How much copper in an electric car?

[Crowbar]

How much copper would one expect on average in the motors and wiring of an electric car (in kg)?

 

[ilikemonkeys]

Not much more than a gasoline-engine car I would imagine.

 

[cash68]

Not much. Why?

 

[Trippytiger]

Probably just a few kilos. Electric motors for vehicle applications aren't really that big.

 

[Crowbar]

Never mind, I just checked and it says a hybrid uses about twice as a similar car in copper. I would expect a fully electric car of the sort we would expect in a few years to be even more, because it gets all its power from an electric motor as it cannot rely on assist from a gasoline engine for any amount of acceleration. 100 kg would be a reasonable estimate (a Prius hybrid is about 50 kg copper). That's going to be a problem then. There is about 500 million tonnes of mineable copper in the world. A 2006 study calculated that bringing electricity infrastructure of developing and third world countries to industrialized western nation standards over the next couple of decades will need pretty much all of that copper. Thus, there simply isn't going to be enough copper to replace every gasoline engine on the road with an electric motor (1.2 billion cars expected on the road in 2020, it's about 700-800 million right now). And there is no suitable alternative. Aluminum has too high a resistivity and you would need to build much larger motors to avoid overheating. So whatever it is that ends up eventually replacing gasoline powered cars, it cannot be electric motors (at least until we mine asteroids or develop practical high temperature superconductors--and neither is going to happen this century).

 

[Duggeh]

We wont get that far. Global economic growth and rising living standards will fall down long before the 3rd world makes it to where the 1st world is now. That unless the current project in France manages to crack Fusion energy on the first go. Even that will only be a stopgap in the face of population growth. The most horrible and the most necessary thing for this planet and mankind to survive and thrive in the grand scheme is a massive and decimating pandemic which knocks global population 80-90%. Maybe Phil the Greek will get his wish and it'll happen.

Rar.

 

[AlanY]

I'm calling BS on the idea that an enormous amount of extra copper is used in the Prius. If so much extra copper was being used over a regular vehicle, the price differential would be much larger than it is. And where is all this extra copper being used? The battery is NiMH -- no copper. You could just as easily use aluminum wiring in the electrical motor as copper.

 

[Trippytiger]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Crowbar /img/forum/go_quote.gif 100 kg would be a reasonable estimate (a Prius hybrid is about 50 kg copper).

Nope. Try this: the very powerful motor in the Tesla Roadster weighs in at around 70 lb/30kg. That's the total weight, so the weight of the copper is obviously going to be even less. The average commuter's car has no need for that kind of power, so the weight of the motor (and consequently, the weight of the copper) in most all-electric cars in the future would be even less than that.

 

[ilikemonkeys]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Trippytiger /img/forum/go_quote.gif Nope. Try this: the very powerful motor in the Tesla Roadster weighs in at around 70 lb/30kg. That's the total weight, so the weight of the copper is obviously going to be even less. The average commuter's car has no need for that kind of power, so the weight of the motor (and consequently, the weight of the copper) in most all-electric cars in the future would be even less than that.

Good point, however the Tesla has one of those motors per wheel. That's why it's so fast.

 

[Trippytiger]

Quote:

Originally Posted by ilikemonkeys /img/forum/go_quote.gif Good point, however the Tesla has one of those motors per wheel. That's why it's so fast.

The Tesla Roadster has a single motor connected to a two speed transmission, not hub motors.

 

[Matteman]

How about using silver for the third world country cars? It's an even better conductor than copper.

 

[Crowbar]

Quote:

Originally Posted by AlanY /img/forum/go_quote.gif I'm calling BS on the idea that an enormous amount of extra copper is used in the Prius. If so much extra copper was being used over a regular vehicle, the price differential would be much larger than it is. And where is all this extra copper being used? The battery is NiMH -- no copper.

I've come across this number several times. For example:

Resource Investor - Interviews - Nothing Like it on Planet Earth - Robert Friedland's Tour d' Tolgoi
"The Toyota Prius, which I just came from Nagoya, I had a tour of this factory with senior management from Toyota, uses 50kg of copper per car. By the way, they don't need any gold to make these cars. 50kg of copper per car is more than twice as much copper intensity per unit car as a conventional car."

Quote:

You could just as easily use aluminum wiring in the electrical motor as copper.

Bull! I already addressed this point in my post. Bother to read before replying next time, chump.

 

[Trippytiger]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Crowbar /img/forum/go_quote.gif I've come across this number several times. For example: Resource Investor - Interviews - Nothing Like it on Planet Earth - Robert Friedland's Tour d' Tolgoi "The Toyota Prius, which I just came from Nagoya, I had a tour of this factory with senior management from Toyota, uses 50kg of copper per car. By the way, they don't need any gold to make these cars. 50kg of copper per car is more than twice as much copper intensity per unit car as a conventional car."

Clearly Toyota need to get their act together if they need that much copper to build their motors, as Tesla can produce a substantially more powerful motor at a considerably lighter weight.


Quote:

Originally Posted by Crowbar /img/forum/go_quote.gif Bull! I already addressed this point in my post. Bother to read before replying next time, chump.

Grow up a little, okay? Besides, as far as I can tell, what you said doesn't rule aluminum windings out, it just makes it more difficult. Electric motors are pretty compact as it is; if the diameter of the windings has to be doubled to match the conductivity of copper, that's probably not the end of the world. And the only problem with excess heat is the wasted energy. The automotive industry has well over a hundred years of experience with removing waste heat from internal combustion engines, which reject a lot of heat.

 

[Crowbar]

Aluminum wiring has very serious longevity problems.

Aluminum wiring
Quote:

During the 1970's, aluminum (instead of copper) wiring became quite popular and was extensively used. Since that time, aluminum wiring has been implicated in a number of house fires, and most jurisdictions no longer permit it in new installations. The main problem with aluminum wiring is a phenomenon known as "cold creep". When aluminum wiring warms up, it expands. When it cools down, it contracts. Unlike copper, when aluminum goesthrough a number of warm/cool cycles it loses a bit of tightness each time. To make the problem worse, aluminum oxidises, or corrodes when in contact with certain types of metal, so the resistance of the connection goes up. Which causes it to heat up and corrode/oxidize still more.

Even if you reduce the copper used to a quarter of the amount that was cited, it's still too much--the issue is that copper supplies are going to be seriously low in 20 years and this application is simply far less important than building electricity supply infrastructure, and thus will lose out. You'll not see aluminum in that application, for the reasons explained above.

 

[infinitesymphony]

Copper will be depleted, oil will dry up...

Better start breeding horses now.