COVID-19 impacts EV and battery demand

The coronavirus outbreak will cause a significant global crisis on EVs, solar and battery demand, reports Energy Live News. The clean economy, including renewable power, energy storage, electric vehicles, heating, cooling and the circular economy ‘will be hit hard’ by the coronavirus, according to researchers from BloombergNEF.

They say they have cut by 16% their global solar demand forecast for 2020, from 121 – 152GW to 108 – 143GW, effect that could potentially lead to the first down year for solar capacity addition since at least the 1980s.

They also suggests the global auto market will also be hit hard by the coronavirus and this will have dramatic consequences for EVs and for battery demand. While vehicle sales in China sank by 44% so far, the optimistic estimate of Covid19’s impact on battery demand in GWh in 2020 is a 4% drop.

The exception is wind, where findings show risk to global wind forecast of 75.4GW, but it is still expected 2020 to be a record year for wind build.