Scenarios for demand growth of critical metals in energy technologies, cars and consumer electronics

The expected future demand for metals is one of the key parameters determining their criticality. There is, however, only a limited number of studies available that describe elaborate scenarios for long term demand of critical... [ view full abstract ]

The expected future demand for metals is one of the key parameters determining their criticality. There is, however, only a limited number of studies available that describe elaborate scenarios for long term demand of critical metals. This study provides detailed bottom-up scenarios towards 2050 for the demand of five metals, being copper, tantalum, neodymium, cobalt and indium. We base our analysis on existing scenario output from the IMAGE integrated assessment model, using their elaboration of the so called Shared Socioeconomic Pathways (SSPs), which allows us to translate detailed information on the application of consumer electronics, cars and electricity generating technologies into figures on their metal requirements through application of a dynamic stock model. Hereby we cover three categories of metal application that are expected to generate a large growth in demand. Additionally, we are able show the effect of enforcing stringent climate policy on the demand for critical metals.  

Initial results show that the annual demand of all considered metals are expected to strongly increase as a result of the a doubling of the in-use stock for cars, appliances as well as for electricity generation technologies. Car purchases are a particular reason for the large increase in demand of cobalt and lithium (of a factor 10 to 20) as these elements are required in batteries for electric vehicles. The most interesting finding however, is the notion that the uncertainty in assumptions on current metal content for the three product groups may be larger than the difference in demand projections between baseline and climate policy scenarios. This shows that current knowledge on the use of critical metals in products is misaligned with the topical political attention.

The study combines tools from the field of industrial ecology and integrated assessment modelling, and shows how detailed and technology-specific scenario data can be a used to asses global critical metal demand from a bottom-up perspective.