Featured VW Plans to Go All-Electric in Europe, US Later

4-6 batteries in a lifetime?

My current car is 5¼ yrs old, with original battery, previous car was 6 yrs old when I sold it - with original battery, one before that, the battery lasted the 4 years I had it, and my sister replaced it about 2 years later.

 

Some advocates may wish EV sales will be that high, but it very likely won't be.

2019 had 2.26 million EV sales, and 2020 will be in the 2.5 to 3.24 million range. Prediction for 2025 has 12.2 million. By 2030, EVs will likely be over 25% of annual car sales. Getting to 50% in that time would be an big achievement.

But EV batteries last a lot longer than a year. So the number of past sales is what we want for predicting number of EV batteries no longer working for cars. Let's say worse case, the packs are only good for 5 years in a car. Evidence says they last longer, but this is for argument's sake.

That would mean having to deal with about 1.5 million packs worldwide today. A total of around 10 million EVs will have been sold by the end of 2020, so 8.5 million to deal with in 2025. By 2030, it will 46 million.

When 76 million EVs are actually sold in a year, those batteries will be in the car for 5 to 10 years, or even longer. After that, most will go on to a second life as large scale UPS for cell towers and other sites, or into grid storage, because at that time, it will be viable to actually gather up to car batteries for that purpose.

After years in that second life, the batteries will finally be trash. As has been pointed out, the research and development to recycle them has already started. By the time there is actually enough truly dead EV batteries to be concerned about, the means of recycling will be in place.

IHS Markit forecasts global EV sales to rise by 70% in 2021 | IHS Markit
Electric vehicle trends | Deloitte Insights
EV-Volumes - The Electric Vehicle World Sales Database
Global EV Outlook 2020 – Analysis - IEA

 

The "average" age of a car in the US is now ~12 years. This is not years to EOL but the average age of cars on the road. So a good estimate is that cars keep getting new batteries until 20 years or so. That would be about 4 batteries. However, as cars age people tend to drive them less and this can lead to a shorter battery life. Some cars last even longer and get more batteries.

Mike

 

Question though:
What is the definition of all-electric in Europe (I think many cases that includes hybrids)?

So it makes sense VW would be later in USA because our policy no hybrids allowed. must be 100% BEV.

PS: I like my EGO eMower so far...only $400 for great quality push mower..and it's got LED headlights....maybe tonite at dusk I will do some. But battery replacement maybe $300+...I might be better off getting a new mower+battery combo when the time comes? Sell a the new Mower sans battery?.