Increasing Lithium-Ion Battery Demand: Manganese Industry Expert Martin Kepman, CEO of Manganese X Energy Weighs In on Ford Projects $45 Billion Profit from New EV Transit Service.
Tesla is no longer the only player in the electric vehicle sector, with most big-name automobile manufacturers across the world producing electric and hybrid models to keep up with market demand.
Batteries for electric vehicles, energy storage systems, and all of our electronic devices need lithium. Lithium-ion batteries are expected are on a rise. Data: Statista estimates; US Department of Energy; IEA; 2019
Ford Motor Company has recently announced its first electric delivery van, which is set to roll out this month. The medium-duty business van is designed for and marketed towards commercial applications. In addition to selling the vehicles themselves, Ford will be launching software and services — collectively named Ford Pro Intelligence — to help companies manage their delivery fleets. These services are set to include charging depots (to help customers minimize energy consumption while maximizing vehicle run time), cloud-based routing (to increase efficiency and decrease drive time), over-the-air updates for new features, and tailored alerts for maintenance and repairs.
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Lithium-ion batteries are a staple of everyday life, powering everything from electric vehicles to electric toothbrushes and smartphones and laptops. As the demand for lithium-ion batteries rises even further due to new products and programs in the electric vehicle sector, so does the demand for one of the key components of these batteries: manganese.
Manganese is an essential component of the lithium-ion battery, but it is also used in the other most common type of battery produced globally, the nickel-manganese-cobalt (NMC) battery.
[Watch Lithium-Ion Battery & Manganese Expert Martin Kepman Video Interview]
“There are plans to re-engineer the chemistry of the current NMC battery by eliminating cobalt and increasing the proportion of manganese in future lithium-ion nickel manganese EV batteries. Some of the reasons that make manganese potentially the mineral of the decade is it doesn’t have the ethical sourcing issues of mining cobalt in the Congo, where the majority of cobalt is produced. Economically, cobalt is 10-47 times more expensive than manganese to acquire, based on the commodity markets of fluctuating prices. Safety, manganese is renowned for its stability in nature and has the characteristics of increasing energy density, which ultimately increases capacity and improves driving range. Also, manganese decreases the combustibility of EV batteries, which is problematic with cobalt infused lithium-ion batteries. Our strategically located manganese property in Canada will provide EV battery manufacturers access to a domestic supply with less reliance on China imports, “ Martin Kepman CEO of Manganese X Energy Corp.
Locating and mining...