Hyperdrive
Rising Battery Costs Hit Carmakers, Threaten Climate-Change Push
- Rising commodities put the brakes on ever-cheaper batteries
- Price decline trend still strong, but less certain, BNEF says
Cables and lithium-ion battery components on the production line at an automobile manufacturing plant in Dingolfing, Germany.
Photographer: Krisztian Bocsi/Bloomberg
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Soaring commodity prices and supply chain bottlenecks threaten to push up the cost of batteries seen as crucial in the fight against climate change.
Higher raw material costs could push the average price of a lithium-ion battery pack to $135 per kilowatt-hour in 2022, a 2.3% gain from this year’s level, according to BloombergNEF’s 2021 Battery Price Survey. It would mark the first increase in prices since at least 2010, when the average cost was $1,200/kWh.