Un Bloomberg NEF report analyzes market trends and formulates forecasts on the cost of batteries for electric vehicles, which is falling vertically. And it tells us that the time for the “breakeven” is near.
Today, government incentives permitting, electric vehicles still cost a lot and certainly more than their petrol counterparts. Maintenance is certainly much cheaper (except in cases where the battery is affected) and in some cases recharging can be cheaper than refueling. But the cost of batteries, still very high, today keeps many buyers away from electric vehicles.
Fortunately, the cost of batteries per kilowatt hour appears to be continuing to decline, and according to a new report from energy research firm BloombergNEF (New Energy Finance), the market average is expected to be $ 101 per kWh by 2023. The psychological threshold to equalize the cost of electric vehicles to that of fuel vehicles is precisely that of a cost of batteries of $ 100 per kWh. In summary: within 3 years there will be no more difference in price, and indeed electric vehicles will cost less than petrol ones if environmental policies also continue economic incentives.
Price predictions
Some interesting data from this report. First of all, the finding that in China the cost of batteries for buses has already fallen below this threshold of $ 100 per kWh. As for the global average price of batteries in 2020 across all segments of electric vehicles (including personal vehicles, buses, stationary battery solutions and commercial electric vehicles), there is a new low of $ 13 per kWh.
That's an 89% drop from 2010, when the price was $1100 per kWh.
The causes of the collapse in battery costs?
BloombergNEF cites increased production due to sales growth. Other factors include falling production costs, the price of cathode materials and new designs. Essentially, they are all classic factors of basic economics. If you do anything more, prices fall as the entire ecosystem adjusts and becomes more efficient.
The report goes further: Bloomberg expects battery costs to drop to $ 58 per kWh by 2030. This could help significantly reduce the price of electric vehicles, especially if they too solid state batteries finally became stable enough to go mainstream. The report states that the manufacturing costs for manufacturing these types of batteries are 40% lower than current lithium-ion batteries.
