Zenyatta Ventures Ltd

http://resourceclips.com/2015/01/21/a-battery-powered-revolution/2/

VRIC 2015 speakers look at emerging needs in energy and commodities

by Greg Klein

Battery megafactories are on their way, heralding a potential “battery revolution,” says Simon Moores. Although they’re already ubiquitous, much more widespread than only a decade ago, he says batteries remain in a relatively “young stage of development.” Electric vehicles and large-scale storage for utilities could bring on a new phase demanding much more of the minerals and metals they require.

Speaking at this year’sVancouver Resource Investment Conference, Moores dated the first commercial battery-powered watch to 1969. By the late 1990s, battery-powered tools, cellphones and mp3 players became common. By the mid-2000s laptops attained widespread use, followed by the “2007 smartphone revolution powered by Apple.” Tablets and other devices gained popularity. “It’s only now that we’ve evolved into a truly mobile world. You can just tell by the amount of mobile devices you have in your pocket now compared to 10 years ago,” theBenchmark Mineral Intelligence analyst pointed out.

But we’re now entering a new phase of fully electric vehicles—not hybrids—and electricity storage for utilities, he said.

Unlike the earlier mercury or lead-acid batteries, the new wave of batteries uses “niche minerals and metals, they’re not really commodities but specially processed and created products” using graphite, lithium and cobalt, among other minerals. Large-scale storage calls for lithium-ion or vanadium flow batteries.

The impending revolution wouldn’t be the first. The Apple iPhone triggered the “hand-held revolution” in 2007, not just outselling competitors but creating enormous additional demand. Its predecessor, the Nokia N70, sold a million handsets in a year, making it the best-selling smartphone of the time, Moores said. Less than two years later the iPhone emerged, selling a million handsets in 72 days. Last September the iPhone 6 sold 10 million in 72 hours.

Obviously that calls for more batteries, but there’s an additional factor that’s often missed, Moores emphasized. Notwithstanding miniaturization of electronics, batteries are getting bigger. In 2012 the iPhone 5 used roughly nine grams of graphite, he said. Two years later its successor took up to 19 grams. Similar increases apply to lithium and cobalt.

Simon Moores foresees a battery revolution brought about by
electronics, EVs and utility storage.

As for electric vehicles, the Nissan Leaf remains the top seller. But Tesla Motors’ approach “could be the tipping point,” Moores thinks. A key innovation was to build a car around the battery, “basically about the size of the chassis of the car” and more than twice the size of Leaf’s battery.

Other manufacturers had taken existing designs, stuck a battery in it and “then they complained the car didn’t go far enough.”

Now Tesla plans a $5-billion project to build the world’s biggest battery plant in Nevada. “They want to take what the world produced in 2013 and double that capacity in Nevada. The idea is lower-cost batteries, lower-cost cars, mass-scale commercialization of the EV.”

Korean manufacturer LG Chem has started building a $500-million battery plant in China. “We think that’s about a seven-gigawatt-hour plant.”

A manufacturer of iPhones for Apple, Foxconn has another battery factory planned for China that Moores thinks will produce about 15 GWh. Like Tesla, Foxconn’s new to the battery-building business.

Tesla’s factory, which the company hopes to see operating in 2017, would have a 35-GWh capacity. “The biggest plant today is about two gigawatt-hours.”

Moores estimates that 200,000 EV sales a year would disrupt minerals markets. “It won’t take millions, it’ll be 200,000 and then you’ll have a supply problem.”

“Because everyone thinks very short-term, this falls under the radar until there’s a massive supply problem. That’s when the price spikes, that’s when investment comes in, but then it’s too late.”

Thomas Drolet suggested investors watch for
technology breakthroughs in energy efficiency.

Coinciding with EV developments will be utility demand for large-scale storage batteries, Moores added. Pointing out that New York City suffered blackouts in 2003 and 2012, he said countries like the U.S., the UK and Canada rely on electrical grids about 100 years old. “They haven’t really changed. They’ve just been expanded and patched up.” Security of supply calls for off-grid storage. An additional benefit would be the ability to supply extra capacity during peak periods.

The two main large-storage types are lithium-ion and vanadium flow, with li-ion the most common. Vanadium flow comprises “probably theoretically better technology,” but the megafactories will churn out lithium-ion products. Both types use graphite.

The world now has only about 580 megawatts of utility storage capacity. Moores cited a Navigant Research forecast of a possible 20 GW by 2022 and an IHSreport predicting as much as 40 GW by the same year.

Among other VRIC speakers addressing energy, nuclear expert Thomas Droletstated the “fusion business is so capital-intensive” that he doesn’t expect it to take hold for generations.

“However there is some research in electrolyte-type ionic transfers that is starting to bear fruit. It’s under deep cover in several countries in the world. Here in B.C. there’s some work going on, in Israel, in Japan, and I would say that cold fusion, as it was portrayed back in the middle ’80s, it won’t be that type of fusion. But fusion probably has the best chance of being the long-term source.”

Panel members representing GoviEx Uranium, Skyharbour Resources and Lakeland Resources agreed that uranium prices will rise to reflect global energy needs.

Mining and exploration aren’t the only opportunities in energy, he emphasized. “Technology breakthroughs for energy efficiency is the place you should be looking in the next decade if you really want to make money in energy.”

Speaking at a panel discussion on uranium investment, GoviEx Uranium CSE:GXUCEO Daniel Major recounted how Govind Friedland came to found the company. Living in coal-polluted Beijing, he “basically got fed up with not being able to breath,” said Major. Friedland “decided the long term for energy supply for China was going to be the uranium market…. We’re driven by a social revolution in China and urbanization in the rest of the world…. Seven million people died in 2012 from pollution-related diseases.”

But the revolution has yet to lift uranium’s post-Fukushima price. The panel’s two Athabasca Basin explorers, Jonathan Armes, president/CEO ofLakeland Resources TSXV:LK and Jordan Trimble, president/CEO of Skyharbour Resources TSXV:SYH, agreed that uranium’s laggard price makes this an opportune time to acquire and explore properties.

Pointing out that the 2030 world will have twice as many nuclear reactors in operation as now, Armes said, “We see the price moving forward—when, we don’t know. But it’s not an ‘if’ it’s a ‘when’.”

Disclaimer: Lakeland Resources Inc is a client of OnPage Media Corp, the publisher of ResourceClips.com. The principals of OnPage Media may hold shares in Lakeland Resources.