EV technologies beyond the obvious

Issue #165, Sep 27th 2022

When we talk about electric vehicles (EVs), the technologies that get most attention are the batteries, charging stations, and autonomous driving to some extent. But the industry is already thinking beyond these known areas. In Japan for example, wireless charging is being tried out to avoid the bottleneck of charging in stations. California is looking at eliminating parking space mandates to discourage its citizens from driving a car to work and use public transportation instead. The growing demand for rare earth materials used to make batteries will translate into more than 300 mines, even if recycling of materials is taken into account. The US Department of Energy’s ReCell Center is working on "direct recycling" of used EV batteries. Here are some recent technology updates in the EV industry beyond just batteries, semiconductors and charging stations.

Wireless EV charging

The lack of widespread charging stations presents a hurdle for bringing EVs into the mainstream. Japanese construction group Obayashi and auto parts supplier Denso have started testing road pavement designed to power EVs while they drive, aiming to have practical technology in 2025. At Obayashi's research center in Tokyo, a small EV was able to run almost continuously at 15 kilometers an hour on a course with uninterrupted lines of electrical coils embedded beneath the surface. - Nikkei Asia

Eliminating parking mandates

Parking mandates in most of California’s cities are a substantial roadblock to achieving its carbon emission goals. In addition to driving up the cost of housing — a single parking spot costs between $40,000 and $80,000 to build, a cost that is passed on to renters and homeowners — parking mandates create powerful incentives for people to drive, even when other modes of transportation are convenient and available. There is abundant research and market data that shows we can safely eliminate parking mandates while also creating climate-resilient communities that people actually want to live in. - Bloomberg

EV batteries and mining

The ongoing transition away from fossil fuels will likely trigger shortages of some key metals used in EV batteries requiring hundreds of new mines.?A projected six-fold surge in demand for lithium-ion batteries over the next decade means up to 384 additional graphite, lithium, nickel and cobalt mines may be needed by 2035 to supply all those new EVs, industry forecaster Benchmark Minerals said in a report. Even a big increase in battery recycling would only cut the number of new mines to 336, according to Benchmark. - Forbes

The challenges in EV battery recycling

Profitability is a major barrier in EV battery recycling. Though lithium-ion batteries contain valuable metals, they are challenging to take apart and the minerals are hard to extract from the tight layers of inorganic and organic compounds. By one estimate, the cost of recycled lithium is five times that of virgin lithium from brine-mining. Efforts to improve battery recycling are underway at the Department of Energy’s ReCell Center. There, researchers are working to scale up what’s called “direct recycling.” - Knowable magazine

Supply chain snarl for logo badge

Ford has delayed deliveries of certain vehicles because it didn’t have the blue oval badges that go on them, in another example of how supply-chain challenges have hit auto makers. Ford executives had considered some workarounds, such as 3-D printing the insignia until the permanent ones could be obtained. But they didn’t feel the printed substitutions would meet the bar on quality. - WSJ