The company will invest $200 million to expand an existing battery factory at Gdansk, Poland; expected annual capacity to be 12GWh
A visualisation of Northvolt’s factory in Gdansk, Poland, Credit: Northvolt website
Swedish battery manufacturer, Northvolt has announced that it will build the largest factory for energy storage systems in Europe at Gdansk, Poland by 2022. The company already has a facility located in the area, which it is expanding with an investment of $200 million. Once completed, the factory will be able to manufacture batteries with a capacity of 5GWh each year. In the future, Northvolt wants to push up the annual capacity to 12GWh in addition to constructing an engineering, research and development centre.
Peter Carlsson, co-founder and Chief Executive of Northvolt, said: “Securing battery cell manufacturing capacity in Europe is key for its industrial future, but what is equally critical is the industrial capacity for integrating cells into real-world solutions. It is this that the new factory will deliver — sophisticated, sustainable energy storage systems to support the transformation of Europe’s electricity grid and its industry.”
Northvolt’s factory in Gdansk will use lithium-ion battery cells from the manufacturer’s gigafactory at Skellefteå in Sweden as raw material to produce modules and larger systems. These energy systems can be operationalized both as stationary and industry grids. The gigafactory, Northvolt Ett is under construction and is expected to be operational later this year, around the same time that the Gdansk factory is slated to be built. Northvolt has speculated that combined with the engineering, research and development centre, the project will create 500 new jobs in Gdansk.
Northvolt has recently entered into a collaboration with Volkswagen to develop lithium-ion batteries for their electric vehicles. Dubbed ‘Northvolt Zwei’, it will power Volkswagen’s line of electric vehicles to be launched in 2024 in Salzgitter, Germany. A host of auto manufacturers and energy companies have committed to partnering with Northvolt, such as BMW, Vestas and Vattenfall.
Volkswagen and Goldman Sachs have also announced their support for a $600 million fundraising effort launched by Northvolt. The German government has also extended state support to the battery manufacturer. Northvolt appears to be Europe’s solution to developing an indigenous source of grid energy storage systems in order to reduce dependency on Asian suppliers.
