4 ms·

> The battery economics really doesn't seem to work. Huh what? Tesla hasn't been selling at a loss for years, in Q3/2022 they made a solid 15.000$ pure profit

> The battery economics really doesn't seem to work. Huh what? Tesla hasn't been selling at a loss for years, in Q3/2022 they made a solid 15.000$ pure profit per car - that's what allowed them to cut prices without going into losses in the first place. [1] https://www.reuters.com/business/autos-transportation/tesla-uses-its-profits-weapon-an-ev-price-war-2023-01-19/ https://www.reuters.com/business/autos-transportation/tesla-...

ho243i2434324 3y ago
I mean macro-economics in the long-run. As a niche, it's fine and profitable; but ICE market is just too massive, and replacing large parts of the supply-chain and transport-infrastructure will likely cause issues on the supply side. https://www.forbes.com/sites/bradtempleton/2023/01/24/researchers-warn-the-ev-transition-needs-too-much-nasty-lithium--thats-not-how-transitions-work/?sh=431dc95b49bf https://www.forbes.com/sites/bradtempleton/2023/01/24/resear...
- panick21_ 3y ago
  Hydrogens issue as an order of magnitude worse. Batterie had 10 years of massive investment and an ever growing market share. The supply chain issues are being worked on. Hydrogen cars a statistically insignificant and have basically no growth. The supply chain has seen little investment and there is not even a prospect that any real investment will go into. Its the same old 'get governments to pay oil/car company to sell a fake future'.
  - ho243i2434324 3y ago
    The efficiency of Hydrolysis is definitely a big issue, but still, it's not a hard-supply issue like Lithium/Cobalt.
    - b7we5b7a 3y ago
      Yes, but you need to build a similar network of hydrogen pumps as we already have for gas, hydrogen requires more power and infrastructure to store, requires more energy to extract, cars need pressurized tanks, ............ Batteries are simply cheaper, and require far less infrastructure. Summarized in an image: https://cdn.motor1.com/images/mgl/OrLRA/s1/efficiency-compared-battery-electric-73-hydrogen-22-ice-13.webp https://cdn.motor1.com/images/mgl/OrLRA/s1/efficiency-compar...
    - panick21_ 3y ago
      Neither Lithium nor Cobalt have hard limits. Lithium is incredibly common. It does take a while to spin up new mines but all lithium producers are increasing capacity and there are 100s of startup ups working on it, many with government support. Cobalt is not as common but still not actually hard to find. Plus Cobalt is an increasingly small part of most batteries. LFP batteries will be in all lower cost EV. And even in higher cost NMC its by now less then 10% and trending even lower. Neither of these are significant long term supply issues.
TheAlchemist 3y ago
Naaah, not even close. 2021-2022 were a very unusual situation - they got lucky with chips shortages (and admittedly they've got it figured out) allowing them to sell at very high prices - the leader event suggested that Teslas are appreciating assets... Reality is catching up quickly. Margins already crashed, and yet governments are still heavily subsidizing EVs. Without subsides, Tesla would never make any money (nor would their competition).

ho243i2434324 3y ago

I mean macro-economics in the long-run. As a niche, it's fine and profitable; but ICE market is just too massive, and replacing large parts of the supply-chain and transport-infrastructure will likely cause issues on the supply side. https://www.forbes.com/sites/bradtempleton/2023/01/24/researchers-warn-the-ev-transition-needs-too-much-nasty-lithium--thats-not-how-transitions-work/?sh=431dc95b49bf https://www.forbes.com/sites/bradtempleton/2023/01/24/resear...

panick21_ 3y ago
Hydrogens issue as an order of magnitude worse. Batterie had 10 years of massive investment and an ever growing market share. The supply chain issues are being worked on. Hydrogen cars a statistically insignificant and have basically no growth. The supply chain has seen little investment and there is not even a prospect that any real investment will go into. Its the same old 'get governments to pay oil/car company to sell a fake future'.
- ho243i2434324 3y ago
  The efficiency of Hydrolysis is definitely a big issue, but still, it's not a hard-supply issue like Lithium/Cobalt.
  - b7we5b7a 3y ago
    Yes, but you need to build a similar network of hydrogen pumps as we already have for gas, hydrogen requires more power and infrastructure to store, requires more energy to extract, cars need pressurized tanks, ............ Batteries are simply cheaper, and require far less infrastructure. Summarized in an image: https://cdn.motor1.com/images/mgl/OrLRA/s1/efficiency-compared-battery-electric-73-hydrogen-22-ice-13.webp https://cdn.motor1.com/images/mgl/OrLRA/s1/efficiency-compar...
  - panick21_ 3y ago
    Neither Lithium nor Cobalt have hard limits. Lithium is incredibly common. It does take a while to spin up new mines but all lithium producers are increasing capacity and there are 100s of startup ups working on it, many with government support. Cobalt is not as common but still not actually hard to find. Plus Cobalt is an increasingly small part of most batteries. LFP batteries will be in all lower cost EV. And even in higher cost NMC its by now less then 10% and trending even lower. Neither of these are significant long term supply issues.

TheAlchemist 3y ago

Naaah, not even close. 2021-2022 were a very unusual situation - they got lucky with chips shortages (and admittedly they've got it figured out) allowing them to sell at very high prices - the leader event suggested that Teslas are appreciating assets... Reality is catching up quickly. Margins already crashed, and yet governments are still heavily subsidizing EVs. Without subsides, Tesla would never make any money (nor would their competition).