Northvolt, a Swedish battery manufacturer, has announced plans to build a gigafactory in northern Germany with a 60 GWh annual manufacturing capacity. The manufacturing unit is expected to come up in Heide, Schleswig-Holstein and this factory will produce lithium-ion batteries for the European market. The manufacturing facility is expected to begin operations in 2025, resulting in the creation of 3,000 jobs in the area.
As per company’s statement, the plant will be powered by Germany’s “cleanest” electricity system. The company also stated that its facility will get its raw materials from used battery metals as part of a goal to source 50 per cent of its raw materials from recycling by 2030. The company also intends to construct a battery recycling plant at the location in order to reuse by-products from the production process.
Earlier this month, in an onshore wind power infrastructure auction, the German Federal Network Agency awarded RWE two onshore wind projects. The Grevenbroich wind farm in North Rhine-Westphalia has a total installed capacity of 45 MW, whereas the Bartelsdorf 2 project is in Lower Saxony. The Grevenbroich wind farm will have a total installed capacity of 17.1 MW, and construction is planned to start in the second quarter of 2022. The plant, which will be equipped with three 5.7 MW Nordex turbines, is projected to be operational by the end of 2022.
