US: Over 10 New Battery Plants To Be Launched In 2022-2025

It will be a decade of the battery rush.

There were only a handful of battery plants launched in the past decade (the Tesla Gigafactory 1 in Nevada was the largest one), but now there is a huge wave of new projects that spread through the automotive industry in the U.S.

The Department of Energy’s (DOE) Vehicle Technologies Office highlights 13 new projects at various stages that are expected to be completed by the end of 2025.

The list appears to include projects related to both battery cells and packs for electric cars. But even with those 13 positions, it is still far from what we will see, as there are more projects in the pipeline.

Let's try to list some of the battery cell projects and see how big the new wave is:

• Ford and SK Innovation's SK On joint venture (BlueOvalSK)
  1) Stanton, west Tennessee - Blue Oval City (43 GWh) - 2025
  2) and 3) Glendale, central Kentucky - BlueOvalSK Battery Park (2x 43 GWh) - 2025
• GM and LG Energy Solution joint venture (Ultium Cells)
  1) Lordstown, Ohio (30+ GWh) - 2022
  2) Spring Hill, Tennessee (30+ GWh) - 2023
  3) and 4) in the piepline (details not announced yet)
• SK Battery America (SKBA), subsidiary of SK Innovation
  1) Commerce, Georgia - Plant 1: 9.8 GWh - early 2022
  2) Commerce, Georgia - Plant 2: 11.7 GWh - 2023
• Stellantis and LG Energy Solution joint venture
  1) 40 GWh - 2024
• Stellantis and Samsung SDI joint venture
  1) 23 GWh with potential for 40 GWh - 2025

A quick look shows that the total manufacturing output will be north of 300 GWh per year by 2025.

That does not include a potentially very large project - Tesla's 4680-type cylindrical cell gigafactory in Texas. It could be a three-digit number of GWh.

As far as we know, basically all battery manufacturers and automotive groups are considering investments in more battery plants. It could be Chinese companies (like the Gotion High-Tech rumored recently), Panasonic (they are working on Tesla's 4680-type cells and with Toyota) or all-new start-ups.

On top of that comes battery pack plants - the list includes two, but there are and will be more of them, alongside car assembly plants.

New battery pack plants

• Toyota and Toyota Tsusho joint venture (battery pack plant)
  1) Greensboro-Randolph Megasite in North Carolina - 2025
• Volkswagen battery pack plant
  1) Chattanooga, Tennessee - 2022

One thing is sure, the EV battery industry might expand by 10 times within less than 5 years.