The Race for Electric Cars Drives New Global Rivalries
An automobile model displaying electric vehicle technologies at the Munich Motor Show on Sept. 5.
The US may have developed the first mass-production automobile, but more than a century later it’s China that’s leading the electric-vehicle revolution.
That’s put the shift from the internal combustion engine to batteries firmly at the heart of geopolitical rivalries.
In a world bristling with upheaval, the transition to EVs is already reshaping economies and global alliances. BloombergNEF forecasts the cumulative value of all forms of EV sales will hit $8.8 trillion by 2030 and $57 trillion by 2050 in its base-case scenario.
China, with a more than 80% share of the world’s lithium-ion battery capacity, is in pole position to capitalize. US President Joe Biden has responded with his Inflation Reduction Act armed with billions of dollars to lure producers to America and its key trading partners.
Yet while Western automakers are expanding fast in Mexico to sell EVs across the northern border, Chinese firms are ramping up sales to local consumers.
In Thailand, which Japanese investment helped turn into a global auto-making powerhouse, Chinese money is pouring in to build EVs.
With the bulk of today’s battery minerals supplied by exporters like China, Chile, Indonesia and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the search is on for alternative sources.
Canada’s so-called “Ring of Fire,” a landscape of rivers and pine forests in the far north loaded with nickel, copper, chromite and platinum, would be a natural source for the US industry.
But development faces environmental concerns: The area of peat and wetlands stores an estimated 35 billion tons of carbon ever year.
The realignment appears unstoppable nonetheless, as the need to end our addiction to fossil fuels becomes ever more urgent. Last month was the warmest October on record, scientists say, and 2023 is “virtually certain” to be the hottest year ever.
For the winners and losers in the EV race, the stakes are enormous. — Karl Maier