Photo: Alexander Schimmeck/Unsplash
When Akio Toyoda stepped down and became Toyota’s chairman, people thought that Toyota was probably going to invest billions in developing battery electric vehicles (BEVs). However, the company has demonstrated that it will not change course as much as the people who believe only BEVs will save the planet: Toyota is still sure that several paths lead to carbon neutrality.
The Japanese carmaker’s chief scientist made that very clear at the World Economic Forum in Davos and also in an interview with Automotive News. Gill Pratt used an interesting example to demonstrate why the company believes those pushing for BEVs are wrong.
Suppose you have a fleet with 100 vehicles powered by combustion engines. Each of these vehicles emits 250 g/km of carbon. If you have a limited amount of lithium, enough only for 100 kWh of batteries, which would be the best strategy to reduce emissions?
If the batteries were put in a single pack, the fleet would have 99 combustion-engined vehicles and one BEV. The average carbon emission in such a fleet would drop to 248.5 g/km. In other words, the pure electric car would not make much difference in a universe of vehicles that still need fossil fuels.
Now get those cells and make smaller battery packs of 1.1 kWh. That would allow the fleet to have 90 hybrid electric vehicles and only ten cars powered by combustion engines. According to the Toyota chief scientist, this fleet would have an average carbon emission of 205 g/km. If the goal is to prevent pumping more carbon into the atmosphere, the less intuitive strategy is the one that has a more considerable impact.
Pratt’s model is a small-scale representation of what the automotive industry is currently going through. There are not enough raw materials for all EVs that governments, politicians, and activists want to see on the streets as soon as possible. Extracting them is not easy: mines take several years to be approved and to start producing and also have troublesome effects on nature. Pratt told Automotive News a car factory takes around three years to be completed, while a mine demands 16 years to start producing raw materials.
The race to get more lithium will also make its prices increase, limiting access to all vehicles that will soon need to get battery packs. Supply may cover just one-third of the global demand for lithium at least until 2040, which is well past what some car companies are establishing as their deadlines to sell only BEVs.
Pratt rightfully argues that the path to carbon neutrality will have to follow other directions if the goal really is to hold climate change back. The chief scientist argues that “there is a crunch that's going to come" and that it will prove that “one size does not fit all.” What if we are wrong about BEVs?
Suppose you have a fleet with 100 vehicles powered by combustion engines. Each of these vehicles emits 250 g/km of carbon. If you have a limited amount of lithium, enough only for 100 kWh of batteries, which would be the best strategy to reduce emissions?
If the batteries were put in a single pack, the fleet would have 99 combustion-engined vehicles and one BEV. The average carbon emission in such a fleet would drop to 248.5 g/km. In other words, the pure electric car would not make much difference in a universe of vehicles that still need fossil fuels.
Now get those cells and make smaller battery packs of 1.1 kWh. That would allow the fleet to have 90 hybrid electric vehicles and only ten cars powered by combustion engines. According to the Toyota chief scientist, this fleet would have an average carbon emission of 205 g/km. If the goal is to prevent pumping more carbon into the atmosphere, the less intuitive strategy is the one that has a more considerable impact.
Pratt’s model is a small-scale representation of what the automotive industry is currently going through. There are not enough raw materials for all EVs that governments, politicians, and activists want to see on the streets as soon as possible. Extracting them is not easy: mines take several years to be approved and to start producing and also have troublesome effects on nature. Pratt told Automotive News a car factory takes around three years to be completed, while a mine demands 16 years to start producing raw materials.
The race to get more lithium will also make its prices increase, limiting access to all vehicles that will soon need to get battery packs. Supply may cover just one-third of the global demand for lithium at least until 2040, which is well past what some car companies are establishing as their deadlines to sell only BEVs.
Pratt rightfully argues that the path to carbon neutrality will have to follow other directions if the goal really is to hold climate change back. The chief scientist argues that “there is a crunch that's going to come" and that it will prove that “one size does not fit all.” What if we are wrong about BEVs?
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