Lowering EV cost: Proven methods
| Electric cars cost more for the initial purchase, but fuel and maintenance is much lower than oil-fired cars.
For example, look at Fork Lift trucks. The initial cost of an Electric fork lift is higher than the propane or diesel version, but fueling is
negligible and the cost of upkeep is mostly confined to the hydraulic system. Naturally, the battery is the big expense, but industrial production has brought the life-cycle
cost down to about parity. Purchase decisions are based on safety (the battery provides ballast, and no fire danger or exhaust) and factors such as
whether it will be used outdoors.
| | An Electric car consists of roughly the same cabin amenities as an oil-fired car, plus a big battery, a lot of electronics and a rather large brushless motor-controller.
| | The cost of the motor-controller is not high, and it lasts millions of miles.
| | So the big cost is the battery. Once again, let's look to lead-acid batteries, such as found in the humble fork lift, for a guide to how cost was lowered.
| | When a lead-acid battery finally fails, after 10 or 15 years, it can't be disposed of except for recycling. Moreover, it's not profitable to separate the metals and alloys for
sale on the metals market; in general, lead batteries are remelted down into new lead batteries, using the same alloys and metals that were in the original battery.
Thus, the only cost is the cost of recycling, since there is already an "urban junkyard" of lead batteries, no new mining needed -- except for new vehicles. Using this
simple method, the recycle value of a battery is higher than the metals-market value. In the same way, the Japanese pioneered the electric mini-mill for steel production; using scrap
iron and steel, monitoring the Carbon, Manganese and other alloys, they were able to bypass the much more expensive roasting process that is required to turn iron ore into steel.
This method lowered the boom on old-time steel companies, who failed to understand the importance of remelting down scrap metals.
| | Thus, Nissan's idea with the LEAF (and any other battery user who expects to succeed) is to remelt down the metals in depleted Lithoum batteries, avoiding
the need for buying new materials except for new vehicles. Once the "urban junkyard" is propagated with millions of batteries, recycling becomes even more
important.
| | When oil-fired cars were new, they were relatively expensive, since they were made in small quantities and usually by hand. Engines cylynders,
for example, were often drilled out by hand. Only the use of mass-production methods, and an enormous at-risk investment (not just in plant, but in
oil refineries, gas stations, hard-surface roads, etc.) because people thought that was the way they wanted to go. Sure, horse-and-buggy were cheaper, but
autos were exciting.
| | What it takes to lower costs, as the Chinese just proved with solar panels, is that simply making a lot of them lowers the cost dramatically. In the
case of solar panels, from $4/Watt down to $1/Watt, making solar rooftop power much less expensive than grid utility power.
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