Fueling the future of mobility

The global pandemic, starting 2020, demonstrated that the established status quo of global trade, especially in raw resources, as well as cross-continental supply chains are more susceptible to disruption than thought before. This has been further exacerbated by the conflict in Ukraine, which extended consequences on global trade strained production and supply of crucial goods – such as grain, gas as well as metals for the modern industry.

Furthermore, the progressive transition towards green mobility will require sizeable amounts of special metals. For instance, NCM (Nickel – Cobalt – Manganese) batteries use 20+ different key materials across 6 main modules: Cathode, Anode, Battery System, Module periphery, Cell housing, Electrolyte separators and other components. Among all those materials, Lithium (2.1% in weight), Cobalt (6.1%), Nickel (6.1%), Manganese (5.7%) and Graphite (16.1%) appear most critical ones for an NCM111 battery^1,2.

In 2021, nearly 10% of light duty vehicles sold globally were EVs (however, four times the market share of 2019), amounting a total of 6.6M units (of which 4.4M EV, and the rest PHEV), and bringing the global fleet to 16.5M units (BEV of PHEV). As far as the heavy-duty market is concerned, in 2021, the global electric bus stock was 670 000 (4% of total) and electric heavy-duty truck stock was 66 000 (0.1% of total)³.

Going forward, by 2030, as penetration will increase, according to the IEA “StatedPolicies Scenario”, the global EV fleet across all road transport modes (excluding two/three-wheelers) will expand rapidly up to 200 million vehicles: an average annual growth of over 30%, reaching an approx. 7% global penetration rate⁴.

Therefore, EV batteries sector is expected to capture a more and more significant share of metals demand by 2030. The expected uptake in EV adoption will be reflected in the EV share of metals demand. 50+% of the lithium extracted in 2021 (as lithium carbonate equivalent) was used in EVs and storage⁵ ; this proportion should reach 80+% in 2030 following typical EV penetration rates scenarios⁶. Similar patterns are expected for Cobalt (34% i in2021⁷), Nickel (4% of Class I and Sulphate in 2021⁸) and natural Graphite (18% in 2019⁹).
 

¹ Drapeau, Pierrick. “Les batteries pour la mobilité. Guide à l’usage des décideurs européens pour s’orienter dans le siècle des métaux”. Deloitte, 2020
² Jan Diekmann et al. J. Electrochem. Soc. 2017; 164:A6184-A6191
³ https://www.iea.org/reports/global-ev-outlook-2022
⁴ https://www.iea.org/data-and-statistics/data-tools/global-ev-data-explorer
⁵ https://pubs.usgs.gov/periodicals/mcs2022/mcs2022.pdf
⁶ https://auto.hindustantimes.com/auto/electric-vehicles/global-ev-battery-market-exceeds-296-gwh-in-2021-41645424908081.html
⁷ https://www.cobaltinstitute.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/FINAL_Cobalt-Market-Report-2021_Cobalt-Institute-3.pdf
⁸ European Commission, Joint Research Centre, Fraser, J., Anderson, J., Lazuen, J., et al., Study on future demand and supply security of nickel for electric vehicle batteries, Publications Office, 2021, https://data.europa.eu/doi/10.2760/212807
⁹ https://www.deutsche-rohstoffagentur.de/DERA/DE/Downloads/Studie%20Graphite%20eng%202020.pdf?__blob=publicationFile&v=3