Electric vehicle sales are about to take off, but the problem is production, JB Straubel, co-founder of Tesla and founder and CEO of battery recycling company Redwood Materials, said on January 13, Can it keep up with demand.
Straubel said demand is growing, but the auto industry isn’t moving fast enough to ensure production keeps up with demand. It caught people off guard a little bit, Straubel said in an interview. It’s a very strong shift. It’s happening in different regions, from a decline in internal combustion engine sales to an almost 100 percent increase in electric vehicle sales.
He noted that industry sales forecasts that EVs will account for 12.7% of total U.S. auto sales by 2025 may be too low. If you look at how fast the penetration is in parts of Europe and the rest of the world, I think by the middle of this decade, it’s probably going to be higher, he said. To that end, Rosewood Materials will invest $1 billion to build a new factory in McAllen, Nevada.