The Guru at Benchmark Minerals last night highlighted that
Gigafactory #265 is planned to be constructed by European Giants Northvolt + Volvo, to many people these announcements are so frequent, the underlying thematics is somewhat clouded. I thought I would highlight just where we sit today in comparison with say 12 months ago and what that means for demand of Graphite Anode Material (The same applies to all battery metals).
Cast Our Minds Back to March 2021 (Only 11 Months Ago)- Volkswagen Just Announced 6 x 40GWh Factories in Europe. This Announcement cracked 200 Gigafactories in the Pipeline by 2030, with a Total Capacity of
3.4TWh- The Benchmark Minerals Team has calculated that on average (Considering various chemistries of battery cells),
1TWh of Battery Capacity requires 1.2Mt of Graphite Anode Material- The Demand Forecasted a demand of
4.1Mt of Graphite Anode Material by 2030 (Additional 2.5Mt or 90 new 30,000tpa projects)
Demand Forecast Today- Simon Moores announcement signals the 265th Gigafactory in the Pipeline (65 New Factories announced in last 11 months) i.e. 1 new gigafactory being announced every 5 days
- 2030 Battery Capacity is now forecast at 5.6TWh (And Growing every 5 days).
-
Graphite Anode Demand by 2030 now sits at 6.7Mtpa (The world requires
170 x New 30,000tpa projects to meet additional 5.1Mtpa)
The Future - The Key Takeaway message is that Demand Forecast Graphs by companies, are utilising the assumption of 3.4TWh by 2030 (Even Renascor's Yesterday). The fact is SOOOO much has been announced over the past 11 months in terms of gigafactories in the pipeline, as well as expansions to existing plants
- Today we sit at
265 Plants for a total capacity of 5.6TWh by 2030, what is the likelihood of reaching 300 Plants in the Pipeline in 2022
- There is going to be an unprecedented demand for raw material such as Graphite, Lithium & Nickel in the very near future. Battery Plants are going to be sitting idle due to a lack of raw material supply. Whilst prices of raw materials will be at all time highs, the Graphite Deficit will begin to emerge in 2022 and wont be slowing down anytime this decade IMO !
