Calc:If all vehicles were electric

Suppose we keep the status quo of transportation, but make all vehicles electric. This raises some basic questions:

How much electricity would we need to power all the vehicles?
How much energy would it take to manufacture vehicles - both in the short term and long term?
Which critical minerals would we need, and how much of each?
Could the minerals be recycled from vehicles at their end-of-life?

Powering the vehicles

Electric cars are more energy-efficient than gas cars, but use a different type of energy, so this might seem like "comparing apples to oranges". But still we can use this knowledge to help make an estimate. Let's start by establishing a simple ratio:

electric_car.efficiency

100 miles per 34.6 kWh

The "gas mileage" equivalent for an average electric car.

Average Electric Car kWh Per Mile [Results From 231 EVs]
ecocostsavings.com › average-electric-car-kwh-per-mile

car.fuel_economy

25.4 miles per gallon gasoline

Gas mileage of an average American new car

This datapoint is conformable with [electric_car.efficiency], because the calculator understands 'gallon gasoline' as an energy unit.

Citation:
"The average fuel economy for new 2020 model year cars, light trucks and SUVs in the United States was 25.4 miles per US gallon (9.3 L/100 km)."
- Fuel economy in automobiles - Wikipedia

ratio (calculation loading)

This tells us that the average electric car has about 4 times the "energy mileage" of the average gas car. But that's without considering the losses in charging and discharging the battery.

Suppose the electric vehicle uses lithium-ion batteries:

li_ion.charge_discharge_efficiency

85%

When you charge a lithium-ion battery, this much of the energy can be recovered. The rest is lost as heat.

Range: 80 to 90 %

ratio_for_li_ion_vehicles (calculation loading)

Or suppose the electric vehicle uses hydrogen fuel cells:

electrolysis.efficiency

80%

Energy efficiency of producing hydrogen & oxygen gases from water

Hydrogen made by the electrolysis of water is now cost-competitive ...
www.carboncommentary.com › blog › hydrogen-made-by-the-electrolysis...

hydrogen_fuel_cell.efficiency

50%

Electric energy efficiency of an average hydrogen fuel cell

Hydrogen Fuel Cells Fact Sheet
www.californiahydrogen.org › uploads › files › doe_fuelcell_factsheet

ratio_for_fuel_cell_vehicles (calculation loading) In this second case, we need electricity to make hydrogen gas, which is later used in the fuel cell to power the car. Hence we consider the losses involved in both processes.

For comparison, consider a car with an internal combustion engine that runs on hydrogen gas instead of gasoline: If the engine's efficiency is similar to a gas car, we end up with something with less overall efficiency than a gas car, because we still have to deal with all the energy losses from making the hydrogen gas in the first place: electrolysis.efficiency ratio_for_hydrogen_combustion_vehicles (calculation loading) This ratio would be less bad if hydrogen combustion engines are more efficient than gasoline combustion engines. More research is needed - you can join the discussion.

So far we've looked at cars - but what about buses, trucks, planes, ships, etc? So far, there isn't a lot of data available. For these next estimates, we just have to assume that the ratios are similar enough.

We do have data on how much energy the world currently uses for transportation (...)( which we could also break into subcategories, but we won't right now, for simplicity sake ). So if we apply the ratios from above:

transport.energy

2890.90 Mtoe/year

Transporation's energy usage - worldwide total

Includes passenger and freight/cargo.

"Key World Energy Statistics 2020" IEA
Page 47 - Simplified energy balance table - World energy balance, 2018

terawatts (calculation loading) terawatts (calculation loading) terawatts (calculation loading) These wattages are power averaged over time. Peak power could be higher, but hopefully we'd find ways to smooth that out.

And there you have it, a simpleThere are probably a lot of more precise estimates to be made at some point. estimate of how much electricity we would need if all vehicles ran without fossil fuels.

But we're not done, because we also need energy to manufacture the vehicles...

Manufacturing the vehicles

Producing batteries is energy-intensive. That's one reason why electric vehicles are more expensive.

Quick estimate based on data on lithium-ion batteries:

li_ion.rq_energy

57 kWh per kWh

Energy required to manufacture a lithium-ion battery

Factory energy only. DOES NOT include the energy involved in mining the materials.

"Based on public data on two different Li-ion battery manufacturing facilities, and adjusted results from a previous study, the most reasonable assumptions for the energy usage for manufacturing Li-ion battery cells appears to be 50–65 kWh of electricity per kWh of battery capacity."
Source:
Energy use for GWh-scale lithium-ion battery production
Institute of Physics - IOP Publishing
https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/2515-7620/ab5e1e

ev.lifespan

8 years

terawatts (calculation loading) For lack of better data, let's assume that this makes roughly the difference between manufacturing electric vehicles vs fossil fuel vehicles. This number would be added to the industrial section of energy demand.

However, this estimate currently doesn't include the energy involved in extracting the minerals to make the battery - only the energy in manufacturing the battery. Mineral-related energy is probably quite high in the case of lithium-ion batteries, especially for the cobalt.^{[QUANTIFICATION needed]} It would likely be much lower for sodium-ion batteries made from more abundant minerals.^{[QUANTIFICATION needed]}

This page doesn't currently have data on energy to manufacture fuel cell vehicles, yet.^{[RESEARCH needed]}

Minerals

First we have to estimate how much energy storage would be needed. Here's a very quick-and-dirty estimate:

ev.battery

65.2 kWh

Energy capacity of the average electric vehicle battery

Useable battery capacity of full electric vehicles
https://ev-database.org/cheatsheet/useable-battery-capacity-electric-car

world.cars

1.446 billion

How Many Cars Are There In The World in 2022?
https://hedgescompany.com/blog/2021/06/how-many-cars-are-there-in-the-world/

commercial_factor

2

Without this, we'd be calculating for just personal vehicles. But we also need to factor in commercial vehicles such as buses and trucks. These vary widely in size, and data is hard to find, so for simplicity sake, we just assume that they'd add up to about the same as personal vehicles - thus doubling total energy storage needed. This assumption is based on the fact that freight trucks are a somewhat smaller share of energy demand than passenger vehicles, but the trucks probably need a longer range.

terajoules vehicle_energy_storage_needed (calculation loading)

Lithium-ion batteries

Lithium-ion batteries are the current standard for electric cars and most small gadgets (phones, laptops, etc).

Is there enough lithium in the Earth?

li_ion.cell_voltage

3.6 volts

Voltage of a single lithium-ion cell.

https://www.cei.washington.edu/education/science-of-solar/battery-technology/
https://www.fluxpower.com/blog/what-is-the-energy-density-of-a-lithium-ion-battery
It's 3.6 volts for the "cobalt type" of lithium-ion battery. Other types might have a very slightly different voltage.

li_ion.lithium_by_energy

0.3 grams per amp hour li_ion.cell_voltage

To store a given amount of energy in lithium-ion batteries, this is how much lithium would be needed.

https://batteryguy.com/kb/knowledge-base/how-to-calculate-the-lithium-content-in-a-battery/
The article says lithium per amp hour. We convert this to lithium per watt hour (energy), by including the cell voltage.

lithium.reserves

18425000 tonnes

Lithium metal: Total global mineral reserves

https://www.statista.com/statistics/268790/countries-with-the-largest-lithium-reserves-worldwide/
Added up all the countries: 9,200,000 + 4,700,000 + 1,900,000 + 1,500,000 + 750,000 + 220,000 + 95,000 + 60,000 = 18,425,000 metric tons

li_ion.cobalt_by_energy

20 kg per 100 kilowatt hours

To store a given amount of energy, in lithium-ion batteries (cobalt type), this is how much cobalt would be needed.

https://www.energy.gov/eere/vehicles/articles/reducing-reliance-cobalt-lithium-ion-batteries

cobalt.reserves

7.1 million tonnes

Cobalt metal: Total global mineral reserves

https://www.statista.com/statistics/264930/global-cobalt-reserves/

% lithium.reserves (calculation loading)

Just barely. How about cobalt? % cobalt.reserves (calculation loading)

Not viable.

Hydrogen fuel cells

Fuel cells need platinum-group metals (PGMs). Mineral reserves are sufficient but production is too low. Calculations are found here: Fuel cell vehicles#Rare minerals in the fuel cell

Recycling

Minerals are scarce enough that recycling is absolutely crucial. You can help expand this section by joining the discussion.

Conclusion

Electric vehicles, in their current form, are probably not a viable way to help stop climate change. Here are some other options worth exploring:

Using some other type of battery, which doesn't depend so much on cobalt.
- Perhaps lithium-sulfur batteries?
- Or even sodium-sulfur batteries?
  - This wiki doesn't yet have enough information to say how viable these battery types currently are.
Electric vehicles with much smaller battery capacity, for city driving only.
- This would be a challenge for marketers & entrepreneurs.
Public transit, especially trains.
Making neighborhoods walkable.