(GUA) NORTHVOLT SWEDEN STARTS PRODUCTION

The Northvolt Ett site in Skellefteå, Sweden. Photograph: Northvolt/Reuters

Electric cars have gone mainstream in Europe – they accounted for nearly a fifth of all car purchases in the UK last month. Yet one piece has been missing up to now: European batteries.

That is now changing. On Tuesday night, Northvolt, a startup, produced its first lithium ion battery cell at a plant in northern Sweden. It is the first of a series of new factories that investors hope will allow Europe to carve out a big proportion of the electric vehicle market – and weaken the stranglehold built up by manufacturers in China, Japan and Korea.

The Northvolt Ett site will be the first European-owned plant to produce at so-called gigafactory scale. Gigafactories are generally considered to be those capable of producing enough batteries each year to provide about 15 gigawatt hours (GWh) of cumulative storage.

Only two large battery factories are operational in Europe, according to Benchmark Mineral Intelligence (BMI), a battery data company: a factory in Wrocław, Poland, run by Korea’s LG, and another owned by Korea’s Samsung near Budapest in Hungary.

Yet there are 25 gigafactories planned for the continent by 2030, according to BMI, as the industry races to keep up with soaring demand for electric cars. Nine of those are owned by Asian manufacturers, which control most of the global supply.

The UK is arguably further behind the rest of Europe, with plans for only two gigafactories. One will be a major expansion of a small battery plant in Sunderland by the Chinese company Envision, while the Glencore-backed startup Britishvolt is attempting to secure funding for a homegrown rival in nearby Blyth. The Guardian - link - Jasper Jolly - link - more like this - link - more like this (Sweden) - link