6 months you can move from extraction to sale,” Palandrani said in an interview.
Palandrani said that because lithium costs are very low lately and some mines operate at production costs below market operating costs, there are not many incentives to reverse the desired massive sums. While SALES of BEV are successful at approximately 50% of the market site by 2030, Palandrani said it would want about 2 million metric tons of lithium carbonate (LCE), more than 6 times the 2019 demand of approximately 300,000 tons of LCE.
Another explanation for why lithium mining corporations may be reluctant to invest heavily in long-term sources is the concern that a new generation may emerge and make investment unnecessary. According to Fitch Solutions Country Risk – Industry Research, recent inventions replacing lithium with stacked sodium would likely pose dangers to lithium-ion batteries in the remote future, even if they do not describe the term “far.”
“On July 20, NUST miSIS scholars( (en.misis.ru) of the Russian Academy of Sciences and Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf (www.hzdr.de) reported that stacked sodium atoms can be used to produce batteries with less charge and equivalent or greater capacity than lithium. Although at the beginning of testing, if additional studies lead to less expensive battery production, we may only hope that sodium is an effective charging competitor for lithium-ion batteries,” Fitch said in a report.
IHS Markit does not believe that the lithium source is a problem, as sales of BEV will not account for approximately 50% of the global market until 2030, up to 17.1%. This will surprise major automakers such as Volkswagen, which expects to achieve 25% of its global sales in the form of BEV by 2025.
“I don’t think (the lithium supply) will make BEVs questionable according to our forecasts, because we still expect more than 80% of internationally produced cars (by 2030) to continue using the internal combustion engine in one way or another. , not just a battery for propulsion. So I don’t agree that a massive increase in sales is expected, but a significant increase in the number of annual sales we see today,” said IHS analyst Markit, Devin Lindsay.
Will IHS make its BEV forecasts?
“No, because we do not anticipate that lithium scarcity will be the main barrier to bent penetration in this period, specifically in the United States. The urgent highest pitfalls are: a comprehensive and sustainable fuel economy policy (especially for the United States). ), customer-acceptance and loading infrastructure. As a result, we haven’t noticed the desire to decrease the existing prognosis in any way,” Lindsay said.
David Merriman, analyst at London-based commodity researcher Roskill, agreed that a new lithium capacity will be needed with the rise of what he has called “mega-refineries” to meet beV’s call after 2024. This will require massive investment. , from battery or vehicle manufacturers. it’s not going to be in the meantime, the progression of a new generation of semiconductors will mean even more lithium supply.
“It is certain that the needs of solid-state batteries will create a major bottleneck in the lithium industry, as generation is still developing across many corporations because of the revolutionary effect it would have on battery power density,” Merriman. Said.
The mix of stricter lithium materials and the lack of uns subsidised calls for electric cars suggests that the EU would likely have to loosen its crackdown on ICE vehicles, or industry may also simply replace its existing plan to produce electric cars that immon the qualities of existing ones. ICE Array Vehicles This may also be an opportunity for small and reasonable cars like the Citroen Ami 1, which has a forty-five mile diversity and a more responsive speed of approximately 30 mph, but will charge about $6,000 or be rented. consistent with the time.
Lindsay from IHS Markit that this may be just an ICE lifeguard or spark marks to replace tactics.
«… At least for the United States, I would say that we would see a continuation of tactics to continue the power of ICE or to focus on reducing the bureaucracy of electrification, such as comfortable hybrids if lithium were so in question. Other regions where those smaller cars in segments A and B (urban cars and a small circle of family cars) are more in demand or emerging markets, would possibly be much more receptive to less expensive and limited-range ERVs,” Lindsay said.
As a former European Reuters correspondent, I spent a few years writing about the industry. I’ll penetrate the hype and arrogance and find
As a former European auto correspondent for Reuters, I spent a few years writing about the industry. I’m going to get to the hype and the bragging of the corporations and find out how those gigantic corporations are doing. I also like to drive your adorable machines and your maximum modesty. I’ll tell you if the generation works too.