Abstract:

This article presents a comprehensive review of existing literature on the life cycle assessment of "lightweighting" electric vehicles. Lightweighting – a concept also applied to internal combustion vehicles – aims to improve the energy efficiency of the vehicle by reducing vehicle mass. Lightweighting is especially important for electric vehicles, which, due to their large battery packs, tend to be heavier than their internal combustion counterparts. The authors conducted two systematic literature searches, across several research databases, yielding a total of 40 documents. Our analysis of this literature indicates that, from a life cycle assessment perspective, electric vehicle lightweighting has been considered primarily with respect to comparatively smaller vehicles (e.g., passenger cars as opposed to light trucks and heavier commercial vehicles), and for vehicle components shared with internal combustion vehicles (e.g., closures, body-in-white, and suspension components). Ultimately, the authors do not find a single life cycle assessment study of electric vehicle lightweighting that evaluates a comprehensive set of environmental impact categories, for a whole vehicle, over the whole vehicle life cycle (i.e., from production through end-of-life). This study recommend that further research on lightweighting consider the characteristics of electric vehicles while better evaluating environmental impacts and resource use (e.g., regarding critical raw materials supply), considering trade-offs and co-benefits.