Sept 14 (Reuters) – Redwood Materials led by Tesla co-founder J.B. Straubel said on Tuesday it will build its battery materials manufacturing facility in the United States, as the country seeks to cut reliance on imports for the key component for electric vehicles.
Battery recycling startup Redwood Materials said in a blog posting that it plans to announce a new site by early next year, aiming to manufacture 100 gigawatt-hours (GWh) per year of cathode active materials (CAM) for one million electric vehicles (EVs) by 2025.
Tesla CEO Elon Musk announced in September that the electric carmaker plans to build a cathode facility as part of its battery cell production plant.
The Biden administration has been trying to expand domestic supply of key components, such as batteries and computer chips, as part of efforts to reduce dependence on China and other countries.
“The battery supply chain… requires materials to travel tens of thousands of miles before they make their way into a battery cell,” Redwood said in a blog posting, saying the complex logistics increases the overall cost and carbon footprint of a battery cell.
Redwood said it will produce anode copper foil and cathode active materials, re-using all of the lithium, copper, nickel and cobalt that it already recovers from old batteries. The materials will be supplied to battery cell makers.
The announcement comes months after Redwood said it had raised $700 million from a group of high-profile fund managers, including T. Rowe Price, Baillie Gifford and Fidelity. read more
Reporting by Akanksha Rana in Bengaluru and Hyunjoo Jin in San Francisco; Editing by Amy Caren Daniel and Andrea Ricci
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