Transportation:

Vehicle Design and Materials

The Vehicle Design and Materials subsegment includes any improvements to vehicular structure that allow for equal (or better) performance with the use of less energy.

Examples include using lightweight carbon fiber to build cars and trucks, designing more aerodynamic trains, and installing winglets on older airplanes to reduce drag. In passenger vehicles, Ford and Aptera are working on lighter, more aerodynamic cars, while aerospace company Boeing works to reduce weight and drag in airplane design.

The market for the majority of these products and services has not been quantified. Battery packs for PEVs are the only product category included in this analysis. PEV battery pack sales revenue is included in the Propulsion Systems subsegment, but is broken out here in order to provide a sense of this individual piece of the value chain. In 2011, global revenue from battery pack sales for PEVs reached $823.9 million. 2012 revenues are expected to more than double to $1.9 billion from sales of an estimated 138,000 units.

The United States captured 33% of the market for PEV battery packs in 2011, accounting for $271.3 million in revenue. Lithium ion (Li-ion) batteries are beginning to appear in HEVs; however, the market for Li-ion batteries in the transportation sector will be driven primarily by plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) and battery electric vehicles (BEVs), which require much larger battery packs than HEVs. U.S. revenues for 2012 are estimated to be $488.0 million, or 25% of the total PEV battery pack market.