Meet students doing their Master thesis within the programme

Edvin Gunnarsson and Lowe Aspeqvist are busy working on the Master thesis project Sustainable Battery Materials for Swedish Electric Cars. It aims to explore the sustainability implications of switching from globally sourced battery minerals to locally sourced ones in Sweden.

- It is fascinating work that grows on you the more you read, they say.

- New information is published almost daily about successes related to the electrification of the world, including Sweden. One example is the Per Geijer deposit, LKAB's discovery in Kiruna that could enable further progress for Sweden in international battery production. To achieve the UN 2030 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), it is essential that the work continues forward, but also with a continued focus on what electrification entails in terms of complications and improvement potentials along the entire life cycle, says Edvin Gunnarsson and Lowe Aspeqvist.

Within their work, they have chosen to specifically focus on exploring Sweden's opportunities for mining critical materials to become more self-sufficient in battery production for electric cars.

- We will further investigate the current supply chain and what implications a shift from international to domestic sourcing of raw materials would have in relation to UN environmental goals. We hope this work will provide valuable input to companies’ and decision-makers’ strategies.

Edvin Gunnarsson and Lowe Aspeqvist are both studying at the Chalmers University of Technology for a Master's degree in Mechanical Engineering, specialising in Supply Chain Management.

 Lowe also recently completed his economics degree at the University of Gothenburg while Edvin was on an exchange semester in Italy studying at Politecnico di Milano.