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Latest Bull Case for Electric Cars: the Cheapest Batteries Ever

Latest Bull Case for Electric Cars: the Cheapest Batteries Ever

(Bloomberg) -- The kind of battery that powers electric vehicles is now the cheapest it’s ever been thanks to a global ramp-up in production.

Lithium-ion battery packs are selling at an average price of $209 a kilowatt-hour, down 24 percent from a year ago and about a fifth of what it was in 2010, a Bloomberg New Energy Finance survey shows. The rate has further to fall -- reaching below $100 a kilowatt-hour by 2025, according to a report by BNEF analyst James Frith.

That’s a magic number for the electric car business. According to Frith, $100 is widely seen as “a tipping point in the adoption of EVs.”

Latest Bull Case for Electric Cars: the Cheapest Batteries Ever

The price estimates are based on a BNEF survey of more than 50 companies, and their decline reflects a rise in battery manufacturing and “the economies of scale that come with it,” the report shows. Developers of stationary storage systems -- like the kind that back up rooftop solar panels -- can expect to pay 51 percent more than automakers because of much lower order volumes.

To contact the reporter on this story: Mark Chediak in San Francisco at mchediak@bloomberg.net.

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Lynn Doan at ldoan6@bloomberg.net, Steve Dickson

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