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In three years, Northvolt has gone from project stage to LA Europe's response to Asian dominance in the battery field.

Two years ago, there were only 20 people in the company. By October 2019, there were 500. The most difficult thing is

to recruit engineers and teach them how to make the cheapest and most durable batteries with current technologies.

The company has a research and development laboratory and a pilot manufacturing line in Västerås, near Stockholm (Sweden). It started production in December 2019. The main production site for battery cells will be located in Skellefteå in northern Sweden: the Northvolt Ett plant has been under construction since October 2019. It should produce its first batteries in 2021. Until then, the pilot line in Västerås will be used for experimentation.

In September 2019, Northvolt and Volkswagen announced a joint venture to establish the 16 GWh Northvolt Zwei plant in Salzgitter (Lower Saxony, Germany). Construction is expected to begin in 2021. A third assembly unit is planned in Poland and is currently under development.

The choice of Sweden was dictated by cheap hydroelectricity. This will make batteries cheaper. The Swedish Ett plant will have an initial capacity of 32 GWh per year, expandable to 40 GWh. It will carry out all production activities, from the input of raw materials to the output of the cells of the finished batteries. The energy requirements are considerable, 2 TWh per year to produce 40 GWh of battery capacity.

In Germany, the energy requirements will be lower as the most energy-intensive part will be done in Sweden and shipped to Germany for the final production of the batteries. The initial production capacity will be 16 GWh.

In Poland, energy needs will be low because it is a battery assembly plant and not a battery cell plant. The initial production capacity of the Polish plant in Poland is also 10,000 modules per year, i.e. approximately 0.1 GWh of batteries.

Northvolt wants to control all parts of the supply chain. The company buys its raw materials (nickel, cobalt and lithium) directly from the mines it visits, so that it has a clear idea of what it buys and how it is produced. In addition, the company monitors the entire supply chain internally. Its logistics are vertically integrated on the European continent. The company wants to go from raw materials to cells, then to packaging and eventually to recycling, collecting data to create the best models available.

The company wants to establish close cooperation with key customers and other stakeholders. It wants to broaden its relationships outside the automotive industry by offering networked batteries, as well as industrial and portable batteries. Northvolt's partners therefore include Siemens, BMW, Vattenfall, Vestas, ABB and other major European companies.

The company is committed to recycling for environmental and economic reasons. Recycling batteries can increase the company's competitiveness because it reduces risks: when material prices rise, recycling products can provide additional income for the company.

Battery sales have already started from the pilot plant in Västerås. When the plant in Ett becomes operational, the pilot plant will become a training and testing centre. The plant in Germany will be the "customer's factory", with manufacturing locations spread out for different customers.

Initial production in Sweden and Germany will reach 48 GWh, compared to the 400 GWh needed for the automotive industry by 2025, i.e. 12% of the cells estimated to be needed.

Northvolt estimates that global demand will reach 200 GWh in 2020 and 1,000 GWh in 2025, while only 48 GWh will be produced in 2024. The company estimates that Europe will need around 20% of the world market. The reason for this is that 20% of electric vehicles - 20 million out of 100 million cars - will be manufactured in Europe. If each car battery has a size of 64 kWh, Northvolt will be able to supply 500,000 to 600,000 electric vehicles per year. The supremacy of China, South Korea and Japan will not be contested, but the company hopes to adopt new ideas and new approaches to be competitive and, above all, to always give priority to quality.

https://www.pv-magazine.com/2020/02/29/the-weekend-read-building-europes-battery-business/

PV Magazine of February 29th

Editor's note This experiment will be followed with great interest by European industrialists. If it fails, it will justify the reluctance to embark on "industrial adventures". It will sound the death knell for the desire for European industrial renewal. The condition for success is the protection of initial battery production by the European authorities. Asian competitors really must not have the "skin" of this initiative. Their temptation will be strong that they launch comparable products at cost price or even at dumping prices. Only to make it more difficult for this new competitor to establish itself on a long-term basis, when they have had time to amortize their equipment and produce in large series.

If it succeeds, it will indicate that it is possible to successfully launch a European initiative. It will show that there is no fatality to Asian manufacturing. It will warn of the degree of support for European customs protection against foreign products. It will incite many other industrialists to take the plunge. On this subject, the recent announcement of a battery manufacturing project by PSA and Total goes in the same direction. The ambition is much less ambitious because the project is only 8 GWh at start-up and only brings together two partners, the battery manufacturer SAFT and the user Peugeot-Citroën. This announcement, even if it has to be confirmed, indicates that there is a serious probability of success. This is what should be remembered.