Waterless manufacturing offers a greener battery alternative

Manufacturing batteries for electric vehicles (EVs) is expensive both in sourcing materials and scaling manufacturing. It also causes environmental concerns due to the large volume of water required for producing battery materials such as lithium—nearly 500,000 gallons of water are used to extract just one tonne of lithium, according to the Institute for Energy Research.

Accounting for nearly 60% of the total cost of the battery—which is around US$312 per kilowatt-hour (kWh) according to BloombergNEF (BNEF)—lithium is also the most expensive material, with Statista reporting an average price of US$17,000 per metric tonne in 2021.