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Written by Martin Lynch, European News Editor for Industrial Info (Galway, Ireland)--The U.K.'s battery startup Britishvolt (Blyth) is accelerating its electric vehicle (EV) ambitions by announcing a £200 million (US$250 million) investment to create a research and testing facility in the West Midlands.
The company will lease the Hams Hall facility to develop and test the manufacturing process it aims to use at the U.K.'s first EV battery plant, a £1 billion (US$1.25 billion) "gigafactory" being planned for a 235-acre (95-hectare) site at the former Blyth coal-fired plant site in Northumberland. The facility will employ up to 150 people, and equipment fit-out is expected to be completed by next summer.
Britishvolt said the location of the facility in the heart of Britain's existing car industry and battery technology development will allow it to benefit from the input of nearby companies including Jaguar, Warwick Manufacturing Group, Faraday Institution and the government-funded U.K. Battery Industrialisation Centre (UKBIC). Britishvolt already has a two-year, multimillion-dollar co-development framework deal with the UKBIC to produce its next generation of battery cells. Hams Hall is also home to Jaguar's Battery Assembly Center (BAC) which is expected to have 4 million battery cells in production every day when at full capacity.
"I am delighted to see Britishvolt lead the U.K.'s journey into re-industrialisation with the first full-scale battery Gigaplant," said Paul Franklin, property director, Britishvolt. "The new R&D and scale-up facilities announced today will help the U.K. build on its home-grown battery intellectual property and level up the country ready for the energy transition."
The gigafactory will be constructed at a former coal-fired plant in Blyth that has benefitted from £100 million (US$120 million) in funding support from the U.K. government. It will have a capacity of 300,000 EV batteries a year by 2027. Industrial Info reported that the project had been green lit last July and the first phase is expected to go live in 2023. For additional information, see July 19, 2021, article--U.K. Green Lights First EV Battery 'Gigafactory' and January 31, 2022, article--First EV Battery 'Gigafactory' for U.K. Gets Funding Boost.
Industrial Info is also tracking the only other U.K. EV battery gigafactory project, being developed by Envision AESC in Sunderland, England. It will have an annual capacity of 11 gigawatt hours (GWh) when it is commissioned in 2024, rising to an annual capacity of up to 38-GWh when fully expanded in later years. Subscribers to Industrial Info's Global Market Intelligence (GMI) Project Database can click here for the reports.
Industrial Info Resources (IIR) is the world's leading provider of market intelligence across the upstream, midstream and downstream energy markets and all other major industrial markets. IIR's Global Market Intelligence Platform (GMI) supports our end-users across their core businesses, and helps them connect trends across multiple markets with access to real, qualified and validated project opportunities. Follow IIR on: LinkedIn.
The company will lease the Hams Hall facility to develop and test the manufacturing process it aims to use at the U.K.'s first EV battery plant, a £1 billion (US$1.25 billion) "gigafactory" being planned for a 235-acre (95-hectare) site at the former Blyth coal-fired plant site in Northumberland. The facility will employ up to 150 people, and equipment fit-out is expected to be completed by next summer.
Britishvolt said the location of the facility in the heart of Britain's existing car industry and battery technology development will allow it to benefit from the input of nearby companies including Jaguar, Warwick Manufacturing Group, Faraday Institution and the government-funded U.K. Battery Industrialisation Centre (UKBIC). Britishvolt already has a two-year, multimillion-dollar co-development framework deal with the UKBIC to produce its next generation of battery cells. Hams Hall is also home to Jaguar's Battery Assembly Center (BAC) which is expected to have 4 million battery cells in production every day when at full capacity.
"I am delighted to see Britishvolt lead the U.K.'s journey into re-industrialisation with the first full-scale battery Gigaplant," said Paul Franklin, property director, Britishvolt. "The new R&D and scale-up facilities announced today will help the U.K. build on its home-grown battery intellectual property and level up the country ready for the energy transition."
The gigafactory will be constructed at a former coal-fired plant in Blyth that has benefitted from £100 million (US$120 million) in funding support from the U.K. government. It will have a capacity of 300,000 EV batteries a year by 2027. Industrial Info reported that the project had been green lit last July and the first phase is expected to go live in 2023. For additional information, see July 19, 2021, article--U.K. Green Lights First EV Battery 'Gigafactory' and January 31, 2022, article--First EV Battery 'Gigafactory' for U.K. Gets Funding Boost.
Industrial Info is also tracking the only other U.K. EV battery gigafactory project, being developed by Envision AESC in Sunderland, England. It will have an annual capacity of 11 gigawatt hours (GWh) when it is commissioned in 2024, rising to an annual capacity of up to 38-GWh when fully expanded in later years. Subscribers to Industrial Info's Global Market Intelligence (GMI) Project Database can click here for the reports.
Industrial Info Resources (IIR) is the world's leading provider of market intelligence across the upstream, midstream and downstream energy markets and all other major industrial markets. IIR's Global Market Intelligence Platform (GMI) supports our end-users across their core businesses, and helps them connect trends across multiple markets with access to real, qualified and validated project opportunities. Follow IIR on: LinkedIn.
