Europe will need at least three million more electric vehicle charging stations by 2030 to meet the projected growth for EVs on the continent, according to a new report by McKinsey.
That will require a staggering 807% increase over less than a decade, a prospect that will have lithium miners across the globe rubbing their hands together with glee.
At the end of 2021, the number of electric vehicle charging stations across the 27 countries in the European Union numbered 375,000, but McKinsey says “in even the most conservative scenario”, that number will need to exceed 3.4 million by the end of the decade.
Europe: EV worldbeaters
“The region’s combination of forward-thinking incumbent manufacturers and early-adopting EV consumers offers it a unique opportunity to create a world-leading EV ecosystem,” the report said.
“That could generate new jobs, lessen air pollution, accelerate progress toward climate goals, and help Europe become a global EV lighthouse.
“But the continent will need extensive utility grid upgrades to distribute electricity to these new charging stations and for the increased renewable-energy capacity Europe’s future EVs will need to run on cleaner power.
“In all, this build-out of the EV-charging infrastructure may cumulatively cost upward of €240 billion by 2030.”
Strict controls for decarbonisation
The report also expressed concerns about the resources required to manufacture and install so many EV charging stations.
“The widespread adoption of EVs could help Europe achieve its decarbonization targets—unless fossil fuels generate the energy used to charge EVs,” it said.
“To prevent EVs from triggering an increase in Europe’s carbon emissions, the report calls for adding sufficient renewable-energy capacity to meet the additional electricity demand expected from future EVs.
“Our analysis shows that electricity demand resulting directly from the charging of passenger and commercial EVs could increase from nine terawatt hours in 2021 to 165 terawatt hours in 2030.
The report proposes a symbiotic use of chargers and EVs, and also calls upon the upstream partners in the supply chain to ensure their methods are as green as possible.
“Bidirectional charging is a particularly promising way to store energy on the grid, since the European Union’s passenger EVs would have up to three terawatt-hours of available battery capacity—equivalent to 40 percent of the European Union’s daily average energy demand,” it says.
“The technology would be a timely solution because the need for grid storage is expected to rise during the transition to renewable energy.
“To be implemented, bidirectional charging would require grid operators to partner with EV owners, and that would create new business models to compensate them for depleting their batteries.”
Australian hopes
There is no shortage of ASX-listed companies that believe they will play a crucial role in this growth.
Take European Lithium Ltd (ASX:EUR, OTCQB:EULIF), whose Wolfsberg project is set to be Europe’s first fully licensed lithium mine.
It is currently working on a local lithium supply chain in Austria, with encouraging results from joint venture (JV) partner EV Resources Ltd’s rock chip sampling at the Eastern Alps Lithium Satellite projects in Austria.
Volt Resources Ltd (ASX:VRC) recently raised $10 million to support its European battery metals efforts - it has a 70% stake in the the ZG Group graphite business, which operates a long-life graphite mine and processing plant with nameplate capacity of up to 30,000 tonnes per annum, producing graphite products across the range.
“We believe the support in the capital raise is reflective of the rare opportunity that Volt presents investors seeking exposure to the production of graphite as well as higher-value graphite products used in lithium-ion batteries and other battery technologies,” managing director Trevor Matthews said.
BlackEarth Minerals NL also recently kicked off a scoping study designed to assess the economics of a manufacturing plant in Europe to produce high-value spheronised and purified graphite (SPG) with European demand for battery anode material forecast to soar, as outlined by McKinsey.
- Daniel Paproth