COLUMBIA, S.C. — The US Department of Energy (DOE) announced the latest round of funding from the Biden administration for businesses in the US to boost domestic production of advanced batteries and battery materials used for electric vehicles. The Associated Press (AP) reports this comes as part of a continuing push to reduce China’s global dominance in battery production for EVs and other electronics.
According to the DOE's Office of Manufacturing and Energy Supply Chains, the grants will fund a total of 25 projects in 14 states, including five projects in South Carolina. These grants were funded through the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law.
White House economic adviser Lael Brainard told the AP the Biden-Harris administration is "committed to making batteries in the United States that are going to be vital for powering our grid, our homes and businesses and America’s iconic auto industry."
“We’re using every tool at our disposal, from grants and loans to allocated tax credits,'' she said, adding that the administration's approach has leveraged more $100 billion in private sector investment since Biden took office.
In South Carolina, the funds total almost $850,000. Recipients include:
- Cirba Solutions in Columbia, $200,000,000 to recycle lithium-ion batteries obtained from electric vehicles (EVs), energy storage systems, end-of-life consumer materials, and manufacturing scrap from cell producers and automotive original equipment manufacturers
- Clarios Circular Solutions LLC, Florence, $150,000,000 to retrofit an existing Clarios facility to collocate scrap-to-CAM production with an annual output rate of 20,000 tons per year, supporting the battery requirements of approximately 200,000 EVs annually.
- EnerSys Advanced Systems, Piedmont, $198,679,760 for a new state-of-the-art 500,000 square foot lithium-ion battery cell manufacturing facility with an initial production capacity of 5 gigawatt-hours (GWh) and an anticipated Start of Production in 2028
- SKI US, Inc (dba Birla Carbon), Orangeburg, $150,000,000 for production of a next generation synthetic graphite domestic continuous production facility to meet the projected U.S. electric vehicle and energy storage market demand.
- American Battery Technology Company, location to be determined, $150,000,000 for construct a new commercial scale lithium-ion battery recycling facility to process approximately 100,000 tons of battery materials per year from its battery manufacturer and automotive OEM partners.
