A Review of Life Cycle Assessment Studies of Electric Vehicles with a Focus on Resource Use

Abstract

Changes in the mobility patterns have evoked concerns about the future availability of certain raw materials necessary to produce alternative drivetrains and related batteries. The goal of this article is to determine if resource use aspects are adequately reflected within life cycle assessment (LCA) case studies of electric vehicles (EV). Overall, 103 LCA studies on electric vehicles from 2009 to 2018 are evaluated regarding their objective, scope, considered impact categories, and assessment methods—with a focus on resource depletion and criticality. The performed analysis shows that only 24 out of 76 EV LCA and 10 out of 27 battery LCA address the issue of resources. The majority of the studies apply one of these methods: CML-IA, ReCiPe, or Eco-Indicator 99. In most studies, EV show higher results for mineral and metal resource depletion than internal combustion engine vehicles (ICEV). The batteries analysis shows that lithium, manganese, copper, and nickel are responsible for the highest burdens. Only few publications approach resource criticality. Although this topic is a serious concern for future mobility, it is currently not comprehensively and consistently considered within LCA studies of electric vehicles. Criticality should be included in the analyses in order to derive results on the potential risks associated with certain resources.

Method for a Multi-Vehicle, Simulation-Based Life Cycle Assessment and Application to Berlin’s Motorized Individual Transport

“…The results for MDP have the same ratio as in [5]. There is a great lack of knowledge on metal depletion and other resource use-related potentials (see [18]).…”

“…The results for MDP have the same ratio as in [5]. There is a great lack of knowledge on metal depletion and other resource use-related potentials (see [18] For the small vehicle class, the diesel-fueled vehicles show the highest impact regarding PMFP, and around 40-50% of the emissions are caused by diesel consumption. In the medium class, the BEV passes the diesel-fueled vehicle slightly and, in the large class, the difference is substantial.…”

“…Therefore, they focused on direct emissions. Others focused on reviews and comparisons of the conducted studies [9,18,19].…”

“…They assumed the future electricity mixes for the following years and calculated an average energy mix for their base case electricity mix [19]. Dolganova et al summarized that most studies concentrated on a variety of impacts but neglected detailed analyses of resource use [18]. Additionally, they state that only a few studies Figure 1.…”

Criticality Assessment of the Life Cycle of Passenger Vehicles Produced in China

“…However, so far only few studies exist [ 26 , 29 , 30 ] analyzing critical resources. And so far, none with the viewpoint of Chi((nese BEVs and ICEVs production [ 31 ]. Criticality refers to the “risk” of supply disruption (or “supply risk”) together with potential (socio-economic) impacts of supply disruption (“vulnerability to supply disruption”), sometimes including other dimensions such as environmental and social aspects [ 32 ].…”