Mobility is at the centre of modern civilization. Over the next 20 years, we will see dramatic changes to how people and goods move around as electrification, shared mobility and autonomous vehicles reshape the automotive and freight markets around the world. BloombergNEF’s Electric Vehicle Outlook (EVO) forecasts how this transition will progress and analyses the factors and trends that will influence global electric vehicle (EV) adoption.
The transition is being driven both by policymakers (top-down regulation promoting low-carbon options and improved fuel efficiency) and by consumers as they become more aware of their environmental impact and concerned by localised air quality.
Key factors in the speed of adoption will be the fall in battery prices, the availability of charging infrastructure, the availability of critical metals and the rise in policy pressure.
The authors predict that about 290 million charging points are needed globally by 2040 to support the growing EV fleet and that the majority of these will be home charging points.
EVs currently account for less than 3% of new car sales. This figure is rising rapidly. It is estimated that by 2030 EVs will comprise 28% of new car sales and there will be 116 million EVs on the roads. There are currently only 8.5 million EVs globally, meaning that in the next 10 years more than 107 million EVs will be manufactured.
EVs are mineral intensive; they require four times the amount of metal than a comparable combustion vehicle and the rechargeable lithium-ion batteries remain reliant on large quantities of cobalt, nickel and lithium. New battery technologies are being developed but electrification and circularity of the planet will continue to require huge amounts of metals for decades to come. Sourcing these minerals from land will be challenged by decreasing ore grades, increasing CO2 footprint, deforestation, social displacement and poor governance.
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