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– We are actively working with different suppliers to bring even further manufacturing to Europe. The 200 mln euro invested by Northvolt in the factory and equipment in Gdańsk is part of expanding the supply chain and building an ecosystem around the Baltic Sea – says Northvolt CEO Peter Carlsson in an interview with BiznesAlert.pl.
BiznesAlert.pl: How to make energy storage business less dependent on raw materials from China?
Peter Carlsson: It is incredibly important that Europe builds its own ecosystem around energy storage, including independent supply chains of all the critical raw materials. Right now, there is a very high dependence on China, especially for materials like lithium oxide and graphite. Many initiatives are underway, but we need even more for Europe to build its processing capacity. An example is our joint venture with Portuguese company GALP – we are building a plant with a production capacity of 35,000 tons of lithium hydroxide per year. We also need cooperation with countries having raw materials. Some of them are in Europe, but we will be dependent on Africa, Australia, and Canada.
What could help you to invest more in Europe?
The continuity of development of skilled engineers is crucial in Poland. Access to people educated in the field of energy, energy storage, automation and electronics has a significant impact on our investment decisions.
Regarding Europe – initiatives like American Inflation Reduction Act bring more interest in North America -we see that among our customers. Therefore, I think this is important to continue responding to IRA. Europe and America are 5-10 years behind China in developing this ecosystem. China started building their champions a decade ago. The Western world needs to do it right now what needs a combination of private and state financing until we reach the needed scale.
What are the advantages of American market for now?
The American market is more developed and sophisticated. American customers appreciate performance and durability of energy storage. If I look at European energy companies, most of them are early in investing in energy storage. Many of them boast about moving to green energy, but they are not yet too convinced about the possibilities related to energy storage, and the price is still a main factor influencing purchasing decisions. It is very important that all customers are aware that if they buy a battery today, they have a huge carbon footprint, ca. 100-150 kg per kWh. Northvolt battery has about fifth of this footprint and in five years it will be one tenth. That awareness has not yet reached the critical level in the European energy market.
What are your future steps in Poland?
We want to continue expanding the energy storage segment in Poland, where we are building 5 GWh of manufacturing capacity. Majority of that would be exported to North America. I would like to build more production capacity to stabilize the European grid, especially as we will see continuous growth of the market in this region. Northvolt has very clear aspiration of being European champion in the manufacturing of battery cells and systems – so far, every our investment was in Europe, and we are also building a European value chain. We are actively working with different suppliers to bring even further manufacturing to Europe. The 200 mln euro invested by Northvolt in the factory and equipment in Gdańsk is part of expanding the supply chain and building an ecosystem around the Baltic Sea.
Interview by Wojciech Jakóbik
