Yesterday Northvolt assembled the first lithium-ion battery cell in conjunction with the commissioning of its Ett gigafactory in Skellefteå in northern Sweden. The company says that it marks a new chapter in European industrial history, the cell being the first to have been fully designed, developed, and assembled at a gigafactory by a homegrown European battery company.

The first cell, a prismatic cell type, is a milestone that Northvolt has been working towards since the gigafactory was announced in 2017. Founded in 2016 to enable the European transition to a decarbonized future, the company has made swift progress on its mission to deliver the world’s greenest lithium-ion battery with a minimal CO2 footprint.

The cell was developed at Northvolt Labs, the company’s industrialization factory in Västerås, Sweden, which has been in production since early 2020. Commissioning and upscaling of the Ett factory will continue into 2022.

“Today is a great milestone for Northvolt which the team has worked very hard to achieve,” said Peter Carlsson, CEO and Co-Founder of Northvolt. “Of course, this first cell is only the beginning. Over the course of the coming years, we look forward to Northvolt Ett expanding its production capacity greatly to enable the European transition to clean energy.”

Production capacity at Northvolt Ett will increase toward 60 GW·h per year to fulfill over $30 billion worth of contracts the company has secured from key customers including BMW, Fluence, Scania, Volkswagen, Volvo Cars, and Polestar. The facility, which presently employs over 500 people representing 56 nationalities, will deliver cells of varying formats to customers in the automotive, industrial, and energy-storage sectors, with commercial deliveries beginning in 2022.

The production milestone capped a busy December for Northvolt.

 

Galp JV for lithium conversion

Earlier this month, the company announced a 50/50 joint venture with energy company Galp called Aurora to develop opportunities related to the battery value chain. With the main goal of establishing Europe´s largest and most sustainable integrated lithium conversion plant, the JV will develop a plant with an initial annual production capacity of up to 35,000 tons of battery-grade lithium hydroxide—a critical material required by the lithium-ion battery manufacturing industry.

The plant will use a proven conversion process, leveraging recent process improvements and technologies to increase sustainability and efficiency. Additionally, the JV is seeking to enable the use of green energy to power the conversion process, thereby minimizing and eventually avoiding reliance on natural gas as the conventional energy source.

The JV is currently conducting technical and economic studies and looking at several possible site locations. While a final investment decision is yet to occur, it is envisaging a start of operations by the end of 2025 and the start of commercial operations in 2026.

The plant will be able to deliver lithium hydroxide sufficient for 50 GW·h of battery production per year, enough for about 700,000 electric vehicles (EVs). As part of the agreement, Northvolt will secure an offtake for up to 50% of the plant’s capacity for use in its battery manufacturing. The partners are looking to meet the highest standards of sustainability, notably in the extraction and concentration of spodumene, the processing of lithium hydroxide, and related processes.

“The development of a European battery manufacturing industry provides tremendous economic and societal opportunity for the region,” said Paolo Cerruti, Co-Founder and COO of Northvolt. “Extending the new European value chain upstream to include raw materials is of critical importance. This joint venture represents a major investment into this area and will position Europe with not only a path to the domestic supply of key materials required in the manufacturing of batteries but the opportunity to set a new standard for sustainability in raw materials sourcing.”

Galp’s participation in the JV is a result of its strategy to develop new businesses aligned with the energy transition, taking advantage of its industrial competencies and regional presence as an integrated energy player and one of the largest solar-power-generation players in Iberia.

“This is a once-in-a-generation opportunity to reposition Europe as a leader in an industry that will be vital to bringing down global CO2 emissions, in line with European and Portuguese climate-change priorities,” said Galp CEO Andy Brown. “To be successful in this drive, we must all work together, industry and decision-makers, with a sense of urgency, because if we do not claim this role today, others will.”

 

Battery R&D with Volvo Cars

December also brought the announcement of Northvolt and Volvo Cars opening a Gothenburg, Sweden, R&D center as part of SEK 30 billion investment in battery development and manufacturing. The announcement marks the finalizing of their JV for the development and sustainable production of batteries for the next generation of pure-electric Volvo cars.

Set to become operational in 2022, the facility will create a few hundred jobs and is said to position Volvo Cars as one of the few automotive brands to make battery-cell development and production part of its end-to-end engineering capabilities. It will be near Volvo Cars’ own R&D operations and Northvolt’s existing innovation campus, Northvolt Labs.

The establishment of the R&D center will be followed by the construction of a new manufacturing plant in Europe to produce battery cells for next-generation pure electric Volvo and Polestar cars. The exact location of the plant is expected to be confirmed in early 2022.

“Our partnership with Northvolt secures the supply of high-quality, sustainably-produced batteries for the next generation of pure electric Volvos,” said Håkan Samuelsson, Chief Executive for Volvo Cars. “It will strengthen our core competencies and our position in the transformation to a fully electric car company.”

Volvo Cars is working with Northvolt to create an end-to-end system for batteries, for which it develops and builds the batteries itself. This deep vertical integration is important since the battery represents the largest individual cost component in an electric car as well as a major part of its carbon footprint.

The joint battery plant will have a potential annual capacity of up to 50 GW·h, which would supply batteries for about half a million cars per year. It will start construction in 2023, with large-scale production in 2026 and expected employment of up to 3000 people.

Alongside battery supply agreements, the partnership with Northvolt secures the European battery cell needs that are part of Volvo Cars’ ambitious electrification plans. It aims to sell 50% pure electric cars by the middle of this decade, and by 2030 it aims to sell only fully electric cars.