Europe plans 38 superbattery plants with a capacity of 1,000 GWh
According to a report published in June by the European Union's non-governmental organization Transport and Environment (T&E), the total number of Gigafactories under construction or under construction in existing projects in Europe is 38, with a total annual capacity of 1,000 GWh, equivalent to 16.7 million all-electric vehicles, at a cost of more than 40 billion euros (309.1 billion yuan).
According to foreign media, with the completion of 38 Gigafactories, the production of electric vehicle batteries in Europe will also significantly increase. It is expected to produce 462GWh in 2025 and increase to 1144GWh in 2030, which is 13 times of the 87GWh expected to be supplied this year. Europe's own electric vehicle battery supply capacity will be significantly enhanced.
But T&E expects the rapid expansion of battery production capacity in Europe to increase demand for materials significantly. Europe's demand for lithium, which is expected to soar 18-fold by 2030, also needs more than fivefold cobalt.
The EU has already invested nearly 20 billion euros in 70 projects to ensure battery autonomy, including developing independent supplies of key raw materials such as lithium, nickel and graphite.But the T&E report predicts that reaching that level of annual supply will not be easy and will remain heavily dependent on Asian batteries and technologies, even through 2029-2030.European Commission Vice-President Maros Sevkovic told the "European Battery Conference" that by 2025 the EU would be able to produce enough batteries to meet the needs of the European car industry and could even build an export capacity without having to rely on imported batteries.Europe's domestic battery companies are ramping up capacity building in a bid to become self-sufficient in electric car batteries and wean themselves off lithium-ion batteries from Asia.In Europe, a number of local battery companies have been established, including Sweden's NORTHVOLT, France's VERKOR, Britain's British Volt, Norway's FREYR, Slovakia's INOBAT Auto, and announced plans for large-scale battery production. It is expected that there will be more domestic battery enterprises to join the camp in the later stage.
But Europe is a great challenge to the local battery enterprises, international battery head enterprises are accelerating the factory layout, including south Korean companies such as LG, samsung SDI, SKI, as well as the age of ningde, beehive energy, fu can science and technology, micro macro power battery enterprises in China have a factory in Europe, such as layout, expected late will also have other batteries with Korea move later in Europe, It competes with domestic battery companies in Europe.On the car side, Tesla plans to turn its future Gigafactory near Berlin into one of the largest in the world, with a capacity of 250GWh per year by 2030.Volkswagen plans to demand 240GWh of batteries in Europe by 2030. To ensure battery supply, Volkswagen plans to build six battery plants in Europe with partners.The Stellantis Group, which owns brands such as Alfa Romeo, Chrysler, Citroen, Dodge and Fiat, is currently developing its own battery brand.Mercedes-Benz plans to produce its own battery cells for electric cars and invest hundreds of millions of euros (billions of yuan) in a plant in Stuttgart, its main production base in southern Germany. It will start small-scale production in 2023, switching from external sourcing of lithium-ion batteries to partial in-house production. Its parent company Daimler recently said it would consider producing its own power batteries.
It can be predicted that Europe will become an important competitive market in the global power battery field in the future, and the competition in the European power battery market will be triggered at any moment with the development of national strategy, supply guarantee, industrial chain cooperation, market game and other dimensions.