Finished product · Transport

Electric car

One midsize battery-electric car of 1,769 kg

This page shows what the product is made of and where each figure comes from. It shows no death toll. The toll is computed from this bill of materials from session 19, and published only once it has an uncertainty interval and has passed a backtest.

A midsize 300-mile battery-electric car, Argonne's EV300, on the same body and chassis as the petrol car in this catalogue and with the 70.6 kWh NMC532 pack from the same laboratory's battery memo of the same month. 1,769 kg, of which 314 kg is the battery. READ THE COMPARISON CAREFULLY: its motor, transmission and controller — 17% of its mass, and where its rare earths and much of its copper live — have no published composition in this source, so they are carried by name and reach no supply chain. The electric car's traced toll is therefore understated against the petrol car's, and the gap is the point of the traced share.

Overall grade — medium
Status — draft

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What it is made of

Each line is one component of one midsize battery-electric car of 1,769 kg: how much of it goes in, how much had to be produced for that, and where the figure comes from.

What it is made of
Component	Quantity	Source
Steel part	747 kg	Kelly and Winjobi (2020), Update of Vehicle Material Compositions in the GREET Model, Arg… · high Table 1, Car: vehicle material composition, the EV300 column gives the EV300's systems as shares of the vehicle without its battery, and Table 4, composition of vehicle components in GREET (%): Car the composition of each; the body (733 kg) and chassis (352 kg) are the ICEV's, which the memo states the powertrains share, so the battery-free EV is 1085 / 0.746 = 1455 kg; steel is 65.3% of the body, 66.8% of the chassis and 50% of the EV powertrain
Lithium-ion battery pack part	314 kg	Winjobi, Dai and Kelly (2020), Update of Bill-of-Materials and Cathode Chemistry addition… · high the BEV NMC532 pack of 314.09 kg for 70.6 kWh, Table 8 of the battery memo — the same laboratory, the same month, and the same 300-mile vehicle this composition is for. Its own bill of materials is in this catalogue
Average plastic — polymers not named by the source part	187 kg	Kelly and Winjobi (2020), Update of Vehicle Material Compositions in the GREET Model, Arg… · high Table 1, Car: vehicle material composition, the EV300 column gives the EV300's systems as shares of the vehicle without its battery, and Table 4, composition of vehicle components in GREET (%): Car the composition of each; the body (733 kg) and chassis (352 kg) are the ICEV's, which the memo states the powertrains share, so the battery-free EV is 1085 / 0.746 = 1455 kg; average plastic is 21.7% of the body, 2.3% of the chassis and 29.5% of the EV powertrain. The catalogue's plastics product has no sourced composition yet, so this mass is carried by name and reaches no supply chain rather than through an empty chain
Traction motor part	135 kg	Kelly and Winjobi (2020), Update of Vehicle Material Compositions in the GREET Model, Arg… · medium Table 1, Car: vehicle material composition, the EV300 column: 9.3% of the battery-free vehicle. Its composition — copper windings and permanent magnets, and with them the rare earths — is NOT in this source, which keeps the value from GREET 2019, so it is carried by name and mass and reaches no supply chain
Aluminium part	95.0 kg	Kelly and Winjobi (2020), Update of Vehicle Material Compositions in the GREET Model, Arg… · high Table 1, Car: vehicle material composition, the EV300 column gives the EV300's systems as shares of the vehicle without its battery, and Table 4, composition of vehicle components in GREET (%): Car the composition of each; the body (733 kg) and chassis (352 kg) are the ICEV's, which the memo states the powertrains share, so the battery-free EV is 1085 / 0.746 = 1455 kg; wrought and cast aluminium together
Electronic controller and inverter part	85.8 kg	Kelly and Winjobi (2020), Update of Vehicle Material Compositions in the GREET Model, Arg… · medium Table 1, Car: vehicle material composition, the EV300 column: 5.9% of the battery-free vehicle; composition kept from GREET 2019 and not published here
Transmission (single-speed reduction gear) part	81.5 kg	Kelly and Winjobi (2020), Update of Vehicle Material Compositions in the GREET Model, Arg… · medium Table 1, Car: vehicle material composition, the EV300 column: 5.6% of the battery-free vehicle; composition kept from GREET 2019 and not published here
Rubber part	45.6 kg	Kelly and Winjobi (2020), Update of Vehicle Material Compositions in the GREET Model, Arg… · high Table 1, Car: vehicle material composition, the EV300 column gives the EV300's systems as shares of the vehicle without its battery, and Table 4, composition of vehicle components in GREET (%): Car the composition of each; the body (733 kg) and chassis (352 kg) are the ICEV's, which the memo states the powertrains share, so the battery-free EV is 1085 / 0.746 = 1455 kg; 1.8% of the body and 9.2% of the chassis, tyres included
Copper part	31.9 kg	Kelly and Winjobi (2020), Update of Vehicle Material Compositions in the GREET Model, Arg… · high Table 1, Car: vehicle material composition, the EV300 column gives the EV300's systems as shares of the vehicle without its battery, and Table 4, composition of vehicle components in GREET (%): Car the composition of each; the body (733 kg) and chassis (352 kg) are the ICEV's, which the memo states the powertrains share, so the battery-free EV is 1085 / 0.746 = 1455 kg; 1.9% of the body, 1.3% of the chassis and 20.5% of the EV powertrain. The motor's copper is NOT in this figure
Glass part	32.3 kg	Kelly and Winjobi (2020), Update of Vehicle Material Compositions in the GREET Model, Arg… · high Table 1, Car: vehicle material composition, the EV300 column gives the EV300's systems as shares of the vehicle without its battery, and Table 4, composition of vehicle components in GREET (%): Car the composition of each; the body (733 kg) and chassis (352 kg) are the ICEV's, which the memo states the powertrains share, so the battery-free EV is 1085 / 0.746 = 1455 kg; 4.4% of the body
Glass fibre-reinforced plastic part	6.57 kg	Kelly and Winjobi (2020), Update of Vehicle Material Compositions in the GREET Model, Arg… · high Table 1, Car: vehicle material composition, the EV300 column gives the EV300's systems as shares of the vehicle without its battery, and Table 4, composition of vehicle components in GREET (%): Car the composition of each; the body (733 kg) and chassis (352 kg) are the ICEV's, which the memo states the powertrains share, so the battery-free EV is 1085 / 0.746 = 1455 kg; 0.8% of the body and 0.2% of the chassis
Other materials not named by the source part	6.60 kg	Kelly and Winjobi (2020), Update of Vehicle Material Compositions in the GREET Model, Arg… · high Table 1, Car: vehicle material composition, the EV300 column gives the EV300's systems as shares of the vehicle without its battery, and Table 4, composition of vehicle components in GREET (%): Car the composition of each; the body (733 kg) and chassis (352 kg) are the ICEV's, which the memo states the powertrains share, so the battery-free EV is 1085 / 0.746 = 1455 kg; 0.9% of the body
Magnesium part	352 g	Kelly and Winjobi (2020), Update of Vehicle Material Compositions in the GREET Model, Arg… · high Table 1, Car: vehicle material composition, the EV300 column gives the EV300's systems as shares of the vehicle without its battery, and Table 4, composition of vehicle components in GREET (%): Car the composition of each; the body (733 kg) and chassis (352 kg) are the ICEV's, which the memo states the powertrains share, so the battery-free EV is 1085 / 0.746 = 1455 kg; 0.1% of the chassis. Magnesium is not in HumanToll's materials register

Down to raw materials

The whole chain multiplied out — everything one midsize battery-electric car of 1,769 kg needs, through every intermediate product, with every loss on the way included.

Down to raw materials
Input	Per functional unit
Bauxite	598 kg
Coal and lignite	442 kg
Cobalt	15.2 kg
Copper	54.4 kg
Iron ore	849 kg
Lithium	8.67 kg
Manganese	20.6 kg
Natural graphite	62.1 kg
Nickel	37.7 kg
Silica sand	23.5 kg
Average plastic — polymers not named by the source (not in the register)	187 kg
Battery management electronics (not in the register)	5.34 kg
Carbon black (conductive additive) (not in the register)	2.52 kg
Coolant: ethylene glycol (not in the register)	8.50 kg
Dimethyl carbonate (electrolyte solvent) (not in the register)	11.5 kg
Electricity, calcination (not in the register)	769 kWh
Electricity, electric arc furnace route (not in the register)	143 kWh
Electronic controller and inverter (not in the register)	85.8 kg
Ethylene carbonate (electrolyte solvent) (not in the register)	11.5 kg
Glass fibre-reinforced plastic (not in the register)	6.57 kg
Limestone (not in the register)	161 kg
Limestone (calcium carbonate) (not in the register)	7.20 kg
Lithium hexafluorophosphate (electrolyte salt) (not in the register)	4.13 kg
Magnesium (not in the register)	352 g
Natural gas, precursor co-precipitation (not in the register)	1,295 kWh
Other materials not named by the source (not in the register)	6.60 kg
Other oxides (not in the register)	161 g
Oxygen, chemically bound (not in the register)	39.0 kg
Polyethylene (not in the register)	129 g
Polyethylene (separator) (not in the register)	560 g
Polyethylene terephthalate (not in the register)	581 g
Polypropylene (separator and casing) (not in the register)	2.48 kg
Polyvinylidene fluoride binder (not in the register)	3.79 kg
Recycled steel (scrap) (not in the register)	225 kg
Rubber (not in the register)	45.6 kg
Soda ash (sodium carbonate) (not in the register)	7.72 kg
Thermal insulation (not in the register)	1.08 kg
Traction motor (not in the register)	135 kg
Transmission (single-speed reduction gear) (not in the register)	81.5 kg

An input marked “not in the register” is counted by mass and reaches no supply chain yet. Industries appear as the euros or tonne-kilometres the bill of materials gives them.

How much of it is explicit

100% of this product’s mass is explicit in its own bill of materials.

Its whole chain draws on 3.15 t of materials, losses included. 67% of that is registered raw materials — the part the model can trace harm to — 33% is inputs not yet in the register, and 0% is a declared remainder.

In the input–output model it belongs to “Manufacture of motor vehicles, trailers and semi-trailers” (FIGARO industry C29).

The number this page does not show

The harm in this chain is not shown.

The model allocates the harm counted where each raw material is produced to the products that use it. That number is a count of people with a run behind it and no uncertainty interval yet, and nothing of that kind is published before the backtest of session 21. What this page can show without it is the structure: what the product is made of, and where each part of that knowledge comes from.

Sources

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