The Lithium Wars: From Kokkola to the Congo for the 500 Mile Battery

Abstract

This paper presents an analysis and interpretation of the current state of play in the global value network of minerals mining, refining and transformation processes in the contemporary battery industry, which will power potentially crucial future industries for manufacture of electric vehicles (EVs) and solar-storage energy systems. The dark influence of the carbon lock-in landscape is gradually being mitigated under the challenge of achieving the “500 mile” battery charge, which would make a transformational difference in the replacement of renewably fuelled vehicles and storage systems, currently still predominantly driven by fossil fuels. The challenge has led to a “war” between manufacturers, miners and refiners, who have realised that the challenge has come alive while most have been vacillating. At an “individualist” rather than an “institutionalist” level, Elon Musk, for all his faults, deserves credit for “moving the market” in these two important industry sectors. This paper anatomises key events and processes stimulating change in this global economic activity through an “abductive” reasoning model and a qualitative “pattern recognition” methodology that proves valuable in achieving rational, probabilistic forecasts. Established incremental innovation characterises first responses in the “war” but research agencies like ARPA are active in funding research that may produce radical battery innovation in future.

Beyond the Smart or Resilient City: In Search of Sustainability in the Sojan Thirdspace

“…He took many years to install the promised solar panels on the roof of the Reno Gigafactory, meanwhile buying subsidised nuclear energy from the NevadaGrid. But, as Kant said: in cosmopolitan life we must accommodate 'the crooked timber' [25] [26].…”

Beyond the Smart or Resilient City: In Search of Sustainability in the Sojan Thirdspace

“…He took many years to install the promised solar panels on the roof of the Reno Gigafactory, meanwhile buying subsidised nuclear energy from the Nevada-Grid. Nevertheless, as Kant said: in cosmopolitan life we must accommodate 'the crooked timber' [31,32].…”

Local Productive Systems’ Transitions to Industry 4.0+

“…However, its capability to capture the value created within the system and to use it as green shared value depends on collective actions supported by trust and corporate responsibility, not only social but also environmental [58]. In addition to transaction and fixed costs, the barriers to a sustainable transition are created by the competing alternative represented, within an LPS or much more efficiently within the technocratic model, by the private capture of the collectively produced value thanks to a digital-supported monopolistic control of both the sources of natural resources and waste sites [55,59].…”

“…From local to global levels, there are options, as we discuss, that head to very different outcomes, namely "Stairway to Heaven or Highway to Hell" [53] (Chapter 8). The second issue relates to smart cities led by big digital players, surveillance approaches, and globally monopolistic districts [59,61]. They might deliver social divides with gated communities, where the liveability of the well-offs is protected, and the predatory disposal of waste in non-protected areas by actors able to exploit monopolistic positions and possibly to mobilize illegal, if not criminal, channels [54].…”

“…Despite referring foremost to advanced economies and to the EU institutional context, this LPS transition framework might be adapted and expanded to contexts and case studies in new industrialized and developing economies [43,59,60,65], also considering initial states of generally low degrees in local drivers. In those regions and countries, the local trade-offs between smart goals and the other goals of sustainability might be more extreme, describing transition paths whose positive outcomes depend on narrower sets of place-based and upper-level-specific conditions.…”