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Insider's Guide to Energy
The Energy Industry is uniquely evolving as traders are under increasing pressure to manage costs, cash, limits, and risks. The Insider’s Guide to Energy Podcast addresses current and emerging challenges business executives face daily through stories shared from peers and industry experts while covering topics such as innovation, disruptive technologies, and emerging trends.
Insider's Guide to Energy
185 - Power Play: Navigating the Global Battery and EV Market with Steve LeVine
In this episode of Insider’s Guide to Energy, hosts Chris Sass and Niall Riddell delve into the intricate dynamics of the global battery and electric vehicle (EV) market with Steve LeVine, editor of The Electric. LeVine brings his vast expertise to the table, discussing the significant role China plays in dominating the battery supply chain and EV production. He explains how the US and Europe need to learn from China's advancements in battery manufacturing and technology to stay competitive in the rapidly evolving energy landscape.
The conversation covers a wide range of critical topics, including the geopolitics of energy, the importance of securing raw materials like lithium, cobalt, and nickel, and the current state of the EV market in the West. LeVine shares his insights on why China has become a leader in this field, detailing the strategic moves that have allowed Chinese companies to control essential components of the battery supply chain. He also highlights the challenges and opportunities for Western car manufacturers in adapting to and competing with Chinese innovations in the EV sector.
Furthermore, the episode explores potential strategies for the US and Europe to regain a foothold in the global EV market, such as investing in battery recycling and adopting new technologies like LFP batteries. LeVine underscores the need for a long-term commitment and collaborative efforts among Western nations to build a sustainable and competitive EV industry. By examining the lessons learned from past industrial transitions, this episode provides valuable insights into how Western countries can effectively navigate the future of energy and transportation.
Meet our Guest: Steve LeVine
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Transcript
00:00:00 Steve LeVine
The US and Europe need to drop their ego a tad and get their act together, invite the Chinese into the United States into Europe, learn from them how to make batteries, how to make cars, how to make software and get that know how. Here and that is the way that they are going to get into the game.
00:00:26 Speaker
Broadcasting from Washington, DC, this is Insider’s Guide to Energy.
00:00:43 Chris Sass
Welcome to another edition of the Insider's Guide to Energy. I'm Chris Sass with me Is Niall Riddell. Today we have Steve LeVine with us. Steve, welcome to the podcast.
00:00:51 Steve LeVine
Thanks so much. Great to be here, Chris.
00:00:54 Chris Sass
We're excited to have you on the podcast. Typically, I start these by asking our guests to give a little background to who they are so our audience knows who we're talking to today.
00:01:04 Steve LeVine
All right, great. So I'm I'm editor of the electric, which is a newsletter that that looks at the whole battery and electric car space from mines, nickel lithium. So on mines all the way through to their their processing.
00:01:23 Steve LeVine
The components, batteries, electric cars, the big geopolitics and it, it does so around the world. I'm a former a former foreign correspondent, so.
00:01:36 Steve LeVine
I tend to to evaluate what we're looking at through the lens of the the tension and the competition between China and the US, but also, you know, there's there's quite a bit of tension here in the US.
00:01:56 Steve LeVine
As you know, around around electric cars right now so that that plays a big role too.
00:02:03 Niall Riddell
And batteries are absolutely crucial to both our energy ecosystem and the emerging electric vehicle revolution. How long have you been looking at batteries for and where did that all begin?
00:02:16 Steve LeVine
I've been looking at batteries for about 14 years, so it it it, it began with an interest in in Oil. Really. So. So I discovered through oil that that was my prior of of of session that the Industry itself is by far the largest industry in the world, and it's so big that it affects power. It affects the power of countries and and and and and how countries interact with one another. And if you look, and if you watch oil, you can actually predict how.
00:03:01 Steve LeVine
Global events are are going to go to some extent and so around 2010 I, you know, I saw that China and the US were both starting to to dive into batteries as a space. They both wanted to.
00:03:17 Steve LeVine
Own and remember, this is coming off the financial crash. This looked like an industry that that if you owned it, it would be real economic traction for a country and. And so that looked like.
00:03:35 Steve LeVine
The you know the same the same as oil and geopolitics, so that that's how I got into it and and and I've kept looking at it since then.
00:03:46 Chris Sass
So you're talking about the geopolitics of energy and and we can't have an energy conversation without politics that that goes down to it.
00:03:54 Chris Sass
We've seen transitions before when when navies switched from, you know, to oil. Do we see this kind of power play taking place? Do you see that around the world with battery technology you you mentioned China in particular, who's done a great job in taking solar power and and and becoming a leader there. Is this something that people should be fearful of and?
00:04:15 Chris Sass
Worried about from the geopolitics?
00:04:22 Steve LeVine
Yes, but in a way, in a way. First it's not. It's not happening when, when. When. Churchill instigated the switch from coal to oil back over 100 years ago.
00:04:37 Steve LeVine
Like that was right. It was a a no brainer because you know how much faster the fleets could go and and and and and you saw that that that turnover happen very, very quickly around the world electric cars.
00:04:53 Steve LeVine
Are not happening as quickly because they haven't persuaded everyone that that it's as as superior a system as oil was to coal or oil was to steam and and so, but.
00:05:14 Steve LeVine
As this transition takes place, it is taking place. China is leading it and and.
00:05:22 Steve LeVine
It's it's it's it's something.
00:05:27 Steve LeVine
To be to be mindful of in the sense that we've the the West has entirely lost control of it. China grabbed a hold of it. the US was in the game in 2010. It dropped.
00:05:42 Steve LeVine
Its role in the game around 20/12/2013, that was around geopolitics. Democratic republican Geo. I'm sorry.
00:05:51 Steve LeVine
Politics and China kept going. It owns the space. China owns the twenty 20s, as the United States and Europe are trying to get in the game. It's trying to get they they're they're trying to get in the game for the twenty 30s and.
00:06:11 Steve LeVine
What does it mean it it it? It means that if the current course if we go on the current course, it means that in Europe, in the United States.
00:06:26 Steve LeVine
All what? What? We're mostly going to be doing is buying Chinese electric cars that are that, that are powered by batteries made in China and the batteries made by by metals.
00:06:44 Steve LeVine
Processed in Chinese Chinese factories. So yeah, we're as it stands.
00:06:55 Steve LeVine
We are when I say we, I mean the West are out of the game and and so to to the degree the United States and Europe make a sustained effort to get in that game. We can be part of the industry.
00:07:12 Niall Riddell
So if we go back to the beginning of the batteries journey, a battery really initiates from some some fairly limited sets of uh, you know, raw materials which are mined out of the ground. Many of those mines do not exist in China.
00:07:28 Niall Riddell
So you know this journey of where the raw material comes from and then moves forward is really, really crucial. What can you tell us about where the materials are coming from and how that supply chain does then ultimately end up in a Chinese battery factory?
00:07:41 Steve LeVine
Yeah, so, so China understood from the beginning that it did not have the, the the main metals would be nickel, lithium, cobalt.
00:07:54 Steve LeVine
Manganese and then mineral minerals. Graphite. So just those four or five minerals and their apart from graphite.
00:08:05 Steve LeVine
China doesn't have any of those or has small quantities of all those but, but in the same way that Japan during the 1980s.
00:08:15 Steve LeVine
Didn't have any oil. They imported and and and continued to import 98% of their oil. They were able to to Marshall the strengths that they do.
00:08:27 Steve LeVine
That they do have and end up on top with with China Chinese companies backed by the Chinese government, went around the world lithium triangle in in South America, more recently to Zimbabwe, Nigeria and Malay grabbing.
00:08:48 Steve LeVine
Control over the lithium supply cobalt supply in.
00:08:53 Steve LeVine
The DRC nickel supply in Indonesia and Australia and and took ownership stakes.
00:09:03 Steve LeVine
In these metals and all of those places and then and then created a processing supply chain, all that raw material flowing into China and then building the factories, expensive factories, big factories, this is not making chocolate chip cookies.
00:09:23 Steve LeVine
This is like making.
00:09:27 Steve LeVine
Cobalt.
00:09:29 Steve LeVine
Cobalt sulfate making NMC powders.
00:09:34 Steve LeVine
This is a science. It's an it's a science and it's an art and and people who say, well, hey, you know, I'm going to, you know, open up a lithium hydroxide factory, alright. I mean I, you know, you know good for you. But you know, it's not easy and you're going to have to compete with.
00:09:46
Oh.
00:09:54 Steve LeVine
The Chinese, who have already been doing it for more than a decade and so so China has, has it the commanding heights in batteries.
00:10:05 Steve LeVine
Is ownership of the processing, the midstream and China owns that.
00:10:13 Niall Riddell
And I've I've been very lucky. I've travelled a little bit and I've been and seen some of the Arsenal lithium mines in northern Chile where local populations were extracting lithium, and I can imagine that that has fundamentally changed. And similarly, I've had the privilege going out to Republic of Congo and meeting Chinese people very early on into 2008.
00:10:34 Niall Riddell
Looking for raw, you know, raw materials and locations, the Chinese have clearly thought this through very.
00:10:40 Niall Riddell
Hopefully do we just give up and go home as Western or Western countries, or is there actually a role for us in this ecosystem, perhaps in the other end of the spectrum, it may be battery recycling?
00:10:53 Steve LeVine
Yeah. So, so I mean, I'd be interested in your in your guys opinion on this too. This is a subjective, a subjective opinion that that you're asking is it important for the West to to have a competitive role to compete.
00:11:12 Steve LeVine
In electric cars and batteries, or.
00:11:16 Steve LeVine
Just say, you know, let's go bowling and and move on to AI and and you know, and we're going to own that space.
00:11:27 Steve LeVine
I I I mean, I personally think that that that we do need to have a role, we do need to have our own assets, our own supply chain and and it doesn't mean they have to be in Europe, in the United States, it's you and all your allies and and.
00:11:46 Steve LeVine
By the way, that is potentially and should be the new geopolitics, right, that, that, that the West pulls together a chain of.
00:11:55 Steve LeVine
Trees lithium triangle. Why does China have to own the DRC? Why does China have to own Indonesia? Why are these countries provinces of China and and and and so the the US has recently by the way.
00:12:10 Steve LeVine
Made moves to whittle away at Chinas's influence in the DRC. It has not done so in Indonesia and Indonesia. Indonesia's role in nickel has resulted in a bunch of Big Western.
00:12:29 Steve LeVine
Nickel operations in Australia closing down.
00:12:34 Steve LeVine
Is that and and so that. That's not. That's not to the. That's not in the West interest. And so my answer to you is yes, we we we currently don't have much of A role, but we should have one and there there should be I I don't know if you're familiar with LFP, LFP is the.
00:12:55 Steve LeVine
Iron lead cap.
00:12:56 Steve LeVine
Load. That's the battery. That's the favorite battery in China. The West has been extremely slow to move to that to that battery. I've been arguing for a long time. That's the best battery. That's the one we should be making. It has the fewest supply chain bottlenecks. It's the cheapest one.
00:13:17 Steve LeVine
But you know the Western companies made a bet on nickel years ago and are having a lot of trouble getting their arms.
00:13:24 Steve LeVine
Down.
00:13:25 Steve LeVine
Changing their mind, but it would be a strategy. It would be strategically smart for the United States, for the EU to say we're going to have LFP industries.
00:13:39 Steve LeVine
On our continents and and and put you know a lot of resources behind making that happen.
00:13:44 Chris Sass
Does.
00:13:46 Chris Sass
The current situation basically ensure that EV adoption won't take place the way we want in the West because it's not in our interest to support China. Does it really put a kibosh on EV's being a solution for the future?
00:14:05 Steve LeVine
Well, first I start from from a framework that you know no one ordained that there has to be a transition to EV's. It's not in the 10 Commandments and and and and you know it's it's just someone somewhere sort of.
00:14:24 Steve LeVine
Decided and I, you know, I haven't tried.
00:14:26 Steve LeVine
To track someone.
00:14:26 Chris Sass
Are you talking about Elon or anyone?
00:14:28
Else.
00:14:29 Steve LeVine
Yeah, well, maybe it was Elon. You know, Elon wrote the 10 Commandments and and but, but somehow it's out there. And so I think that there is a transition and whether we like it or not, it's happening and it's led by China, you know, to Elon, you know.
00:14:49 Steve LeVine
Elon has pushed it, but some of his edge, he's lost some of his edge over the last year or so. He has mentally switched to AI. He is much less of an of an EV evangelist than he was, you know, leading up to the last.
00:15:08 Steve LeVine
Say 18 months and and so we're going to have this transition and we're going to be driving Chinese cars. Chris, I just wrote a a story that that ran a week or so ago where I forecast that we're going to have.
00:15:28 Steve LeVine
Chinese.
00:15:30 Steve LeVine
Electric car factories in the United States and Trump.
00:15:38 Steve LeVine
Trump has said, and he and he, he, he said it again in his acceptance speech at the Republican National Convention that if he wins re re election, that he would try to press.
00:15:55 Steve LeVine
Sure, companies like BYOD, Chinas, BYOD to build instead of building plants in Mexico, which is what BYOD is planning to do right now to build those factories in the United States and train up Americans to make cars and and.
00:16:15 Steve LeVine
And employ Americans. And if they don't impose a 200% tariff on them on those cars made in Mexico, and you know the Financial Times recently published an editorial pushing a A a similar.
00:16:35 Steve LeVine
Proposal for Europe and so. So I see, you know, if Mercedes and VW, Ford and so on don't get into the game, don't make these electric cars. China will make them for us.
00:16:54 Chris Sass
Doesn't the IRA already kind of position that though the domestic part of the content? I mean, that's already happening, right? We're seeing resources trying to get ready to move onshore doesn't mean they're all owned by Americans. It seems like their production needs to be onshore. Isn't that Genie already out of the bottle?
00:17:12 Steve LeVine
Yes, so so the IRA, by the way, the IRA is, you know some people try to characterize what it is in peace time. There is no precedent for the size of the investment that the that the that the United States has determined to make.
00:17:32 Steve LeVine
To support the creation of this.
00:17:34 Steve LeVine
Industry over $300 billion. You won't find any any in initiative out of Washington Economic initiative supporting an industry. It's a it's a very impressive program but you know.
00:17:54 Steve LeVine
You know, apart from Tesla name a car that you an electric car, you want to buy.
00:18:00 Steve LeVine
Right.
00:18:01 Steve LeVine
You know the so the, the, the, these car companies they need to but well I take that back I like loose.
00:18:08 Chris Sass
Is BYOD one of the cards you could have on there or not?
00:18:12 Steve LeVine
Well, BYOD is not selling in the United States right now. Nothing's going to happen. But I think Lucid Lucid makes in incredible cars. If you have $129,000.
00:18:25 Steve LeVine
But but but but Western car companies, they need to get their act together, you know, and put some other word in in the space of that word, act and and and you'll see we we our car companies.
00:18:47 Steve LeVine
At home replayed the movie Field of Dreams and thought that was the EV.
00:18:54 Steve LeVine
Revolution, they thought all all they had to do was make EV's just, you know, put a a battery into their combustion cars and people would line up around the block to buy them. You know, the the last two or three years have informed our car companies that that wasn't the case.
00:19:14 Steve LeVine
And they they need to go back to the drawing board. They have to make desirable cars and that that's what. That's what Chinese Chinese car companies.
00:19:25 Steve LeVine
They have a brutal competition in China 100 / 100 EV companies, and they're they're they're competing, it's it's a death grip. And so they they they've had to improve their cars to survive.
00:19:44 Steve LeVine
And we, we we haven't had that.
00:19:50 Niall Riddell
Yeah. So I I think, you know, sat here in Europe, are there any desirable electric cars to buy? Yes, there's lots. And I think one of the things that I think is quite intriguing about this, this conversation is we've had quite a few uh, Chinese or Asian, uh, manufactured electric car companies try and start up here, Neo.
00:20:10 Niall Riddell
Cherry Vin fast some of those have not made.
00:20:15 Niall Riddell
And I recently had the privilege of sitting through a presentation from someone who's represented a number of those brands, and he ended up with an interesting conclusion, which is it all comes down to what the consumer wants. And a lot of those consumers are still quite brand loyal. So as a consequence, the the intuitive statement that Chinese electric cars are coming, they're cheaper.
00:20:36 Niall Riddell
Is really fascinating, but if you listen to McKenzie, they'll tell you the automotive OEMs have a different issue that actually they're not able to integrate the software and the technology into the vehicles and that's perhaps where the Chinese vehicle manufacturers have an additional edge.
00:20:51 Niall Riddell
Is you get all the software and all the tech that you might not get in a legacy automotive vehicle.
00:20:57 Steve LeVine
Yeah. Yes, I think that's that. Both of the things you said are correct. The Chinese automakers, I think BYOD has had a little bit more luck than the other, yeah, then the others, but not a lot of luck. I mean they're right, but.
00:21:13 Steve LeVine
They have come into Europe and assumed because they sell well in China that these same cars are going to sell well in the in the West and they haven't found that to be the case. But the past, the past shows us that they will make course corrections. I mean I I think I think you know, we can't underestimate that. The second thing you pointed out.
00:21:33 Steve LeVine
The software the the reports you get out of out of China is that.
00:21:40 Steve LeVine
You know the Chinese are.
00:21:41 Steve LeVine
Tech.
00:21:42 Steve LeVine
Crazy. And so the the distinguishing factor in their EVA's are what do they have inside for me to do? What's cool for me to do inside the car and and so that, you know, they're filled with gizmos. You're right that.
00:22:01 Steve LeVine
Volkswagen has completely failed to create software. Herbert Deese lost his job because he failed to, you know, to to get cariad to work correctly now.
00:22:15 Steve LeVine
Has made a $5 billion bet on Rivian solely, I think, solely to get rivian software system and and and adopt that into its own its own vehicle. So.
00:22:28 Chris Sass
But but the audio industry seems to have gone through this before. I remember in the 70s, eighties, when the Japanese cars came into the market. And like Datsuns and Toyotas were these tiny rust buckets that nobody wanted. I mean, they were. They were inexpensive. They came into our market. They weren't great.
00:22:42 Chris Sass
And then, you know, a decade later, they dominated the market and they had US plants and or maybe two decades later. But I mean that it's transformative. And then Kia, you know, Korean car maker came out of nowhere, and they have EV's that people buy in Europe. I had friends that drove them around when I lived in Europe.
00:22:59 Chris Sass
And so, I mean I I think we've seen the movie before. If you build a better mousetrap, people come right, they they they like better vehicles. And the American Auto Industries had to try to adapt to it in the past, right? There was a time when you thought all the big three were dead and you know, the Japanese car makers were going to take over and they they're still here today. There's no guarantee they'll be here in the future.
00:23:21 Chris Sass
But haven't we already seen this movie?
00:23:24 Steve LeVine
Yes, we we haven't. We're we're seeing it again, Chris, look at when you say that Ford and GM are still here, but in what form are they still here? They have become regional car makers, they their, their.
00:23:44 Steve LeVine
Almost their their whole businesses are North American businesses making big trucks and.
00:23:50 Steve LeVine
U's.
00:23:52 Steve LeVine
Ford has given up making cars sedans and they they, you know, they make lots of money from, from these, you know, to these two segments. But you know, Toyota is, you know, the second biggest car maker in the United States is 15% of the market.
00:24:12 Steve LeVine
GM is just slightly ahead of it, forward is behind, and so they're much shrunken and so OK, you say. All right, we've seen this movie before, and if the same movie plays out, we do, we end up with Chinese.
00:24:26 Steve LeVine
Is car makers in in the United States making making electric cars and the risk is that Ford and GM shrink shrink further? Look, I don't have, you know, I don't have any dog in this in this fight. You know, I've never had a.
00:24:46 Steve LeVine
Relative working for Ford or or GM, I don't own shares in any of those companies.
00:24:52 Steve LeVine
But and and and really. Does it really matter? You know from whom Americans are buying cars. But, but I'm saying that the that the, the the way the industry is going the EV industry and the battery industry is is it is going in a direction heavily.
00:25:12 Steve LeVine
Dominated by by by the Chinese companies and you do raise a super.
00:25:18 Steve LeVine
Important point. Somehow the South Koreans, Hyundai and Kia have figured out the game and and their and their cars. Their EV's are well loved get, you know, in in incredible reviews and they're they're going to be a big.
00:25:39 Steve LeVine
A big part of this future?
00:25:43 Niall Riddell
So I briefly touched on this question earlier around, you know, where could we play a role in the West? But I think one of the things that intrigues me about this whole conversation is clearly it's resource intensive. We're digging minerals out of the ground and manufacturing and we're making big vehicles in many cases. What about the the end of life as we as we proceed?
00:26:02 Niall Riddell
To that mineral extraction, battery fabrication.
00:26:06 Niall Riddell
Enter the EV. The whole debate there. Where do we see this second hand or even, you know, recycling and reuse of batteries? Figuring into this plan is that an opportunity for the West to dominate and really showcase, you know, full circular lifestyles for these these really important raw materials.
00:26:25 Steve LeVine
OK, the first thing I want to I want to say in in response. I hope I haven't given the impression that is hope.
00:26:34 Steve LeVine
For the West, for Western carmakers, what I'm trying to say is they need to wake up and and and get their act together and and and. And it's a long game. There has to be a sustained effort. It's not it. It can't go on.
00:26:51 Steve LeVine
Presidential administration cycles. You know we're doing it, then we're not doing it. And then we're doing it. You know, there has to be a commitment made. We're going to get in this game, we're going to be part of the industry and our karma. It's not just, it's not like that's a minority part.
00:27:09 Steve LeVine
Uh.
00:27:10 Steve LeVine
You know what the governments do? The major part is the car makers, the car makers themselves. You know, if you don't want to copy BYOD copy Hyundai you know get you know get get your get your act together it's not again it's not about the twenty 20s it's about the twenty 30s and beyond.
00:27:31 Steve LeVine
In terms of recycling?
00:27:35 Steve LeVine
That's one of the things that's that's raised. I think you know that's that's important, it's not important.
00:27:42 Steve LeVine
This decade, because there, there, there, there has to be a critical mass of batteries to recycle. Electric cars haven't been around long enough to generate that, that that volume of those batteries. But in the twenty 30s, for sure, you're going to see, you know, what they call in the circular economy.
00:28:03 Steve LeVine
You know the batteries coming out of the cars and then and then being recycled and then you end up having to mine a lot less nickel, a lot less lithium and and so on.
00:28:19 Steve LeVine
Yeah. So that, that, that is happening again, you know, won't surprise you, China is huge in this. In the West, we keep hearing well. You know we're not going to go to LFP batteries like China because you can't recycle LP, false Chinese.
00:28:39 Steve LeVine
Companies recycle LFP to to get the lithium.
00:28:46 Steve LeVine
Out of it. So so.
00:28:48 Steve LeVine
It's a big game. It's a big game for the next decade.
00:28:51 Chris Sass
All right, so.
00:28:52 Chris Sass
We've we've gone all over the place in the conversation. You started with a strong announcement, you know, basically talking how China has a lot of the supply chain and the minerals and all the things to go into the batteries and they're playing the long game. We've talked a little bit about changing the EV's or the North American product to make a product the market wants maybe or upgrading the products they remain.
00:29:13 Chris Sass
Relevant.
00:29:15 Chris Sass
You you said all hope isn't lost as we bring this together.
00:29:19 Chris Sass
What's the path forward? How? How do you think it will go and how would you like it to go if it's different?
00:29:28 Steve LeVine
How do I think it will go so?
00:29:32 Steve LeVine
OK, there's a caveat here. The caveat is it is so dangerous to predict and and this enters we've had so many shifts that no one forecast but the but the direction of things right now are are that we are going to have, we have to have.
00:29:51 Steve LeVine
Chinese battery companies western.
00:29:55 Steve LeVine
EV makers the the Big Western car companies cannot even think about getting into the game unless they buy LFP batteries from Chinese companies. Chinese companies make almost all the LFP around the world so that that that goes without saying so. So I do think.
00:30:15 Steve LeVine
We're going to have.
00:30:17 Steve LeVine
Chinese industry in the United States, in in Europe, and we probably should and and we should drop.
00:30:28 Steve LeVine
A level our egos and be willing to learn from the Chinese and make sure that as part of that learning that that, that the that that the know how the know how of how to make batteries at scale efficiently, how to make the software.
00:30:49 Steve LeVine
At scale, that really works. That has that pizzazz, gets transfers.
00:30:54 Steve LeVine
To to the West, we had the the US. This is not just, you know, you know, Rah, rah, rallying. the US still has the edge on, on, on, on, on battery.
00:31:09 Steve LeVine
Innovation and and and invention. These batter all of these major batteries were invented in the United States by Americans and then China, South Korea.
00:31:21 Steve LeVine
Japanese grabbed those patents and they scaled them up. The next generation batteries are are are reaching scale in the United.
00:31:32 Steve LeVine
Days.
00:31:34 Steve LeVine
We need to hold on to them, scale them up here so that you know, that's just a smart move. I think. I think that'll that'll happen. I I fear. I fear the politics because for unknown reasons, you know, we think that an inanimate object like a car is Republican.
00:31:54 Steve LeVine
Or it's Democrat democratic. They're not. They're inanimate objects. But, but. But because they take on this this identity, then, you know, then you get this erratic public policy.
00:32:10 Steve LeVine
So so I have optimism. I think we do end up with with a balance of Western and Chinese companies in, in the US and Europe. I do think I I listen to to Jim Farley, the CEO of Ford.
00:32:31 Steve LeVine
He's he's made a series of public speeches and also appearances on other people's podcasts. You, you guys should have him on. And he, he understands everything that I've said today, he obviously.
00:32:47 Steve LeVine
Gets and it's a matter of of doing it and they have, by the way, Ford. He talks about a skunk works. He's got this secret skunk works in Los Angeles somewhere where they where they are a separate entity from Ford. Like he he's his Card To get to get into the build it Does not work.
00:33:13 Steve LeVine
At the Skunk Works, they are veterans of Tesla, Rivian, Apple and they are creating like A and an adjunct to Ford. They're in the in the next two or three years, you're going to see, he says, right. See EV's come out of there, he says, completely different from what Ford Ink has produced, you know, with different methods. That I'm super interested to see what what they come up with.
00:33:45 Niall Riddell
Steve, this is fascinating. You've given us an insight as to how China is shaping our marketplace both in the US and here in Europe. You've given us an insight and a tour as to where you think this might go next and you've given us hope that as long as we all sit up and listen, there is an opportunity for us to ensure that we are part of this future.
00:34:04 Niall Riddell
So, I really appreciate your time. Thank you for joining.
00:34:07 Steve LeVine
Thanks so much, Niall. Thanks. Thanks, Chris, for having me.
00:34:10 Chris Sass
For audience, we hope you've enjoyed this episode of the Insider's Guide Energy. If you have, don't forget to like, don't forget to comment if you agree you disagree. Add comments, get the conversation going. We'll see you again next time on the Insider's Guide To Energy. Bye for now.