More than two-thirds (68%) of lithium-ion battery production planned for Europe is at risk of being delayed, scaled down or cancelled, new analysis shows. Tesla in Berlin, Northvolt in northern Germany and Italvolt near Turin are among the projects that stand to lose the greatest volumes of their slated capacity as the companies weigh up investing in the US instead.
Transport & Environment (T&E), which conducted the research, called for both EU-wide financial support to scale up battery production and faster approvals processes to capture projects at risk from American subsidies.
Battery production capacity equivalent to 18 million electric cars – 1.2 TWh – is at a high or medium risk of being disrupted or lost. Without this expansion, Europe will not be able to satisfy its battery demand in 2030 and will need to import from foreign rivals.
T&E used publicly available information to assess the 50 gigafactories announced in Europe based on their finance and permits, whether they had secured a location, and the companies’ links to the US.
For the rest of this article: https://www.transportenvironment.org/discover/two-thirds-of-european-battery-production-at-risk-analysis/