DOE Awards $100 Million to Group14 Technologies for Battery Production

Group14 Technologies announced that it has been selected as a recipient of the first set of projects funded by US President Joe Biden’s ‘Bipartisan Infrastructure Law’ to expand domestic battery manufacturing for electric vehicles and the electrical grid. Group14 held that it will receive $100 million for battery materials processing and battery manufacturing to support surging electric vehicle and energy storage demand. Group14 is a global manufacturer and supplier of advanced silicon battery technology based in Washington, USA.

In line with the new law, DOE is deploying its first phase of more than $7 billion of total investments to boost the production of the advanced battery technologies critical to strengthening clean energy industries. The object is to focus on the domestic processing of materials and components currently imported overseas to increase U.S. economic competitiveness, energy dependence and national security.

As part of the investment, the DOE solicited qualified proposals from battery materials manufacturers pursuing the creation of new, retrofitted and expanded domestic factories to produce battery materials, and selected Group14 for its established modular manufacturing approach to delivering commercial-scale quantities of lithium-silicon battery materials.

Group14 had launched its first commercial-scale Battery Active Materials factory (BAM-1) in Washington in April 2021 that will produce 120 tons per year of silicon-carbon battery technology, SCC55. The factory currently delivers to more than 60 customers representing 90% of worldwide battery production.

Group14 also raised $400 million led by Porsche AG to fund its second US BAM factory (BAM-2) to be located in Moses Lake, Washington. This factory is engineered for modular manufacturing, and each module will have an annual production capacity of 2,000 tons per year, equivalent to powering at least 100,000 electric vehicles.

Dr. Rick Costantino, CTO, Group14, “With this most recent award from the Office of Manufacturing and Energy Supply Chains, Group14 is continuing our proud history of partnering with the DOE to strengthen the U.S. battery supply chain.”

Group14 said that it will leverage the funding from the DOE to build two 2,000-ton-per-year commercial manufacturing modules in BAM-2.

Rick Luebbe, CEO, Group14, mentioned, “With our growing footprint in the Pacific Northwest, we’re answering the call for ‘all-American’ batteries and remain steadfastly committed to building out a fully end-to-end domestic battery supply chain to help the U.S. stay ahead in the electrification race.”