Battery Materials Firm lands $100 m Grant From US DoE

Battery materials company Novonix has secured a $US100 million grant from the US Department of Energy which will support expanded production of synthetic graphite anode materials at its production facility in Tennessee. The company manufactures industry-leading battery cell testing equipment, is growing its high-performance synthetic graphite anode material manufacturing operations, and has developed an all-dry, zero-waste cathode synthesis process.

For the NASDAQ-listed and Canada headquartered Novonix, the grant will help  expand domestic production of high-performance, synthetic graphite anode materials at its Riverside facility in Chattanooga, Tennessee.

Specifically, the grant will support the installation and commissioning of equipment to expand production capacity at its Riverside facility to 20,000 tonnes per annum. Novonix needs to match the grant amount, with the goal to begin production at its Riverside facility in late 2024.

Recent Chinese export controls on graphite have underlined the threat to counting on supplies from that country. China in fact has driven many countries to revaluate their supply chain security, with sudden changes and moves to its vast green energy supply chain. From materials to technology to opaque pricing, firms in China and beyond face increasing disruption from the changes in that country. It is believed that the effort is to dissuade manufacturing facilities elsewhere, even as China based giants investr massively into domestic expansion.

Novonix is also progressing with plans to build a new synthetic graphite manufacturing facility with an initial production target of at least 30,000 tonnes per annum.

Founded by Dr. Chris Burns, CEO and Co-Founder of NOVONIX, who worked under Dr. Jeff Dahn at Dalhousie University as a graduate student researching more efficient ways to determine the lifespans of lithium-ion batteries. This led to the development of the Ultra-High Precision Coulometry (UHPC) systems and technique that NOVONIX is known for today.