At OilPrice.com Felicity Bradstock observes:
Rising material prices over the last few years have sent EV manufacturing costs soaring, in an already expensive and highly competitive industry. Lithium, nickel, and cobalt prices have all increased in recent years, as shortages have been seen, and core battery components have also been hard to source due to supply chain constraints. Mounting pressures from governments, looking to reduce their dependence on major mining powers, such as China, are further complicating the situation by making automakers look for domestic suppliers or at least diversify their imports.
The future of the electric battery remains uncertain. As governments encourage a rapid transition away from fossil fuel-powered vehicles to EVs, no one is quite sure whether the battery manufacturing industry can keep up with the demand. A range of challenges continues to threaten output, with huge investments required to develop the mining operations and gigafactories needed to support battery production around the globe. Yet, progress remains slow considering the ambitious targets set out for EV production by governments worldwide.
Different people tell different stories. One story being told is one of enormously rapid technological advance and they attribute declining prices in batteries (and increasing capacity) to that. Another story is that battery production has been enormously subsidized, particularly by China. In that story the profits on the T-shirt or iPhone you bought are paying for the cheaper higher-capacity battery you see. There hasn’t been a major breakthrough in battery technology make it into production since the 1980s. Incremental technological and production improvements, yes, but no breakthrough technology. Maybe we’re due; maybe not.
In the meantime I hope someone can explain to me how demand rising faster than supply, slow improvements in technology and production, and shortages of labor and materials do not translate into higher prices.
Batteries are today’s gas lighting. Most electric vehicles will be powered using fuel cells, period. A few weeks back, they had an article about a new tractor trailer using ammonia for fuel cells.
Capitalists believe in the magic of the markets, except for when they dont want to believe.
Steve
BTW, did you that the U of Illinois is building a micro reactor? Penn State also? Many universities have small reactors but they are all old. Its nice to see these (liberal) universities leading the way on small scale nuclear.
Steve
I saw the article but didn’t read it. At this point the primary barriers to small modular reactors are regulatory.
As I’ve noted before small scale reactors aren’t new—there are probably more of them than of any other kind, cf. nuclear-powered submarines. Small modular reactors are new and NuScale just got regulatory approval on one of its designs. I suspect that increased interest on the part of universities and NuScale’s regulatory approval are related.
China is just now just building the world’s first SMR. The first two being built in the US are being built at universities and not at commercial sites. I think all of that suggests its more than just regulations.
Steve