This post is taken from the newsletter ” Human warmth “, sent every Tuesday at 12 p.m. Every week, journalist Nabil Wakim, who hosts the Chaleur Humaine podcast, answers questions from Internet users on the climate challenge. You can register for free here:
The question of the week
“I don’t understand why an electric car is much more expensive than a thermal car. The argument is the exorbitant price of the battery, and I hear that (…)but if we compare these two vehicles, the electric car is much simpler technologically; (…) Aren’t we paying very dearly for the restructuring of production chains, the industrial transition, and the reluctance of the oil lobby to see this jackpot disappear too quickly? » (Question asked by Patrick at chaud [email protected])
My answer : You are right, electric vehicles are more expensive to produce because of the cost of the battery, despite the savings on everything else. But they would also be cheaper if they were smaller and had fewer features.
1- Why does the battery add to the price?
To see things more clearly, I asked Alexandre Marian, an expert in the automotive sector at AlixPartners. To give an order of magnitude, the production cost of the engine and transmission is between 1,500 and 3,000 euros for a thermal vehicle. It’s a little cheaper for an electric vehicle, around 2,000 euros on average. In particular, it is estimated that less labor is needed to assemble an electric vehicle across the entire chain. (This was also one of the objects of the conflict between car manufacturers and unions in the United States in 2023, but that is another subject.)
“What really makes the difference is the cost of the battery,” explains Alexandre Marian, who estimates that it is now 6,000 to 10,000 euros per vehicle. And variations are possible given the cost of raw materials, such as lithium, which can change sharply over the next few years depending on demand. In other words: at the same range, an electric vehicle is likely to be expensive for a long time to come – even if competition or technological developments in batteries may bring costs down a little.
2 – But it’s not just that!
The battery weighs heavily in the production cost, but so do the choices of manufacturers: they have decided, in general, to launch into the electric car market with mid-range or high-end models, which include a lot of on-board electronics. We could have comparable prices with cars less rich in options and buttons, explains Alexandre Marian: “Manufacturers are enriching vehicles generation after generation, perhaps to succeed in the electric transition, we will have to review this software. » The other option is obviously also to have smaller batteries, with a lower autonomy, which would cost less to produce.
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