On April 11 2020 I purchased 12 packs of AA for $1.33ea & AAA for $1.25ea from Amazon. A couple of weeks ago I checked Amazon & both sizes were $2.50ea so I decided to check at Walmart. Today at Walmart they were $2.75ea so I came home to buy at Amazon. Now at Amazon AA size are over $3.00EA!

Supply and demand is a bitch.

Amazon brand lithium batteries have gone way up too. An 12-pack of 9V is $65 when it's even actually in stock.

I noticed the same thing. Luckily, I have a small set of Eneloop rechargeable AAs that I use for my most common AA stuff.

Guess I should invest in even more rechargeables.

I save the expensive lithium primary cells for only stuff that doesn't get used often or for very long. Everything else gets Eneloops.

is demand for lithium higher because of battery electric vehicles (bev)?

Yeah,

Thinking the EV marked increased the demand, the supply is still the same.

$1.94 each at Sam’s Club today.

Off my Amazon orders:

April 24 2021 Energizer AA Lithium batteries, 24 pack $28.90

Price today: $63.49

Bought a ten pack yesterday for $25!

The cold was killing my regular batteries in my doorbell camera.

Part of the increased demand may be based on fewer people buying Duracells.
Duracell batteries seem to often leak now and people have shifted brand/types.

quote:

Originally posted by cas:
Off my Amazon orders:

April 24 2021 Energizer AA Lithium batteries, 24 pack $28.90

Price today: $63.49

Priced today, $67.00

It really made me think about what's coming, two fold. The ever increasing demand for them in every day products alone will drive the price up. When electric vehicles really get into full swing, then what? $10k-$20k price increases every model year?

And the other shoe to drop... when the world wakes up (wokes up) about how and where the raw materials are coming from. If you think they're expensive now with child labor, wait till it's an all adult (union?) work force. Good lord.



Funny thing about that, that always made me laugh and yet sad. The only thing worse than an 9 year old in some third world country that has to work in a sweat shop to help feed their family, is a 9 year old that needs to work in a sweat shop to feed their family, but can't, because some middle age housewife from Connecticut wants to feel better about herself. But that's a different issue.

Still $1.94 each at Samsclub.

The stories say it's because of demand, use in E cars, etc.
Not sure I buy that as the price of Lithium as a commodity is down about 45% from a year ago. It had been rising for years but seemed to dip in 2022.

 
EBL lithium primaries are a lot cheaper. They also advertise a 10 year shelf life. I have been using them for a couple of years now, since the Energizers started going crazy.

"We're running out of oil!!!"

Iron, copper, steel, nickle, aluminum, graphite, cobalt, manganese... all the things you need to make an EV battery, apparently we have an inexhaustible supply.

EV's batteries only use a small amount of Lithium. Graphite, Manganese, Aluminum, Cobalt, Nickel, copper and Steel are the main ingrediants in EV batteries and most are coming from China because the EPA has too many restrictions on mining in the US to get them here economically. There is no shortage of Li batteries at Costco or Sam's. The Kirkland batteries at Costco are made by Energizer, but I don't think they are as good as the name brand product.

I have about 12 electric shades in my house that take 10 AA batteries each. Ouch.

I needed a couple of CR 123 batteries and stopped by the local drug store.

For two of the Energizers, they wanted $24 or 25.

Nope. I went home and ordered a pack of 12 Stream light batteries for about $25.

16 pack of energizer CR123 at Sam's Club is $35.98, about $2.25 each