March 28, 2025 • 30 mins
EV sales in the US continue to grow. Learn what needs to happen to spur further adoption.
Roughly 20% of US passenger vehicles sold in 2024 were battery electric or hybrid vehicles. What’s next for the EV industry, especially in the face of a changing regulatory environment and tariffson key materials such as lithium?
Join Steve Odland and guest Dr. Alex Heil, senior economist in the US Economy, Strategy & Finance Center, to explore the future of EV growth in the US, whether EVs are price competitive with fossil fuel vehicles, and what’s happening in countries such as Norway, China, and India.
(00:29) Understanding Electric Vehicles
(02:15) Trends in EV Adoption
(03:47) Challenges of Range and Cost
(06:27) Impact on the Electrical Grid
(09:10) Charging Infrastructure Developments
(14:06) Commercial and Freight EVs
(17:33) Global EV Market Insights
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Steve Odland (00:00):
Welcome to C-Suite Perspectives, a signature
(00:02):
series by The Conference Board.
I'm Steve Odland from The ConferenceBoard and the host of this series.
In today's discussion, we're goingto talk about electric vehicle
adoption in the United States.
What are the incentives, thechallenges in the EV market?
Joining me today is Dr. Alex Heil, senioreconomist and the interim leader of our
US Economy, Strategy & Finance Center.
(00:24):
Alex, welcome.
Alex Heil (00:25):
Thanks, Steve.
Good to be here with you.
Steve Odland (00:29):
So Alex, you've written a really interesting paper on the
EV market, the electric vehiclemarket, in the United States.
What is an electric vehicle?
There are multiple flavors to this.
Alex Heil (00:40):
Yeah.
So I think if we want to differentiatesome of the drivetrains, we have
the traditional fossil fuel-poweredvehicles, and then we have a variety
of hybrid vehicles that eitherincludes the plug-in hybrids, meaning
those are vehicles that have a smallelectric engine, a small battery.
And there's a combination betweenan electrically charged drivetrain,
(01:04):
as well as a hybrid fossil fuel,partially fossil fuel-powered engine.
We also have a hybridthat is not a plug in.
So a hybrid that would include basicallyjust this sort of transition engine that
is partly fossil fuel-driven and partlybased on a mechanism by which you get some
(01:26):
electric power charged within the process.
And then we also have the purebattery electric vehicles.
Those are the ones that I thinkpeople mostly think about when
they think about electric vehicles.
Those are the ones with a bigbattery, you charge them, and then
you get certain range out of it.
And by the time you run out ofrange, you have to plug in again.
And it's all 100% electricity-powered.
Steve Odland (01:47):
So four modes.
One is internal combustion,gas or diesel only.
Second is electric only,pure electric like a Tesla.
Third is hybrid, like a Prius.
And then fourth is a plug-inhybrid, which is both.
You have batteries to charge andan internal combustion engine.
(02:07):
Did I get that right?
Alex Heil (02:08):
Yeah.
That's correct.
It's a range between fossilfuel on the one end and pure
battery electric on the other.
Steve Odland (02:14):
OK.
So just talk about the trends here becauseEVs, and we're using that broadly
to cover multiples of these, they'vebeen really growing recently in share.
Alex Heil (02:28):
Yeah, 2024 was a year characterized by a lot of
growth in that vehicle market.
So electric vehicles, that's batteryelectric, they grew by a little over 7% to
about a million 1.3 million vehicles sold.
And in order to, we just talkedabout hybrids, you have to add to
(02:49):
that, and another almost 2 millionof hybrid vehicles that were sold
as well in 2024, bringing the totalfor those three electrified, in
various stages, vehicle categoriesto a little over 3 million vehicles.
That's almost 20%, that's around20% of all vehicles sold in
the US, that's a big number.
(03:09):
The battery piece of this is a littleunder 10%, but it's a number that's
been rising relatively quickly, sowe've broken through the million-dollar
mark with battery electric vehicles,essentially, a couple years ago.
And growth has slowed slightly in allof this, so the 7% growth in that market
segment is a little less than we hadin a couple years prior, but still,
(03:33):
overall, it's pretty healthy growth.
Steve Odland (03:35):
Yeah, in classical marketing terms, you talk about early adopters
on any new technology, and that's whatwe saw probably for, I would say, for
the first half a dozen years or so.
And then you have the people who followon, and I think we're at the high-growth
stage here, which means that there'sgreater trust in the technology, but
(03:57):
one of the things that people have beentrying to overcome is this range anxiety,
and so this level of growth suggests thatpeople are coming to terms with that.
Alex Heil (04:07):
I think that's true.
I think the latest models of the electricvehicles, they have a lot of range.
And certainly enough range to covermost of the average household's trip.
But that's even true for plug-in hybrids.
So a plug-in hybrid, if you take thesort of the standard model, maybe has
(04:28):
a range of 30, 40 miles to a charge.
But it's true that most trips in theUnited States, if you look at the average
household and their driving patterns, mosttrips are a relatively short distance.
So you can accomplish a lot, even witha relatively small battery capacity.
However, you have to qualify this.
That's true, especially in thesuburban setup, where people have
(04:51):
charges at home, they can return totheir home base, they can recharge.
In more rural environments where distancesare longer, that's not always the case.
So it also depends on the circumstances.
Steve Odland (05:02):
Now, the other barrier has been the upfront costs.
When Tesla first came out, theycame out with their most expensive
model, it was very expensive, itwas equivalent to a luxury sedan.
And that's just a barrier for most people.
Now, as more manufacturers havegotten into it, and the electric-only
(05:23):
manufacturers have brought in cheapervehicles, it's made it more accessible.
So how do the upfront costs compare?
Alex Heil (05:31):
I think in the US, in particular, it is still true that
battery electric vehicles comewith a price premium compared to
a fossil fuel car, the comparable.
That premium, it depends on thetype of car you're talking about,
could be anywhere around 20% to 30%.
You also have potentially higherinsurance costs, but if we're just
(05:52):
talking about the upfront investment,there's still a premium associated
with a battery electric vehicle.
That premium has shrunk over time,I think that's certainly true,
largely in part because of fallingbattery cost, but it's still there.
The current industry view isthat, depending on some of the
(06:12):
circumstances around further adoption,technological improvements, resource
prices, component prices, and soforth, we're probably looking at
reaching price parity within the nextthree to four years or thereabouts.
Steve Odland (06:28):
The other thing that people have been talking about is, the
reason that you go to a battery electricis because it's more fuel efficient and
energy efficient, but you've written alot on the about the electrical grid and
the fact that it still is too relianton fossil fuels, for one thing, but
(06:49):
secondly, there's a limit to the grid.
Where is the tipping point on that?
Where, in order to put a substantiallyhigher number of vehicles onto the
grid to charge, that you really haveto expand the grid dramatically.
Alex Heil (07:04):
Yeah.
So I think, just staying withthe vehicles for a moment.
If you're looking at basically theamortization of some of the emissions that
are embedded with the battery, mostly,but also some of the manufacturing,
it depends on the type of vehicle.
It depends on how many miles aperson drives per year, but usually
(07:24):
studies, they peg it around, let'ssay, 15,000, 20,000 miles.
So what does that mean?
After 15 or 20,000 miles, abattery electric vehicle has broken
even in terms of the emissionsreductions and then becomes
environmentally beneficial completely.
So it basically amortizes that biglump of emissions from the battery.
(07:47):
Now I think what we've also seenis certainly the improvement
of the battery quality.
We've seen improvements in someof the mineral content that is
used in some of these batteries.
We've seen prices drop.
So all of this has contributed to thefurther environmental improvement
of battery electric vehicles, butthe point is well taken that if
(08:09):
we're looking at the grid overall,a large-scale electrification of
transportation, let's say in thepassenger space, ignoring freight for
a moment in certainly the passengerspace will require more electricity
demand of electricity capacity.
It will increase the load demand.
We're not at the point yet where we cannecessarily say that the grid is up to
(08:32):
that particular challenge, but that's truebecause also the overall energy transition
depends on electrification of a variety ofsectors, transportation being one of them.
So I think that's a challenge goingforward, just thinking about how
can we make sure that the grid holdsup to that particular challenge.
Steve Odland (08:49):
Yeah, you could think of it as if there was price parity between an
internal combustion engine and a batteryelectric vehicle, and if the range
was acceptable, and if the charging wasas plentiful and as fast, there would
be no reason that consumers wouldn'tmove to a battery electric vehicle.
They're faster.
They're simpler to maintain and so forth.
(09:10):
So there are some things here thatare moving in the right direction,
but still are somewhat barriers.
Talk about the charging infrastructure asa barrier, and where do we stand on that,
as well as the regulatory environment.
Alex Heil (09:24):
Yeah, it's sometimes viewed as the "chicken and the
egg" kind of a problem, right?
You need a charger inorder to recharge your car.
But it only makes sense to have avast charging network if there's
a sufficient number of vehicleson the road that can utilize this.
We have as a country, if you lookat public charging stations in
particular, we've made tremendousprogress over the last few years.
(09:47):
So the number of publiclyavailable chargers has doubled
in the last four years.
And that's significant.
That is paired with some of theseinvestments that households have made
in their own charging infrastructure.
So if you live in a suburban household,you have sufficient space in your garage,
you can install a level two charger,which is a relatively fast charger.
(10:10):
And you can replenish yourvehicle's battery overnight and
then be ready to go in the morning.
So that's certainly oneend of that development.
The other one is publiclyavailable charges.
We've seen some investments being madeon the public side, there's been an
incentive the prior administration hadmade on how many billions of dollars were
(10:33):
going to be invested in public charges.
That was relatively slowto pick up and take off.
So as of right now, I think it is probablylikely to be a situation where there's
not going to be much policy supportthat public chargers are going to be
receiving from the current administration.
That's going to be one challenge for thecontinued growth in electric vehicles.
(10:56):
But, on the other hand, we havealso seen that private chargers,
household chargers, they haveseen significant growth, as well.
And some of those are still beingsupported financially by, for instance,
the incentives from your local utility, orthe energy generation firms that provide
some of the financial benefits there.
(11:17):
I think with chargers, it's achallenge, but it's certainly one
that overall, it's being overcome,but it just takes some time.
Steve Odland (11:26):
Level one is just, you plug it into an outlet.
That takes forever.
Level two is a 220-volt, which you haveto install separately with the charger.
But then there's also DC chargingthat's all AC, but DC, charging
direct current, is actually very fast.
And that seems to be the majority ofwhat's being installed in charging.
Alex Heil (11:45):
Yeah, I think that the point is that if you're on the road,
and you need to recharge your car,you can't wait for eight hours, right?
That's really the point.
So you need something that can replenishyour battery in relatively short order.
If someone drives from New York toWashington and needs to recharge
along the way, having a DC charger,that makes that trip suitable.
You can basically plan a stop alongI-95 and then, after a relatively short
(12:10):
period of time, be up and running again.
I think that comes with this entiretransition to electric vehicles,
fast charge is the way to go.
Now, you don't always want to chargeyour battery in that way because it's
a little bit too intense for thebattery to take on a day-to-day basis.
But it is certainly something that makesyour operations a whole lot easier.
Steve Odland (12:32):
And if you can plug in with a DC charger, you can plug in and get
80% of your capacity in what, 20 minutes?
So it puts it withinreason for a longer trip.
And so therefore that helpswith the adoption, as well.
Alex Heil (12:49):
Oh yeah, absolutely.
I think this whole issue, you mentionedit in the beginning, is range anxiety.
A lot of households have experiencedthis, that one of the obstacles,
just from a behavioral perspective,"How much can I rely on my car being
available for a trip?" Especially oncewe're talking about a couple hundred
(13:09):
miles of distance in driving.
That certainly providesan obstacle overall.
I think we've also seen nowwith new battery composition,
new battery chemistry, we'veseen improvements in range.
We've seen improvements in theextent to which battery capacity
falls in cold weather, for instance.
That's a big advantage becauseit used to be the case that, once
(13:31):
you reach the winter, there's alot of capacity that's lost just
because of the temperature alone.
But some of the improved batterycomposition of some of the more recent
battery technologies, they do overcomesome of those challenges, as well.
Steve Odland (13:46):
We're talking about electric vehicles and the economics of those.
We're going to take a shortbreak and be right back.
Welcome back to C-Suite Perspectives.
I'm your host, Steve Odland,from The Conference Board.
And I'm joined today by Alex Heil, senioreconomist and interim leader of the
US Economy, Strategy & Finance Center.
Alex, you mentioned earlier, before thebreak, that most of our conversation
(14:10):
was on passenger vehicles, but forcommercial travel or freight travel, it's
a different deal entirely, isn't it?
Alex Heil (14:17):
Yeah, I think that we're talking about these numbers that
have been very impressive on thepassenger side, several million cars.
The projection is that, depending onhow you interpret the continued adoption
towards the end of this decade, we'regoing to reach a point where a quarter,
30, 40% of vehicles on the road aregoing to be battery electric vehicles
(14:39):
or hybrids or some combination thereof.
On the freight side, it'sreally a different story.
We're really in the early stages there.
The numbers are much, much smaller forthese long-duration trips of trucks.
The electrification of that sliceof the transportation system
creates much bigger challenges.
(15:00):
There needs to be much more investment intrucks that can handle that sort of range.
We need to have the adequate charginginfrastructure to service some
of these long-distance trucks.
And considering how the marketis organized, that's not only
large companies operating thesetrucking networks, but also a lot
of individuals, sole proprietors,essentially, that are operating a truck.
(15:21):
The upfront cost of some of thosebattery-operated trucks is still
prohibitive for a lot of people.
Steve Odland (15:28):
And the weight is an issue because it limits the amount of
freight that you can haul, as well.
You have to balance that out differently.
So there's a lot there to dealwith, but look, there are companies
producing trucks that are electric.
And the last-mile distributors, Amazonand FedEx and UPS, converting to electric.
(15:49):
So there is some progress here.
Alex Heil (15:52):
Oh, absolutely.
I think the moment that you can relyon a sort of a depot system, like a
hub-and-spoke system, where a truck cango back to its home base, to a warehouse,
at the end of the afternoon or theend of the night, recharge overnight,
and then be back out again the nextmorning, I think that's very much doable.
I think that's very true.
And you can see that already,as you indicated, in some
(16:13):
neighborhoods, last-mile retaildeliveries that are already
serviced by battery-operated trucks.
I think it's the long-distance market,the New York to Chicago, New York
to the West Coast, anything alongthose kinds of what one has imagined
as being the long-haul truck routes.
Those are going to be the onesmuch more challenged by this.
Steve Odland (16:33):
Yeah.
And then you've got rail, which isa competitive system to trucks.
And not much is being done there, butyou could see some demand shift or supply
shift there, depending on where regulatorypolicies go between rail and trucks.
Alex Heil (16:53):
Rail is, it depends on what the transportation modes are
like in their specifics, but railhistorically has been the environmentally
safer, the less emissions per tonof freight transported type of mode.
So there have been benefitsthere, and that's certainly true.
(17:15):
In a world where we're shiftingcompletely to battery-operated
trucks, maybe that's going to change.
But rail certainly has an advantagein that long-distance traffic.
Steve Odland (17:24):
Now, you can't turn on the television or look at a newspaper
without reading about tariffs andtrade barriers and industrial policy.
And all of that does impact theUS EV market, particularly as it
relates to critical minerals andcomponents to make batteries.
Talk about the macro environmenthere and the potential impact on EVs.
Alex Heil (17:46):
Yeah, so I think it's important to just recognize that
the biggest cost driver for anelectric vehicle is the battery.
And the prices of lithium-ionbatteries, in particular, have come down
dramatically over the last few years.
So in 2024 alone, the batterydrop price drop was 10%.
That's the biggest one since 2017.
(18:06):
So that's meaningful.
Just to give a sense.
, and these numbers don't necessarilymean anything without context, but
just to give where we are in this,the current price per kilowatt hour
of battery capacity is around $115.
Industry analysts currently forecastthat the moment they're going to hit
(18:26):
$100 per kilowatt hour of capacity, we'rereaching price parity between fossil fuel
vehicles and battery electric vehicles.
So that's all to say that, in the battery,the materials being used, a lot of those
come from other parts of the world.
They are not necessarilymanufactured in the United States.
(18:47):
So trade barriers, trade tariffs are goingto be affecting some of those prices.
I think the current sense in theindustry is that tariffs on imports
to the United States, includingsome of these materials, are, if not
increasing prices of battery electricvehicles or the battery component
thereof, but at least slow the decline.
(19:08):
And I think that's certainlytrue in that regard.
Steve Odland (19:11):
Yeah, and I keep pointing here, you've got rare-earth
minerals, but lithium's a big deal.
And there is lithium in the groundin the United States, you've got
regulatory issues around miningit, but we're dependent on China
for a lot of our lithium now.
Alex Heil (19:25):
Oh yeah, absolutely.
There are mines that have beenbasically proposed or have been
planned out west—Thacker Pass in,I believe, Nevada—is one of them.
But most of those materialscurrently come from China.
And we're all aware of the trade tariffsthat we're now dealing with and what that
actually means for some of these minerals.
(19:46):
So I think that going forward, not onlyfor component parts, but also for the
minerals themselves, we're going to bedealing with an environment where there's
going to be upward price pressure, andthat's going to make that transition to
electric vehicles even more challenging.
Steve Odland (19:59):
Which makes the discussions about the deal with
Ukraine over some of these mineralsvery interesting and potentially a
game-changer if that comes to fruition.
Alex Heil (20:09):
Yeah, there's the minerals part, and that's certainly true.
I think the other part that is importanthere is a focus on recycling of some
of these materials that have alreadybeen in use in some of these batteries.
So if you take the traditional car batterythat everybody is used to from decades
ago, we have reached a level of recyclingin that market that is truly tremendous.
(20:32):
I believe it's 98% of that material,lead acid batteries, are being recycled.
So I think going forward, there's reallya lot of growth in the used EV market, and
ultimately, there will have to be a plan.
There's going to be someplan towards recycling some
of these battery components.
So considering this growth, certainly oneof the early challenges now is going to
(20:56):
be to think about how to secure access tosome of these materials, how to make sure
that we have enough battery capacity forthese, for the increase in manufacturing.
But also then, if you take the longerview, there needs to be some consideration
of, oh, we can probably recycle someof these materials that have already
been in use in some of these cars.
Steve Odland (21:17):
Yeah.
And that's lithium.
But you and I have talked in thepast about the newer technologies.
Sodium batteries havehigh promise at low cost.
You also are hearing aboutsolid state development.
There are technologies inthe pipeline here which could
radically change the economics.
Alex Heil (21:37):
Oh, that's absolutely true.
I think that the technology and the rateof improvements there is fast, and it's
going to have a huge impact on the market.
The other area that I think is reallyimportant to consider is, at some point,
we're also going to reach critical mass.
And you mentioned the grid before.
When it comes to bidirectional charging,which is basically the process by
(21:59):
which you connect electric vehiclesto the grid, and the battery becomes a
support for the grid during high demandtimes and so forth, there's currently,
I believe, a couple electric vehiclemodels that are able to already do this.
They can basically power your homeor serve the grid if you have the
right infrastructure in place.
But if you extrapolate from there, andyou look at a fleet of electric vehicles
(22:24):
that is being used by US householdseverywhere, that could be a game-changer
when it comes to just the amount ofstorage that is available supporting the
grid and make some of these shortagesalso a little bit easier to handle.
Steve Odland (22:39):
One thing you've said before, and you've written about is that
the grid capacity is not as acute asit would appear because you're looking
at grids, the capacity maxing out inthe daytime when there's maximum use,
but most of these charging most ofthe charging happens overnight, which
is when the grid is not at capacity.
So this actually helpslevel out use of the grid.
Alex Heil (23:03):
Yeah, I think that's true.
I think there's a general sensethat the grid certainly is undersized
considering electrification goingforward, but reconductoring the process
of improving some of the materialsthat are used within the grid itself,
that can increase capacity by 20%.
As you mentioned, just changing thetiming of when one connects to the
(23:27):
grid in order to recharge vehicles orstorage or anything along those lines.
I think that can make a difference.
So I think there are ways to moreefficiently operate the electric grid
and the energy system that can certainlyget us years into the future without
necessarily making big sacrifices there.
Steve Odland (23:46):
Now we've talked about learning from what other countries
are doing, and certainly there arecountries that are that have higher
rates of adoption and usage of EVs,Norway being a classic example here.
Talk about what we can learnelsewhere and apply here.
Alex Heil (24:02):
Yeah, so you mentioned a series of publications that we put out.
We published this and we wrote itup, our research in collaboration
with our colleagues in Europe andin China, and that has allowed us to
gather insights around other markets.
We wrote a paper on Norway,wrote a paper on India.
We had a real interesting reflectionon what other markets are like.
(24:25):
China was another regionalmarket that we looked at.
And these are all very different stories.
Norway is, at this point, north of 90%when it comes to electric vehicles as a
share of annual car sales essentially.
So that's in part due to the significantfinancial incentive that they have in
place and this network effect that, onceyou have this large number of EVs and a
(24:49):
relatively widespread charging network,that really the small country has really
pushed into this and leaned into it.
If you look at other countries, andthat's probably true for the EV market
overall, it's really a China story.
You can see a lot ofcapacity expansion in China.
You can see the prices of battery electricvehicles coming down dramatically.
(25:10):
50% of new cars sold inChina are now electric.
So you can see a lot of this.
And really, in terms of growth,Chinese manufacturers are now
looking for overseas markets.
They're looking, they can't enter theUS, but they can look towards other parts
of Asia, they look at Europe, certainly.
And market shares are going tobe moving there in their favor
(25:32):
relatively quickly, one would think.
And that's certainly veryimpressive, that's very descriptive
of what's happening in the market.
India, on the other hand,is another story, right?
They're very early on inthis electrification process.
For them, an electric vehicleis still a luxury product.
That is, affordability is one ofthe big issues for various reasons.
And there, in the intermediate,near-term future, it is much more
(25:57):
a question of how you electrifytwo- and three-wheel scooters.
Because that's something thatis going to have an immediate
effect, especially on air qualityin some of the highly populated
cities, like Delhi, for instance.
Steve Odland (26:09):
Yeah, tuk-tuks.
As you said, every story is different.
In the case of China.
They don't have oil.
They're buying it from Russia.
They're trying to reducetheir dependence on oil.
And so therefore, they're building acoal-fired plant, production plant,
electricity plant every month.
It's a really high rate, which isnot good for the environment, but
they're going to get there and beable to electrify their fleet and
(26:31):
therefore reduce their dependenceon oil coming from other countries.
But every country has a different story.
Norway's got mostly hydropower,which is clean and plentiful there.
In the desert nations,there's no hydropower.
So it's a different challenge everywhere.
Final question.
What do you see in terms of projectionsfor EV adoption over the years, and
(26:52):
what could influence those projections?
Alex Heil (26:55):
Certainly, in the very near term, some of the policies enacted
are going to make a difference.
There's been work put out by academicslast year, I believe, that suggested
that as a result of an eliminationof the tax credit that EV purchasers
currently enjoy, the sales mightdrop by about a quarter or so.
(27:16):
Now, that's true.
I think overall, some of thisis going to be overcome by the
continued downward trend in prices.
If you look out a little bit further andtry to project where we're going to be in
terms of the shares of vehicles that aregoing to be electric as part of the total,
I think, by even 10 years from now, wemight have reached and gone through 25%.
(27:40):
Maybe 30% of all vehicles might beelectric at that point, but that requires
a relatively quick adoption consideringthe average age, the life cycle of a
car, is 12 years or something like that.
So it takes a while for fossilfuel vehicles that are sold
today to actually be retired.
If you mirror this globally, Ithink you get similar projections.
(28:02):
So if the sales share reaches 50%and then goes north of that, I think
we may get to the point that, by theend of the next decade, a third, 40%
of all vehicles might be electric.
We've run these numbers in the past,and we've had these conversations,
Steve, about what this meansfor greenhouse gas emissions.
I think one of the big factors is justsimply it takes a while to turn over the
(28:26):
portfolio of cars that is currently on theroads in the United States and completely
electrify those millions of cars.
I think we're going to see moregrowth in the near-term growth.
I think it's going to be slower thanit otherwise might have been, but I
think EVs are certainly set up for.
dominance of that market,especially internationally, if
(28:47):
the current projections hold.
Steve Odland (28:49):
And it's going to take decades, and we need
to plan, which is a point thatyou've made over and over again.
We need a master plan for this, so, Dr.Alex Heil, thanks for being with us today.
Alex Heil (29:00):
Thanks so much for having me.
Steve Odland (29:03):
And thanks to all of you for listening to C-Suite Perspectives.
I'm Steve Odland, and this series has beenbrought to you by The Conference Board.
Welcome to C-Suite Perspectives, a signature
(00:02):
series by The Conference Board.
I'm Steve Odland from The ConferenceBoard and the host of this series.
In today's discussion, we're goingto talk about electric vehicle
adoption in the United States.
What are the incentives, thechallenges in the EV market?
Joining me today is Dr. Alex Heil, senioreconomist and the interim leader of our
US Economy, Strategy & Finance Center.
(00:24):
Alex, welcome.
Alex Heil (00:25):
Thanks, Steve.
Good to be here with you.
Steve Odland (00:29):
So Alex, you've written a really interesting paper on the
EV market, the electric vehiclemarket, in the United States.
What is an electric vehicle?
There are multiple flavors to this.
Alex Heil (00:40):
Yeah.
So I think if we want to differentiatesome of the drivetrains, we have
the traditional fossil fuel-poweredvehicles, and then we have a variety
of hybrid vehicles that eitherincludes the plug-in hybrids, meaning
those are vehicles that have a smallelectric engine, a small battery.
And there's a combination betweenan electrically charged drivetrain,
(01:04):
as well as a hybrid fossil fuel,partially fossil fuel-powered engine.
We also have a hybridthat is not a plug in.
So a hybrid that would include basicallyjust this sort of transition engine that
is partly fossil fuel-driven and partlybased on a mechanism by which you get some
(01:26):
electric power charged within the process.
And then we also have the purebattery electric vehicles.
Those are the ones that I thinkpeople mostly think about when
they think about electric vehicles.
Those are the ones with a bigbattery, you charge them, and then
you get certain range out of it.
And by the time you run out ofrange, you have to plug in again.
And it's all 100% electricity-powered.
Steve Odland (01:47):
So four modes.
One is internal combustion,gas or diesel only.
Second is electric only,pure electric like a Tesla.
Third is hybrid, like a Prius.
And then fourth is a plug-inhybrid, which is both.
You have batteries to charge andan internal combustion engine.
(02:07):
Did I get that right?
Alex Heil (02:08):
Yeah.
That's correct.
It's a range between fossilfuel on the one end and pure
battery electric on the other.
Steve Odland (02:14):
OK.
So just talk about the trends here becauseEVs, and we're using that broadly
to cover multiples of these, they'vebeen really growing recently in share.
Alex Heil (02:28):
Yeah, 2024 was a year characterized by a lot of
growth in that vehicle market.
So electric vehicles, that's batteryelectric, they grew by a little over 7% to
about a million 1.3 million vehicles sold.
And in order to, we just talkedabout hybrids, you have to add to
(02:49):
that, and another almost 2 millionof hybrid vehicles that were sold
as well in 2024, bringing the totalfor those three electrified, in
various stages, vehicle categoriesto a little over 3 million vehicles.
That's almost 20%, that's around20% of all vehicles sold in
the US, that's a big number.
(03:09):
The battery piece of this is a littleunder 10%, but it's a number that's
been rising relatively quickly, sowe've broken through the million-dollar
mark with battery electric vehicles,essentially, a couple years ago.
And growth has slowed slightly in allof this, so the 7% growth in that market
segment is a little less than we hadin a couple years prior, but still,
(03:33):
overall, it's pretty healthy growth.
Steve Odland (03:35):
Yeah, in classical marketing terms, you talk about early adopters
on any new technology, and that's whatwe saw probably for, I would say, for
the first half a dozen years or so.
And then you have the people who followon, and I think we're at the high-growth
stage here, which means that there'sgreater trust in the technology, but
(03:57):
one of the things that people have beentrying to overcome is this range anxiety,
and so this level of growth suggests thatpeople are coming to terms with that.
Alex Heil (04:07):
I think that's true.
I think the latest models of the electricvehicles, they have a lot of range.
And certainly enough range to covermost of the average household's trip.
But that's even true for plug-in hybrids.
So a plug-in hybrid, if you take thesort of the standard model, maybe has
(04:28):
a range of 30, 40 miles to a charge.
But it's true that most trips in theUnited States, if you look at the average
household and their driving patterns, mosttrips are a relatively short distance.
So you can accomplish a lot, even witha relatively small battery capacity.
However, you have to qualify this.
That's true, especially in thesuburban setup, where people have
(04:51):
charges at home, they can return totheir home base, they can recharge.
In more rural environments where distancesare longer, that's not always the case.
So it also depends on the circumstances.
Steve Odland (05:02):
Now, the other barrier has been the upfront costs.
When Tesla first came out, theycame out with their most expensive
model, it was very expensive, itwas equivalent to a luxury sedan.
And that's just a barrier for most people.
Now, as more manufacturers havegotten into it, and the electric-only
(05:23):
manufacturers have brought in cheapervehicles, it's made it more accessible.
So how do the upfront costs compare?
Alex Heil (05:31):
I think in the US, in particular, it is still true that
battery electric vehicles comewith a price premium compared to
a fossil fuel car, the comparable.
That premium, it depends on thetype of car you're talking about,
could be anywhere around 20% to 30%.
You also have potentially higherinsurance costs, but if we're just
(05:52):
talking about the upfront investment,there's still a premium associated
with a battery electric vehicle.
That premium has shrunk over time,I think that's certainly true,
largely in part because of fallingbattery cost, but it's still there.
The current industry view isthat, depending on some of the
(06:12):
circumstances around further adoption,technological improvements, resource
prices, component prices, and soforth, we're probably looking at
reaching price parity within the nextthree to four years or thereabouts.
Steve Odland (06:28):
The other thing that people have been talking about is, the
reason that you go to a battery electricis because it's more fuel efficient and
energy efficient, but you've written alot on the about the electrical grid and
the fact that it still is too relianton fossil fuels, for one thing, but
(06:49):
secondly, there's a limit to the grid.
Where is the tipping point on that?
Where, in order to put a substantiallyhigher number of vehicles onto the
grid to charge, that you really haveto expand the grid dramatically.
Alex Heil (07:04):
Yeah.
So I think, just staying withthe vehicles for a moment.
If you're looking at basically theamortization of some of the emissions that
are embedded with the battery, mostly,but also some of the manufacturing,
it depends on the type of vehicle.
It depends on how many miles aperson drives per year, but usually
(07:24):
studies, they peg it around, let'ssay, 15,000, 20,000 miles.
So what does that mean?
After 15 or 20,000 miles, abattery electric vehicle has broken
even in terms of the emissionsreductions and then becomes
environmentally beneficial completely.
So it basically amortizes that biglump of emissions from the battery.
(07:47):
Now I think what we've also seenis certainly the improvement
of the battery quality.
We've seen improvements in someof the mineral content that is
used in some of these batteries.
We've seen prices drop.
So all of this has contributed to thefurther environmental improvement
of battery electric vehicles, butthe point is well taken that if
(08:09):
we're looking at the grid overall,a large-scale electrification of
transportation, let's say in thepassenger space, ignoring freight for
a moment in certainly the passengerspace will require more electricity
demand of electricity capacity.
It will increase the load demand.
We're not at the point yet where we cannecessarily say that the grid is up to
(08:32):
that particular challenge, but that's truebecause also the overall energy transition
depends on electrification of a variety ofsectors, transportation being one of them.
So I think that's a challenge goingforward, just thinking about how
can we make sure that the grid holdsup to that particular challenge.
Steve Odland (08:49):
Yeah, you could think of it as if there was price parity between an
internal combustion engine and a batteryelectric vehicle, and if the range
was acceptable, and if the charging wasas plentiful and as fast, there would
be no reason that consumers wouldn'tmove to a battery electric vehicle.
They're faster.
They're simpler to maintain and so forth.
(09:10):
So there are some things here thatare moving in the right direction,
but still are somewhat barriers.
Talk about the charging infrastructure asa barrier, and where do we stand on that,
as well as the regulatory environment.
Alex Heil (09:24):
Yeah, it's sometimes viewed as the "chicken and the
egg" kind of a problem, right?
You need a charger inorder to recharge your car.
But it only makes sense to have avast charging network if there's
a sufficient number of vehicleson the road that can utilize this.
We have as a country, if you lookat public charging stations in
particular, we've made tremendousprogress over the last few years.
(09:47):
So the number of publiclyavailable chargers has doubled
in the last four years.
And that's significant.
That is paired with some of theseinvestments that households have made
in their own charging infrastructure.
So if you live in a suburban household,you have sufficient space in your garage,
you can install a level two charger,which is a relatively fast charger.
(10:10):
And you can replenish yourvehicle's battery overnight and
then be ready to go in the morning.
So that's certainly oneend of that development.
The other one is publiclyavailable charges.
We've seen some investments being madeon the public side, there's been an
incentive the prior administration hadmade on how many billions of dollars were
(10:33):
going to be invested in public charges.
That was relatively slowto pick up and take off.
So as of right now, I think it is probablylikely to be a situation where there's
not going to be much policy supportthat public chargers are going to be
receiving from the current administration.
That's going to be one challenge for thecontinued growth in electric vehicles.
(10:56):
But, on the other hand, we havealso seen that private chargers,
household chargers, they haveseen significant growth, as well.
And some of those are still beingsupported financially by, for instance,
the incentives from your local utility, orthe energy generation firms that provide
some of the financial benefits there.
(11:17):
I think with chargers, it's achallenge, but it's certainly one
that overall, it's being overcome,but it just takes some time.
Steve Odland (11:26):
Level one is just, you plug it into an outlet.
That takes forever.
Level two is a 220-volt, which you haveto install separately with the charger.
But then there's also DC chargingthat's all AC, but DC, charging
direct current, is actually very fast.
And that seems to be the majority ofwhat's being installed in charging.
Alex Heil (11:45):
Yeah, I think that the point is that if you're on the road,
and you need to recharge your car,you can't wait for eight hours, right?
That's really the point.
So you need something that can replenishyour battery in relatively short order.
If someone drives from New York toWashington and needs to recharge
along the way, having a DC charger,that makes that trip suitable.
You can basically plan a stop alongI-95 and then, after a relatively short
(12:10):
period of time, be up and running again.
I think that comes with this entiretransition to electric vehicles,
fast charge is the way to go.
Now, you don't always want to chargeyour battery in that way because it's
a little bit too intense for thebattery to take on a day-to-day basis.
But it is certainly something that makesyour operations a whole lot easier.
Steve Odland (12:32):
And if you can plug in with a DC charger, you can plug in and get
80% of your capacity in what, 20 minutes?
So it puts it withinreason for a longer trip.
And so therefore that helpswith the adoption, as well.
Alex Heil (12:49):
Oh yeah, absolutely.
I think this whole issue, you mentionedit in the beginning, is range anxiety.
A lot of households have experiencedthis, that one of the obstacles,
just from a behavioral perspective,"How much can I rely on my car being
available for a trip?" Especially oncewe're talking about a couple hundred
(13:09):
miles of distance in driving.
That certainly providesan obstacle overall.
I think we've also seen nowwith new battery composition,
new battery chemistry, we'veseen improvements in range.
We've seen improvements in theextent to which battery capacity
falls in cold weather, for instance.
That's a big advantage becauseit used to be the case that, once
(13:31):
you reach the winter, there's alot of capacity that's lost just
because of the temperature alone.
But some of the improved batterycomposition of some of the more recent
battery technologies, they do overcomesome of those challenges, as well.
Steve Odland (13:46):
We're talking about electric vehicles and the economics of those.
We're going to take a shortbreak and be right back.
Welcome back to C-Suite Perspectives.
I'm your host, Steve Odland,from The Conference Board.
And I'm joined today by Alex Heil, senioreconomist and interim leader of the
US Economy, Strategy & Finance Center.
Alex, you mentioned earlier, before thebreak, that most of our conversation
(14:10):
was on passenger vehicles, but forcommercial travel or freight travel, it's
a different deal entirely, isn't it?
Alex Heil (14:17):
Yeah, I think that we're talking about these numbers that
have been very impressive on thepassenger side, several million cars.
The projection is that, depending onhow you interpret the continued adoption
towards the end of this decade, we'regoing to reach a point where a quarter,
30, 40% of vehicles on the road aregoing to be battery electric vehicles
(14:39):
or hybrids or some combination thereof.
On the freight side, it'sreally a different story.
We're really in the early stages there.
The numbers are much, much smaller forthese long-duration trips of trucks.
The electrification of that sliceof the transportation system
creates much bigger challenges.
(15:00):
There needs to be much more investment intrucks that can handle that sort of range.
We need to have the adequate charginginfrastructure to service some
of these long-distance trucks.
And considering how the marketis organized, that's not only
large companies operating thesetrucking networks, but also a lot
of individuals, sole proprietors,essentially, that are operating a truck.
(15:21):
The upfront cost of some of thosebattery-operated trucks is still
prohibitive for a lot of people.
Steve Odland (15:28):
And the weight is an issue because it limits the amount of
freight that you can haul, as well.
You have to balance that out differently.
So there's a lot there to dealwith, but look, there are companies
producing trucks that are electric.
And the last-mile distributors, Amazonand FedEx and UPS, converting to electric.
(15:49):
So there is some progress here.
Alex Heil (15:52):
Oh, absolutely.
I think the moment that you can relyon a sort of a depot system, like a
hub-and-spoke system, where a truck cango back to its home base, to a warehouse,
at the end of the afternoon or theend of the night, recharge overnight,
and then be back out again the nextmorning, I think that's very much doable.
I think that's very true.
And you can see that already,as you indicated, in some
(16:13):
neighborhoods, last-mile retaildeliveries that are already
serviced by battery-operated trucks.
I think it's the long-distance market,the New York to Chicago, New York
to the West Coast, anything alongthose kinds of what one has imagined
as being the long-haul truck routes.
Those are going to be the onesmuch more challenged by this.
Steve Odland (16:33):
Yeah.
And then you've got rail, which isa competitive system to trucks.
And not much is being done there, butyou could see some demand shift or supply
shift there, depending on where regulatorypolicies go between rail and trucks.
Alex Heil (16:53):
Rail is, it depends on what the transportation modes are
like in their specifics, but railhistorically has been the environmentally
safer, the less emissions per tonof freight transported type of mode.
So there have been benefitsthere, and that's certainly true.
(17:15):
In a world where we're shiftingcompletely to battery-operated
trucks, maybe that's going to change.
But rail certainly has an advantagein that long-distance traffic.
Steve Odland (17:24):
Now, you can't turn on the television or look at a newspaper
without reading about tariffs andtrade barriers and industrial policy.
And all of that does impact theUS EV market, particularly as it
relates to critical minerals andcomponents to make batteries.
Talk about the macro environmenthere and the potential impact on EVs.
Alex Heil (17:46):
Yeah, so I think it's important to just recognize that
the biggest cost driver for anelectric vehicle is the battery.
And the prices of lithium-ionbatteries, in particular, have come down
dramatically over the last few years.
So in 2024 alone, the batterydrop price drop was 10%.
That's the biggest one since 2017.
(18:06):
So that's meaningful.
Just to give a sense.
, and these numbers don't necessarilymean anything without context, but
just to give where we are in this,the current price per kilowatt hour
of battery capacity is around $115.
Industry analysts currently forecastthat the moment they're going to hit
(18:26):
$100 per kilowatt hour of capacity, we'rereaching price parity between fossil fuel
vehicles and battery electric vehicles.
So that's all to say that, in the battery,the materials being used, a lot of those
come from other parts of the world.
They are not necessarilymanufactured in the United States.
(18:47):
So trade barriers, trade tariffs are goingto be affecting some of those prices.
I think the current sense in theindustry is that tariffs on imports
to the United States, includingsome of these materials, are, if not
increasing prices of battery electricvehicles or the battery component
thereof, but at least slow the decline.
(19:08):
And I think that's certainlytrue in that regard.
Steve Odland (19:11):
Yeah, and I keep pointing here, you've got rare-earth
minerals, but lithium's a big deal.
And there is lithium in the groundin the United States, you've got
regulatory issues around miningit, but we're dependent on China
for a lot of our lithium now.
Alex Heil (19:25):
Oh yeah, absolutely.
There are mines that have beenbasically proposed or have been
planned out west—Thacker Pass in,I believe, Nevada—is one of them.
But most of those materialscurrently come from China.
And we're all aware of the trade tariffsthat we're now dealing with and what that
actually means for some of these minerals.
(19:46):
So I think that going forward, not onlyfor component parts, but also for the
minerals themselves, we're going to bedealing with an environment where there's
going to be upward price pressure, andthat's going to make that transition to
electric vehicles even more challenging.
Steve Odland (19:59):
Which makes the discussions about the deal with
Ukraine over some of these mineralsvery interesting and potentially a
game-changer if that comes to fruition.
Alex Heil (20:09):
Yeah, there's the minerals part, and that's certainly true.
I think the other part that is importanthere is a focus on recycling of some
of these materials that have alreadybeen in use in some of these batteries.
So if you take the traditional car batterythat everybody is used to from decades
ago, we have reached a level of recyclingin that market that is truly tremendous.
(20:32):
I believe it's 98% of that material,lead acid batteries, are being recycled.
So I think going forward, there's reallya lot of growth in the used EV market, and
ultimately, there will have to be a plan.
There's going to be someplan towards recycling some
of these battery components.
So considering this growth, certainly oneof the early challenges now is going to
(20:56):
be to think about how to secure access tosome of these materials, how to make sure
that we have enough battery capacity forthese, for the increase in manufacturing.
But also then, if you take the longerview, there needs to be some consideration
of, oh, we can probably recycle someof these materials that have already
been in use in some of these cars.
Steve Odland (21:17):
Yeah.
And that's lithium.
But you and I have talked in thepast about the newer technologies.
Sodium batteries havehigh promise at low cost.
You also are hearing aboutsolid state development.
There are technologies inthe pipeline here which could
radically change the economics.
Alex Heil (21:37):
Oh, that's absolutely true.
I think that the technology and the rateof improvements there is fast, and it's
going to have a huge impact on the market.
The other area that I think is reallyimportant to consider is, at some point,
we're also going to reach critical mass.
And you mentioned the grid before.
When it comes to bidirectional charging,which is basically the process by
(21:59):
which you connect electric vehiclesto the grid, and the battery becomes a
support for the grid during high demandtimes and so forth, there's currently,
I believe, a couple electric vehiclemodels that are able to already do this.
They can basically power your homeor serve the grid if you have the
right infrastructure in place.
But if you extrapolate from there, andyou look at a fleet of electric vehicles
(22:24):
that is being used by US householdseverywhere, that could be a game-changer
when it comes to just the amount ofstorage that is available supporting the
grid and make some of these shortagesalso a little bit easier to handle.
Steve Odland (22:39):
One thing you've said before, and you've written about is that
the grid capacity is not as acute asit would appear because you're looking
at grids, the capacity maxing out inthe daytime when there's maximum use,
but most of these charging most ofthe charging happens overnight, which
is when the grid is not at capacity.
So this actually helpslevel out use of the grid.
Alex Heil (23:03):
Yeah, I think that's true.
I think there's a general sensethat the grid certainly is undersized
considering electrification goingforward, but reconductoring the process
of improving some of the materialsthat are used within the grid itself,
that can increase capacity by 20%.
As you mentioned, just changing thetiming of when one connects to the
(23:27):
grid in order to recharge vehicles orstorage or anything along those lines.
I think that can make a difference.
So I think there are ways to moreefficiently operate the electric grid
and the energy system that can certainlyget us years into the future without
necessarily making big sacrifices there.
Steve Odland (23:46):
Now we've talked about learning from what other countries
are doing, and certainly there arecountries that are that have higher
rates of adoption and usage of EVs,Norway being a classic example here.
Talk about what we can learnelsewhere and apply here.
Alex Heil (24:02):
Yeah, so you mentioned a series of publications that we put out.
We published this and we wrote itup, our research in collaboration
with our colleagues in Europe andin China, and that has allowed us to
gather insights around other markets.
We wrote a paper on Norway,wrote a paper on India.
We had a real interesting reflectionon what other markets are like.
(24:25):
China was another regionalmarket that we looked at.
And these are all very different stories.
Norway is, at this point, north of 90%when it comes to electric vehicles as a
share of annual car sales essentially.
So that's in part due to the significantfinancial incentive that they have in
place and this network effect that, onceyou have this large number of EVs and a
(24:49):
relatively widespread charging network,that really the small country has really
pushed into this and leaned into it.
If you look at other countries, andthat's probably true for the EV market
overall, it's really a China story.
You can see a lot ofcapacity expansion in China.
You can see the prices of battery electricvehicles coming down dramatically.
(25:10):
50% of new cars sold inChina are now electric.
So you can see a lot of this.
And really, in terms of growth,Chinese manufacturers are now
looking for overseas markets.
They're looking, they can't enter theUS, but they can look towards other parts
of Asia, they look at Europe, certainly.
And market shares are going tobe moving there in their favor
(25:32):
relatively quickly, one would think.
And that's certainly veryimpressive, that's very descriptive
of what's happening in the market.
India, on the other hand,is another story, right?
They're very early on inthis electrification process.
For them, an electric vehicleis still a luxury product.
That is, affordability is one ofthe big issues for various reasons.
And there, in the intermediate,near-term future, it is much more
(25:57):
a question of how you electrifytwo- and three-wheel scooters.
Because that's something thatis going to have an immediate
effect, especially on air qualityin some of the highly populated
cities, like Delhi, for instance.
Steve Odland (26:09):
Yeah, tuk-tuks.
As you said, every story is different.
In the case of China.
They don't have oil.
They're buying it from Russia.
They're trying to reducetheir dependence on oil.
And so therefore, they're building acoal-fired plant, production plant,
electricity plant every month.
It's a really high rate, which isnot good for the environment, but
they're going to get there and beable to electrify their fleet and
(26:31):
therefore reduce their dependenceon oil coming from other countries.
But every country has a different story.
Norway's got mostly hydropower,which is clean and plentiful there.
In the desert nations,there's no hydropower.
So it's a different challenge everywhere.
Final question.
What do you see in terms of projectionsfor EV adoption over the years, and
(26:52):
what could influence those projections?
Alex Heil (26:55):
Certainly, in the very near term, some of the policies enacted
are going to make a difference.
There's been work put out by academicslast year, I believe, that suggested
that as a result of an eliminationof the tax credit that EV purchasers
currently enjoy, the sales mightdrop by about a quarter or so.
(27:16):
Now, that's true.
I think overall, some of thisis going to be overcome by the
continued downward trend in prices.
If you look out a little bit further andtry to project where we're going to be in
terms of the shares of vehicles that aregoing to be electric as part of the total,
I think, by even 10 years from now, wemight have reached and gone through 25%.
(27:40):
Maybe 30% of all vehicles might beelectric at that point, but that requires
a relatively quick adoption consideringthe average age, the life cycle of a
car, is 12 years or something like that.
So it takes a while for fossilfuel vehicles that are sold
today to actually be retired.
If you mirror this globally, Ithink you get similar projections.
(28:02):
So if the sales share reaches 50%and then goes north of that, I think
we may get to the point that, by theend of the next decade, a third, 40%
of all vehicles might be electric.
We've run these numbers in the past,and we've had these conversations,
Steve, about what this meansfor greenhouse gas emissions.
I think one of the big factors is justsimply it takes a while to turn over the
(28:26):
portfolio of cars that is currently on theroads in the United States and completely
electrify those millions of cars.
I think we're going to see moregrowth in the near-term growth.
I think it's going to be slower thanit otherwise might have been, but I
think EVs are certainly set up for.
dominance of that market,especially internationally, if
(28:47):
the current projections hold.
Steve Odland (28:49):
And it's going to take decades, and we need
to plan, which is a point thatyou've made over and over again.
We need a master plan for this, so, Dr.Alex Heil, thanks for being with us today.
Alex Heil (29:00):
Thanks so much for having me.
Steve Odland (29:03):
And thanks to all of you for listening to C-Suite Perspectives.
I'm Steve Odland, and this series has beenbrought to you by The Conference Board.
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