Checking in on John Petersen, the excellent, well-versed skeptic of the electric vehicle, finds him increasingly strident in his criticism of plug-ins generally and lithium ion (Li-ion) in particular. He surfaces a fatal flaw in resting the entire EV enterprise on a too-scarce Li-ion resource: "It's a fundamental flaw in the economics of using batteries to replace a fuel tank; a flaw that will cost investors billions before the current round of electric car hype fades and the rotting corpse of an idea only Hollywood could love is buried with a silver stake through its undead heart."
OMG. Pale face and cold sweat. We have unwittingly traveled a dead end; embarrassed, stupid cheerleaders for a misguided misuse of time and focus and resources. John's analysis appears thorough, well-researched and well-reasoned.
But has his excellent focus on this one ill-fitting lithium piece of the puzzle drawn him to the false conclusion that we gotta quit putting the puzzle together? Does his analysis rest on an unfounded premise of stasis, when the reality is so much more dynamic and robust, with other solutions known and yet to be known offering to fill in?
For instance, these silver shotgun pellets:
- Inductive road charging (possibly lessening the vehicle's storage capacity requirement)
- Li-air (this article calls Li-ion a bridge technology anyway)
- Lithium iron magnesium phosphate
- New electric storage capacitors (see the skeptical write-up here)
The beauty of the Li-ion problem is that it doesn't crater the whole deal. The infrastructure that feeds the electric car doesn't care if we use Li-ion to store its charge. Let it be some other battery material, or some other approach (like road charging). What's more, hard-nosed dreamers will be hard-pressed to abandon the electric vehicle because it tenders a key piece of a powerful solution that fixes much, while other pieces of the solution (renewables, smart buildings, smart grid) continue to develop nicely. In the meantime, Li-ion can be the bridge technology that keeps development of these other pieces moving forward. (The problem with Li-ion, after all, is a problem of trying to get to scale using a limited natural resource).
As always, there's an implicit collaboration between the critic and the dreamer, a necessary tension in the dialog that helps us better get to a better place. John Peterson's critique may nail a lithium supply problem, but the total solution doesn't necessarily depend on lithium, so the total solution should still be considered viable and intact. What's more, the total solution is a holier grail than the numbers you can slice-and-dice on lithium and the electric vehicle, and we need both for the time being to achieve the total solution.
Photo: [ вα7яαιиsтαя ] on flickr
Tags: Batteries, Cars, Transportation
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