US battery separator material company Entek announced plans to establish operations in Indiana, investing $1.5 billion in a new production facility.
The project, which the company said is its largest investment ever, will create up to 642 jobs by the end of 2027 in the electric vehicle (EV) industry in Indiana and across the US.
The facility will be built on a 340-acre greenfield site in the Vigo County Industrial Park II in Terre Haute. The company plans to construct four buildings covering approximately 1.4 million square feet.
It will be fitted with equipment built at Entek manufacturing facilities in Oregon and Nevada and include specialty biaxial stretching equipment supplied by Brueckner Group USA. The plant will manufacture battery separators for lithium-ion battery manufacturers across the US.
The campus received a $200 million grant from the US Department of Energy. Entek plans to break ground as soon as engineering and permitting is completed and will launch its Indiana operations between 2025 and 2027.
This project is the first phase of Entek’s planned expansion to produce some 1.4 billion square metres of ceramic-coated lithium separators across its operations. Phase 2 will add up to an additional 1.8 billion square metres of battery separator per year.
Photo (L-R): Steve Witt, President of the Terre Haute Economic Development Corp.; Larry Keith, Entek CEO; Kim Medford, Entek Manufacturing President; Chris Switzer, Mike Morris and Mark Clinkenbeard, Vigo County Commissioners.
