Car manufacturers like Tesla are embracing cobalt-free batteries. While the metal increases battery life and energy density, cobalt is expensive, making up 30% of an EV's total cost. Why else are tech companies and start-ups working to eliminate cobalt?
Lithium-ion batteries contain a number of different materials including lithium, nickel, aluminum, iron, manganese and cobalt. Of all these metals, cobalt is the most expensive. For the past four years, the average cost of cobalt was higher than the cost of all the other battery metals put together.
"For mass electrification to happen, there are lots of sentiments that cobalt needs to be eliminated or reduced to the bare minimum," says Chibueze Amanchukwu, professor of molecular engineering at the University of Chicago. The price of cobalt has also historically been very volatile. Part of this volatility is because cobalt is usually produced as a byproduct of nickel and copper mining, and therefore tied to the demand and price fluctuations of those metals. The mining and refining of cobalt is also geographically limited.
"The majority of the world's battery-grade cobalt reserves are located in the Democratic Republic of Congo, where the the mining of cobalt is associated with human rights abuses and child labor," says Sam Adham, a senior powertrain research analyst at LMC Automotive. Chinese investors control about 70% of Congo's mining sector. China also has over 80% control of the cobalt refining industry, where the raw material is turned into commercial-grade cobalt metal suitable for use in EVs. In light of the U.S.-China trade war, cobalt supply is in a precarious position for U.S. manufacturers."There is already a viable cobalt-free battery and that is lithium iron phosphate or LFP.
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