Fortune photo
By Nancy Thorner -
On Wednesday morning March 9, 2022, the Biden White House responded to the inflation news by suggesting Americans purchase $60,000 electric cars. Announced was that inflation had hit a record 7.9%, up from 1.4% when Trump Left Office.
Reported on 3/12/2022 in the New York Post, none other than Tesla EV boss Elon Musk called out the green-energy foolishness of Biden, Harris and Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg.
Despite the push to wean the public from oil and gas to green energy sources, there is no way electric vehicles will be going mainstream tomorrow, or even next year, or maybe not even the next five years.
Why is this? Electricity doesn’t grow on trees; It’s created by burning those dreaded fossil fuels or by inefficient wind turbines. You will need nuclear power to ramp up capacity to meet the imaginary levels. And how many nuclear plants will the environmentalists running the Biden administration really allow?
Electric vehicles also run on batteries that rely on nickel, lithium and cobalt, minerals where China has become a significant refiner, and why China has also become a top manufacturer of EV batteries.
Law of unintended consequences
The U.S. and its allies in the EU and others around the world have imposed harsh economic sanctions on Russia. In retaliation, Russia announced that it will cut off exports of important chemicals, metals and processed gasses to any nation that has sanctioned Russia, exports that are indispensable to manufacturing processes including semiconductors, automobiles and agriculture. In the end, this will result in most of the economic pain falling on Western manufacturing.
And what if Russia should follow through?
About Russia’s exports
As the crisis in Ukraine escalates and President Joe Biden puts in place new sanctions targeting the Russian economy, there could be substantial collateral damage to the auto industry, including automakers and parts suppliers in the U.S., Europe and Asia.
Russia is one of the world’s largest suppliers of several key metals, including palladium and nickel, used in auto manufacturing around the world. It’s also home to a sizable manufacturing base, which includes a number of plants owned by foreign manufacturers like Stellantis, Volkswagen and Toyota. With at least a quarter of the parts used in Russian-made vehicles coming from abroad — including from the U.S. — those assembly plants could have trouble continuing to operate while sanctions are in place, according to analysts and industry officials.
Russia is also the world’s third-largest supplier of the nickel used in lithium-ion batteries, and it provides 40 percent of the palladium used in catalytic converters, which can be found in all gas and diesel-powered vehicles.
If Russian President Vladamir Putin retaliates against the West by cutting off palladium supplies, automakers would have to find alternative suppliers or they wouldn’t be able to build vehicles with internal combustion engines.
Ukraine as Major Manufacturer of World’s Neon Used for Semi-Conductor Chips
*Excerpted and adapted full original report here.
3-13-22, Generico.ru — Ukraine's two leading suppliers of neon, Ingas and Cryoin, which are located in Mariupol and Odessa, supplied from 25 to 35 tons of the neon inert gas for the production of lasers and semiconductor chips. Their neon is estimated to be approx 50% of the world’s supply.
As of 2/24/22, when Russia entered the Ukraine, the companies halted their operations and will undoubtedly aggravate the semiconductor supply causing a shortage; used in cell phones and laptop computers. Ukrainian neon is a byproduct of Russian steel manufacturing. The gas, which is also used in laser eye surgery, is produced in China as well, but Chinese prices are rising steadily.
Before the invasion, Ingas produced 15,000 to 20,000 cubic meters of neon per month for customers in Taiwan, Korea, China, the United States and Germany, with about 75% going to the chip industry.
And Cryoin, which produced roughly 10,000 to 15,000 cubic meters per month is located in Odessa. The Economy Ministry of Taiwan, home to the world's largest contract chip maker TSMC, said that Taiwanese firms already made advanced preparations and had "safety stocks" of neon, so it did not see any supply chain problems in the near term.
According to Richard Barnett, chief marketing officer of Supplyframe reported that companies elsewhere could initiate neon production, but it would take nine months to two years to ramp up.
More here from Newsmax.
Closing thought
Continuation much longer of the Russia/Ukraine conflict, a war the Ukrainian people didn't ask for, will definitely curtail and damage this nation's and the world's economic health, at a time when the economic effects from the Covid shutdowns were finally nearing an end.
