President Barrack Obama is currently encouraging Americans to take up the challenges of succeeding in the automotive green technology’s global market competition. One element of this competition is the market for advanced lithium-ion batteries and other components for electric vehicles. Other elements of the competition are manufacturing electric vehicles and charging stations for those vehicles.
President Obama wants the United States to become more competitive in the global green technology market for several reasons, but it’s partly to save America’s failing automotive industry. According to IHS Global Insight, approximately 20% of the 2030 global market for light vehicles will be made up of electric vehicles. Numerous analysts believe that whoever has the leading edge on manufacturing the batteries for these vehicles will control the entire automotive industry. According to statistics, the United States is only producing 2% of the batteries for this market, which is way lower than China, India, Korea, and Japan. These countries got ahead in the global market by borrowing U.S. lithium-ion battery technology for cell phones and personal appliances.
The basic concept is that manufacturing electric vehicles, their batteries and other components, and their charging stations will resolve several problems for the United States. For one, it is expected to help reduce unemployment as battery plants and charging stations are constructed and operated, thus helping to boost the construction industry as well as the automotive industry. Manufacturing electric vehicles and their components would either increase employment or save current jobs, and greatly help the automotive industry regain its leading edge in the global market. Secondly, the increased revenue from the sale of the batteries and electric vehicles will help to stabilize the American economy. Thirdly, producing the batteries and electric vehicles in the U.S. will reduce the cost for consumers utilizing them here.
Using more green technology will help reduce the planet’s environmental problems. Additionally, it will help to reduce the United States’ reliance on oil imported from politically or economically unstable, anti-American countries. The United States currently spends approximately $150 billion annually to import around 1.5 billion barrels of oil, most of which is imported from countries that are on the U.S. State Department’s “warning list” of countries that pose a danger to traveling Americans.
Most of all, manufacturing the batteries, components, and electric vehicles here will help the U.S. avoid becoming reliant on foreign batteries and electric vehicles for our personal and goods transportation. If we don’t step up to the challenge, we will become just as dependent on imported batteries as we currently are on imported crude oil.
According to various analysts, the next two to five years are very critical to the success of this plan. In order for the plan to be successful, four things need to occur simultaneously, or within a short time frame of each other. First, Americans need to step up researching and manufacturing advanced batteries and electric vehicle components.
Secondly, automobile manufacturers need to increase production of electric vehicles to create a demand for those batteries and components. Although over 108,000 Americans have signed up on waiting lists for electric vehicles, automotive manufacturers are only planning on producing approximately 13,000 within the next couple of years. Plus, they are only being released in five states for now.
Thirdly, the U.S. energy grid and easy access to recharging stations for the electric vehicles need to be increased and become more affordable so electric cars can be considered feasible options. Lastly, a large portion of the American public will have to be willing to change from using conventional fossil-fueled to electric or plug-in hybrid vehicles. The success of the plan is already at high risk due to various divisive political agendas, personal greed, and people in general’s fear of changes.
Currently, most of these projects are being supported by the $787 billion which was generated by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) of 2009. However, with the existing outrage over diverse bailouts and government spending, the funding and political backing for these projects may be revoked. If that happens, the U.S. will likely return or fall deeper into the crippling recession that has already harmed most Americans for the past decade.
To show his own support for these programs, President Obama attended the groundbreaking of a new $303 million automotive battery plant in Holland, Michigan on July 15, 2010. He also recently visited Smith Electric Vehicles in Kansas City, Missouri. Smith Electric Vehicles converts delivery trucks from diesel to electric power. Numerous companies are now converting their fleets to electric or plug-in hybrids due to the oil industry’s instability and the rising business costs. New York City already uses a fleet of 6,000 plug-in electric vehicles.
The battery plant President Obama visited, Compact Power, is a subsidiary of South Korean-owned LG Chem. The plant, which is expected to employ around 400 people when it opens in 2012, received $151.4 million in federal grants and loans under ARRA. This plant will be making lithium-ion batteries and other components for the Chevrolet Volt and Ford Focus electric cars. Eight other lithium-ion battery plants have also been funded by ARRA. The plant is one of the nine plants which have been funded through matching government funding. Out of nine plants, four are expected to be producing batteries by the end of 2010.
Altogether, there are now 30 electric vehicle battery and component plants under construction, including the 9 lithium-ion battery plants. Of these plants, 26 have received government funding assistance. The 30 factories are expected to have the capacity to produce 20% of the global advanced vehicle batteries by 2012, and possibly around 40% by 2015. Now we need for the automobile manufacturers to meet President Obama’s challenge of building a million plug-in and hybrid vehicles by 2015. Numerous recharging stations are already being constructed across the United States.
References:
ABC News:
The Christian Science Monitor
Freep/Detroit Free Press
HIS Global Insight
New York Times
