Lithium Ion Batteries and Tesla's Elon Musk
Tesla is expanding it bussines in many ways, SpaceX, Tesla cars, solar roofs as well as batteries. Those lithium ion batteries are used for the cars themselves as well as batteries for storing power from solar panels.
Apart from Tesla's uses of these batteries they are used in smartphones/laptops and other electronics. He even recently offered to solve South Australian problem with energy by building more batteries to store power for when theres a deficit.
Its stock is soaring making it worth more than a company such as Ford that produced 6.4 million cars in 2016 while Tesla produced almost 84000, yep thousand.
It all seems to be about the hype it has created and the most recent hype(positive) Tesla is getting is about plans to invest to make more batteries; how much 35 GigaWatthours. If youre not sure how much that would represent it would mean they would be able to produce enough batteries for almost 400k of their Model S cars. Not bad.
Since his statement China has announced plans to build factories that will produce 120 GigaWatthours; in terms of Elon Musk's factory x 4. Yet you wouldn't hear this in the news cause its not Tesla, even if Ford was doing it you'd be seeing it on page 38 while Tesla's news is front page.
Now everyone is realising the potential of this, all these new electronic devices (inc cars) coming online , that do more and more will need a better battery to drive it, that reliable and rechargeable. And Lithium Ion technology is best we currently have.
Look below at current use and projections of lithium ion batteries in world today:
What does this mean for you: Companies that make lithium ion batteries (most are in China/US) but the key is the hype. Tesla's positive hype will eventually fall of but the demand for batteries will stay as we get more electronic equipment in our lives so if youre going to invest in battery manufacturers choose others. Another thing that you could learn from this is even though Lithium is plentiful supply, all these battery manufacturers will put pressure on the price. And for fellow Australians on here Australia is a major supplier.
Sources: www.bloomberg.com
www.lithiumion-batteries.com
irfo1
Lithium is a rare earth metal and the battles for these metals are just beginning. At the moment China has the biggest percentage of this metal and unless Tesla starts kneeling down to the kings of the East then this company is going no where fast. There is an alternative though - loosen regulations further for new tech companies in the USA, welcome and nurture new businesses, lower their tax rates to 0 for the first 5 years. Do this an new technologies will be found, new batteries that dont even need lithium, maybe no abtteries at all! This could be easily done without printing any new moneys, just cut half of the useless Gov. jobs.
beauracracy is going to grow more sadly, I never see smaller governments just bigger