又一个被穆斯克颠覆的行业

埃隆•穆斯克对大规模生产电动汽车的追求，不仅颠覆了传统汽车市场，也撼动了作为汽车原料的金属市场。

这一趋势体现最明显的便是锂市场，因为锂正是电动汽车所用的锂离子电池的主要原料。目前，汽车行业对锂已经出现了明显的供不应求。据《华尔街日报》（The Wall Street Journal）报道，今年第一季度，碳酸锂（一种制取锂的中间产品）的价格已经比2015年的平均价格上涨了47%。据《华尔街日报》引述数据供应商基准矿业情报（Benchmark Mineral Intelligence，以下简称BMI）的数据显示，去年全年，锂金属的价格上涨了28%，而同期道琼斯工业金属指数和铂与贵金属指数均下跌了40%以上。

鉴于目前纯电动车只占全球机动车总量的比例还不足1%，因此市场对锂的需求的潜在增长将是不可估量的。《华尔街日报》引用了高盛（Goldman Sachs）的一份报告称，10年内，市场对锂的需求可能将翻三番，达到每年57万吨。穆斯克本周早些时候曾表示，特斯拉（Tesla）要想满足年产50万辆电动汽车的目标，“基本上需要吸收全世界的锂离子产量。”

这一需求增长很可能出现，而特斯拉只占其中一部分而已。据BMI指出，到2020年，中国的锂离子电池产能将达到美国的2倍。特斯拉公司在内华达州开办的“超级工厂”虽说很可能是全球正在兴建中的最大的锂离子电池工厂，但除它以外，全球正在兴建的此类项目至少还有11个。

其它从电动汽车行业的发展中获益的金属可能还包括铜和铝。电动汽车对铜的用量是传统汽车的四倍。另外，为了降低车重和燃油消耗，许多公司也开始大量使用铝来替代车身钢材（比如福特的F-150，以及特斯拉Model S的全铝合金框架）。另外，据研究机构工业矿物（Industrial Minerals）估算，光是特斯拉的“超级工厂”每年就将需要93,000吨的片状石墨来生产电极用的电极，相当于每年要消耗掉六座石墨矿山。而这也将有力地刺激石墨行业改良已经成为行业标准的低效开采方法（据工业矿物公司（IM）估算，开采出的石墨原料高达70%都被浪费了）。

锂元素在地壳中的储量相对来说是比较丰富的，但一般很难开采，因为锂的提炼制取技术需要因地制宜，一块矿床和另一块矿床很可能使用的是不同的开采技术。全球已探明的最大锂矿位于波利维亚，不过要想将这里锂矿运到最近的港口，就必须穿越安第斯山脉，否则就要绕过南美运往大西洋。

有人可能会觉得，有了这种几乎全新的用途来提振金属的矿产需求，采矿行业肯定会热情高涨，因为目前这个行业几乎是在全线后退之中。然而事实上，随着业内许多之前盲目上马的项目被关停（其中一些还是当初由于对中国未来需求的盲目乐观而建立的），行业能否为新项目筹集到几十亿美元的资本，目前看来希望比较渺茫。除此以外，过去一些年，也不乏许多新概念一度被炒得火热，结局却令人失望的例子。这个怪圈也害苦了不少独立采矿公司。（阅读《财富》对这些公司去年所面临的麻烦的报道，请点击此处。）

此外，随着内燃发动机逐步被锂离子电池取代，数十亿美元投入其它金属开采的投资也将受到重大影响，比如铂和钯等金属，它们都是催化转换器中不可或缺的催化剂，对净化传统汽车的尾气起着重要作用。而电动汽车用不到这种催化转换装置。据《华尔街日报》引述澳大利亚采矿公司South32的CEO格拉哈姆•科尔的话称，随着电池技术继续出现新的进步，有些原本“流行一时”的金属，很有可能最终会落个靠边站的命运。（财富中文网）

译者：朴成奎

Elon Musk’s quest for the mass-produced electric car isn’t only disrupting the traditional auto market—it’s shaking up the markets for the metals that go into cars too.

The trend is most evident in the market for lithium, which is used in the lithium-ion batteries that power electric vehicles. Already, growing demand from the auto industry is starting to outrun supply. According to The Wall Street Journal, prices for lithium carbonate, an intermediate product in the refining of lithium, were up 47% from the average price in 2015 in the first quarter of this year. It cited figures from Benchmark Mineral Intelligence, a data provider, showing that prices for lithium rose 28% last year, in which time the Dow Jones Industrial Metals index and the Platinum and Precious Metals index both fell over 40%.

Given that pure EVs account for less than 1% of all vehicles on the world’s roads, the potential growth in demand for lithium is dizzying. The WSJ cites a Goldman Sachs report suggesting that demand could triple within 10 years to 570,000 tons a year. Musk said earlier this week that for Tesla to meet its target of 500,000 cars a year, “we would basically need to absorb the entire world’s lithium-ion production.”

And Tesla represents only a fraction of the likely demand growth. According to BMI, China will build twice as much new lithium-ion battery capacity as the U.S. by 2020. Tesla’s ‘Gigafactory 1’ in Nevada may be (comfortably) the biggest factory being built, but it is only one of at least 12 such projects across the world, BMI says.

Other metals that could also profit from evolution in the sector could be copper (EVs use four times as much as a conventional car) and aluminum—a material that companies are turning to to replace steel in order to cut overall weight and fuel consumption (think of Ford’s F-150, as well as the all-aluminum frame of Tesla’s Model S). At the same time, research house Industrial Minerals reckons that Tesla’s Gigafactory alone could need some 93,000 tons a year of flake graphite to make anodes for its batteries. That would be the equivalent of six new mines—a powerful incentive for industry to improve the inefficient methods that are the current industry standard (IM reckons up to 70% of raw graphite mined is wasted).

Lithium is relatively abundant in the earth’s crust but often hard to get to, and the technology needed to extract it can differ from one deposit to another. The world’s biggest resources, in Bolivia, would have to cross the Andes to reach the nearest seaport, or else face a long journey across South America to the Atlantic.

One would think that an almost completely new source of mineral demand ought to be met with enthusiasm in a mining sector that is in near-universal retreat at the moment. But the prospect of raising billions of dollars in capital for fresh projects at the same time as the industry is shuttering earlier ill-judged ventures—some of which were predicated on optimistic new paradigms ultimately based on guesswork regarding future Chinese demand—is daunting. And a number of independent miners have fallen prey to the usual cycle of hype and disappointment around such new dawns (to readFortune‘s story from last year on their troubles, clickhere).

Moreover, the displacement of the combustion engine by the lithium-ion battery has serious implications for the billions of dollars sunk into other mines that extract metals such as platinum and palladium, which end up in catalytic convertors to clean exhaust fumes. The WSJ quoted Graham Kerr, CEO of Australian mining company South32, as reluctant to invest in lithium, something that is “flavor of the month” but which could be rendered obsolete by other, as-yet unknown advances in battery technology.