Battery cell manufacturer AMTE Power has chosen Scotland to build a 500MW “megafactory” to manufacture lithium-ion and sodium-ion cells.
The proposed new site at Dundee’s Michelin Scotland Innovation Parc (MSIP) will manufacture pouch cells for the EV and stationary energy storage markets.
The company has licensed sodium-ion technology from Faradion, the UK firm bought by Reliance New Energy Solar (RNESL), a wholly owned subsidiary of Reliance Industries, in January.
The site will complement AMTE Power’s existing facility in Thurso, Caithness, Scotland.
AMTE Power is in discussion with Scottish Enterprise— a non-departmental public body of the Scottish government— to bring the development in line with its aim to provide funding and support to drive sustainable economic growth in Scotland.
Following the proposed state-of-the art fit out of an existing building at MSIP, the new plant could be operational and in production by the third quarter of 2025— based on planned timings.
In May 2020, AMTE initially announced plans for a 1GWh a year production facility, which was scheduled to be online in 2023 at a cost of £200 million ($245 million).
An AMTE spokesman told BEST the company’s shift to a “megafactory”— less than 1GWh— was about delivering cells to customers as “quickly as possible” and reflected the growing demand the business was seeing from its core markets.
Gigafactory battery plans
In May, 2020, Amte Power and gigafactory developer Britishvolt announced plans to build lithium-ion battery cell gigafactories following a memorandum of understanding (MoU).
An AMTE spokesman said there was no update to the collaboration at this time.
Initial plans were for two gigafactories for two different products lines, with these potentially being at the same site with the potential to merge if the agreements laid out in the MoU are met, said a spokesman for the companies.
Britishvolt said at the time it aimed to build a 30GWh factory in either Dundee, or Teesside, UK.
The firm aims to reach full capacity of its batteries for automotive, grid storage and large industrial equipment applications by 2025/26.
Sodium-ion battery deal
In March, AMTE Power announced it would use technology licensed from sodium-ion pioneer Faradion in batteries used to power AceOn’s portable energy storage systems in sub-Saharan Africa.
A thousand sodium-ion batteries are expected to be incorporated into systems to power solar-powered energy storage units.
The battery order is the first for AMTE, which entered into a partnership with Faradion to develop its Ultra Safe 135-140Wh/kg cells in Thurso last year.
