The world is splitting into two great battery zones with two competing chemistries. In one camp is the US-Korean industrial nexus; in the other is China, with Europe as a junior province. The technology race will slash battery pack prices by the mid-2020s, and slash them again by the turn of the decade.
The China-Europe bloc specialises on cheaper lithium iron phosphate batteries that last longer, degrade less in the heat, and don’t need cobalt from African child labour, but are 30 per cent less energy dense. The greenflation scare caused by COVID and Putin is subsiding. Battery components are in surplus supply. Global battery pack prices were $US153 kWh at the end of 2022. Goldman thinks they will fall to $US99 by the end of 2025, and $US72 by 2030.Electric vehicles will soon undercut combustion cars on a lifecycle or “total cost of ownership” basis on pure price in most places. “We estimate that cost parity without subsidies could be achieved around mid-decade,” they said.
The industry has now figured out how to harness silicon using nanotechnology. One leading start-up is the British firm Nexeon, a spin-off from Imperial College, London. It is building a commercial-scale plant in Korea to supply batteries for Panasonic, blending carbon and silicon as its secret sauce.The company’s Karandeep Bhogal told me that this cut costs by 20 per cent, boosts the driving range by 20 per cent to 40 per cent, and opens the way for a flood of smaller mass-market EVs.
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