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The headline is a misquote. The actual quote, from Musk in the article, is "In order to produce half a million cars a year…we would basically need to absorb the

The headline is a misquote. The actual quote, from Musk in the article, is "In order to produce half a million cars a year…we would basically need to absorb the entire world’s lithium-ion production." That is very different that the entire world's lithium production.

mtgx 10y ago
Which is just another variation of something he's said since he announced the Gigafactory - "We'll produce more than the entire world's capacity of batteries."
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- tkahnoski 10y ago
  It's fascinating to read some of the other related articles on the Internet. There's a lot investment analysis going into whether the EV market will cause a "Peak Lithium" like "Peak Oil". It could happen, however given how Tesla has already made moves to create a giga-factory to avoid "Peak Battery" pricing they likely already have a supply solution in mind.
  - creshal 10y ago
    > will cause a "Peak Lithium" like "Peak Oil". So a pointless hype bubble? As long as there's demand and money to back up that demand, we'll find a way to make more of whatever you want.
- hinkley 10y ago
  And I'm still trying to figure out why everyone thinks this is a big deal. Lots and lots and lots of companies end up at some point representing 50% of all sales, products, or activity in their market. Hell, even Starbucks was opening coffee shops so fast they were targeting owning half of all coffee shops on the planet. If he said he needed to quadruple the world output, I might furrow a brow. If he said he needed 8 times the world supply, I'd think he was nuts. Double? That's just a really big growth market.
  - dv_dt 10y ago
    People are trying to talk up existing investments somewhere in the lithium chain, or trying to get investments for somewhere in that chain; or if you like tinfoil hats, fossil fuel interests are trying to inject uncertainty into the growth of electric cars. I think the last possibility is probably silly because available Lithium resources will likely behave similarly to other extracted commodities such as oil - with the difference that you can likely recycle lithium out of expended batteries.
  - xenadu02 10y ago
    Indeed; at one point iPod production was consuming over half the world's flash memory. What happened? They built more factories. Prices of flash continued to drop aka "a functioning market".

mtgx 10y ago

Which is just another variation of something he's said since he announced the Gigafactory - "We'll produce more than the entire world's capacity of batteries."

deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
tkahnoski 10y ago
It's fascinating to read some of the other related articles on the Internet. There's a lot investment analysis going into whether the EV market will cause a "Peak Lithium" like "Peak Oil". It could happen, however given how Tesla has already made moves to create a giga-factory to avoid "Peak Battery" pricing they likely already have a supply solution in mind.
- creshal 10y ago
  > will cause a "Peak Lithium" like "Peak Oil". So a pointless hype bubble? As long as there's demand and money to back up that demand, we'll find a way to make more of whatever you want.
hinkley 10y ago
And I'm still trying to figure out why everyone thinks this is a big deal. Lots and lots and lots of companies end up at some point representing 50% of all sales, products, or activity in their market. Hell, even Starbucks was opening coffee shops so fast they were targeting owning half of all coffee shops on the planet. If he said he needed to quadruple the world output, I might furrow a brow. If he said he needed 8 times the world supply, I'd think he was nuts. Double? That's just a really big growth market.
- dv_dt 10y ago
  People are trying to talk up existing investments somewhere in the lithium chain, or trying to get investments for somewhere in that chain; or if you like tinfoil hats, fossil fuel interests are trying to inject uncertainty into the growth of electric cars. I think the last possibility is probably silly because available Lithium resources will likely behave similarly to other extracted commodities such as oil - with the difference that you can likely recycle lithium out of expended batteries.
- xenadu02 10y ago
  Indeed; at one point iPod production was consuming over half the world's flash memory. What happened? They built more factories. Prices of flash continued to drop aka "a functioning market".