How much lithium is needed to replace all internal combustion engines in the world?

[ding]

Bump

 

[The Duke]

Interestingly enough, scientists ARE working on ways to get lithium out of seawater, and they're making some pretty decent advances on it. Still not economically feasible (yet), but it's getting closer and closer to happening.

https://cen.acs.org/materials/inorganic-chemistry/Can-seawater-give-us-lithium-to-meet-our-battery-needs/99/i36

Yeah, just like solar...30 years later...

 

[Sunsettommy]

I am driving a 2021 Toyota Sienna Hybrid. Have you stopped beating your wife yet?

Hybrid is the way to go at this time as this greatly increase MPG milage and allow for long drives. All electric idea has been pushed way too fast on the public now there is a growing backlash because of it.

The government should have let the technology and support services mature to make it work but alas they have a climate crisis delusion to maintain thus be stupid about it in their idiotic rush to outlaw petroleum-based cars by 2030–2035-time frame.

 

[Old Rocks]

You can't simply calculate how many electric vehicles (EV) batteries are needed for the worldwide fleet to replace internal combustion engines. First of all there is no exact number of internal combustion engines in the world. Secondly there is variability in the battery size of EV batteries. So the best way to calculate how much lithium is needed to replace all of internal combustion engines in the world is to look at the daily energy consumed by internal combustion engines. This is the amount of EV battery capacity that is needed to operate EV's on a daily basis.

So we have to start with how much oil is produced daily. That number is 88 million barrels of oil per day. Then we need to calculate how much of that oil is actually refined into gasoline and diesel. Approximately 45 percent of a typical barrel of crude oil is refined into gasoline. An additional 29 percent is refined to diesel fuel. So I will start with the assumption that 74% of the 88 million barrels of oil per day is being consumed by ICE engines or 65,120,000 barrels of oil per day (88,000,000 bopd x 0.74 = 65,120,000 bopd). This is the amount of EV battery capacity that is needed to operate EV's on a daily basis.

Next we need to calculate the energy equivalent in kWh of 65,120,000 barrels of oil per day. The energy contained in a barrel of oil is approximately 5.8 million British thermal units (MBtus) or 1,700 kilowatt-hours (kWh) of energy. So there are an equivalent 110,700,000,000 kWh (110,700,000 mWh or 110,700 gWh or 110.7 tWh) in 65,120,000 barrels of oil (65,120,000 bbl of oil x 1700 kWh/bbl of oil = 110,700,000,000 kWh).

Next we need to determine the amount of lithium that is required to produce enough batteries to hold a charge of 110,700,000,000 kWh. The lithium content found in a lithium-ion battery for an electric vehicle is approximately 0.85 kg of lithium carbonate per kWh. This amounts to approximately 0.16kg of Lithium metal/kWh. So the amount of lithium required to produce enough batteries to hold a charge of 110,700,000,000 kWh is 17,713,000,000 kg of lithium metal.

So the answer to the question of how much lithium is needed to replace all internal combustion engines in the world is 17,713,000,000 kg of lithium metal. Which is equal to 17,712,640 metric tons.

Worldwide Oil Produced per day

Global oil production 2023 | Statista

Global oil production amounted to 96.4 million barrels per day in 2023.

www.statista.com

Percent of Gasoline/Diesel Refined per barrel of oil

https://www3.uwsp.edu/cnr-ap/KEEP/Documents/Activities/Energy%20Fact%20Sheets/FactsAboutOil.pdf

kWh Equivalent of a barrel of oil

https://www.ocean.washington.edu/courses/envir215/energynumbers.pdf

Lithium metal Required per kWH

How Much Lithium is in an Electric car Battery?_Greenway battery | E-BIKE Battery-Custom Lithium Battery Pack

How Much Lithium is in an Electric car Battery?-Greenway battery | E-BIKE Battery-Custom Lithium Battery Pack

m.greenway-battery.com

Any questions?

How much whale oil is needed to run them new fangled horseless carriages? I am totally amazed at the number of dumb fucks that seem to ignore the very many different battery chemistries being worked on and even now produced. Just one of those, Sodium sulfur not only uses no lithium, but is far less costly than present lithium batteries. And then there is aluminum graphene, and so many others.

 

[Old Rocks]

Yeah, just like solar...30 years later...

And solar is the least expensive form of new generation, and infinitely scalable. In the form of VPP's and agrivoltaics, it will be the major contributor to the grid by 2030.

 

[Old Rocks]

Sodium-ion batteries have the same disadvantage of being low energy density and requiring an electrical infrastructure. Plus I'm pretty sure they weren't commercially practical.

But you are basically admitting that a new battery technology is needed.

Not as many as you think given the high energy density of fossil fuels

There are 1,700 kWh of equivalent energy in 1 barrel of oil.

And when you burn it the efficiency is about 20%.

 

[Old Rocks]

Hybrid is the way to go at this time as this greatly increase MPG milage and allow for long drives. All electric idea has been pushed way too fast on the public now there is a growing backlash because of it.

The government should have let the technology and support services mature to make it work but alas they have a climate crisis delusion to maintain thus be stupid about it in their idiotic rush to outlaw petroleum-based cars by 2030–2035-time frame.

So you call the fact that Tesla and others cannot manufacture enough EV's to keep up with demand a growing backlash? The kindest thing I can say about that is that you are pretty Goddamned stupid.

 

[Old Rocks]

Another question would be the environmental cost of all that large scale lithium mining, which primarily occurs in developing nations with minimal environmental standards.

Do we also become more dependent on China as they buy up interests in Lithium mines across the entire globe?

Sodium-ion Batteries Expected in Evs with Ranges of up to 500 Km, CATL Exec Says - Batteries News

Sodium-ion batteries expected in EVs with ranges of up to 500 km, CATL exec says. A CATL executive's words imply that initial sodium-ion

batteriesnews.com

 

[ding]

How much whale oil is needed to run them new fangled horseless carriages? I am totally amazed at the number of dumb fucks that seem to ignore the very many different battery chemistries being worked on and even now produced. Just one of those, Sodium sulfur not only uses no lithium, but is far less costly than present lithium batteries. And then there is aluminum graphene, and so many others.

And when they actually replace the lithium-ion battery that everyone is using NOW we can discuss them then. Until then, they are pie in the sky.

 

[ding]

And when you burn it the efficiency is about 20%.

That is correct. SLoT tells us there are no perfect conversions from matter to energy or vice versa.

And that has nothing whatsoever to do with my point.

 

[jc456]

How much whale oil is needed to run them new fangled horseless carriages? I am totally amazed at the number of dumb fucks that seem to ignore the very many different battery chemistries being worked on and even now produced. Just one of those, Sodium sulfur not only uses no lithium, but is far less costly than present lithium batteries. And then there is aluminum graphene, and so many others.

who's using those new batteries?

 

[westwall]

Sodium-ion Batteries Expected in Evs with Ranges of up to 500 Km, CATL Exec Says - Batteries News

Sodium-ion batteries expected in EVs with ranges of up to 500 km, CATL exec says. A CATL executive's words imply that initial sodium-ion

batteriesnews.com

Expected.

But none exist currently.

 

[Sunsettommy]

So you call the fact that Tesla and others cannot manufacture enough EV's to keep up with demand a growing backlash? The kindest thing I can say about that is that you are pretty Goddamned stupid.

This is what Crick wrote that I lauded and supported:

I am driving a 2021 Toyota Sienna Hybrid.

I didn't say a word about Tesla thus your post was dead on arrival and stupid because it is government who are forcing people to buy EV's without regard for allowing for FREE market and consumer decisions.

 

[westwall]

This is what Crick wrote that I lauded and supported:



I didn't say a word about Tesla thus your post was dead on arrival and stupid because it is government who are forcing people to buy EV's without regard for allowing for FREE market and consumer decisions.

And the idiot STILL doesn't even own a hybrid.

The chucklehead has been yapping about how great EV's are FOR YEARS! Yet he still doesn't own one.

So they must not be as good as he claims.