The boom in electric vehicle sales needed to prevent excessive global warming will create a trillion dollar addressable market for battery metals, according to Bernstein analyst Bob Brackett.

Using forecasts from the International Energy Agency, Brackett estimated the acceleration in EV sales penetration required to achieve a world where global warming is limited to 1.8 degrees C as well as the circumstantial changes that would occur in battery metal supply and demand.

In that scenario, EV purchases would total an estimated 41.4% of global automobile sales by 2030 and 70.9% of sales by 2035, with an estimated 858.8 million EVs in stock worldwide by 2040 and roughly 1.2 billion in stock by 2050, Brackett said in the Sept. 22 note.

Multiplying the average battery metal tonnage used in an EV by the typical cost of those materials, Brackett estimated there is potentially a trillion dollar addressable market in the EV supply chain.

This could have significant implications for a supply-constrained battery metals sector. Copper, cobalt, manganese and nickel each have 50 years or less of reserve life, the analyst said. Higher prices will be needed to "deliver the required increase" in supply to avoid an EV market limited by mineral availability, Brackett said.

Market observers have said significant investment in battery metals production will be necessary in order to deploy EVs at the scale required to stem global warming. The coronavirus pandemic has made investment more difficult by lowering metal prices, depressing automobile demand and stymieing investment in new mines and project expansions.

If EV battery chemistry yields improve by 2030, demand for battery metals other than copper could decline in the long term, Brackett said. However, such technological advances will not eliminate the medium-term uptick in demand through 2030.

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