Impact of lithium abundance and cost on electric vehicle battery applications

This paper addresses the issues of realistic specific energy levels attainable with Li batteries, the maximum number of electric vehicles as limited by the identified Li world reserves and the anticipated battery price. The Li-ion battery, LiC6/LixNiO2, is taken as the basis for the analysis presented here. It is shown that economically recoverable Li world reserves are sufficient to meet the demands of current new passenger car world production and its anticipated growth in the next 50 years. Currently identified world reserves can power 2 billion cars with Li-ion batteries, that is four times the number of cars presently registered in the world. World annual Li production of 10 000 metric tons would have to be increased l3-fold to power current new car world production with Li batteries. Such increase of the production capacity is seen as principally feasible. The ‘theoretical reactant cost’ — the absolute minimum reactant cost — for the Li-ion battery with Ni oxide cathode is US$ 19.20/kWh, compared to US$ 15.40 for the Ni/Cd and US$ 29.40 for the Ni/metal-hydride (AB2) battery. By comparison with the large-volume price for Ni/Cd vehicle batteries, a minimum price of US$ 330/kWh or US$ 8000 per 24 kWh battery is predicted for mass-produced Li-ion vehicle batteries, once the technology has matured. A battery life of 1000 cycles, already demonstrated in laboratory cells, results in a total vehicle mileage of approximately 126 000 miles when based on a 24 kWh battery. The cost of battery ownership and ‘electric fuel’ combined is 11 ¢/mile, that of car ownership and fuel combined 27 ¢/toile, if based on a vehicle price of US$ 23 000.