South Korean battery "No1" LG New Energy in the United States and China to build, expand the pace of power battery.
Two plants in the United States were delivered and started
In early April, LG New Energy's two power battery factories in the United States entered the new stage of delivery and construction respectively.
One is to start deliveries at one of the joint venture plants with General Motors. On April 1 local time, LG New Energy announced that its Ultium Cells second plant in Spring Hill, Tennessee, United States, produced and delivered its first batteries to customers two and a half years after groundbreaking. Ultium Cells is a battery joint venture between General Motors and LG New Energy. Gm and LG New Energy plan to invest $7.475 billion to build three battery plants in Ohio, Tennessee and Michigan, with a total battery capacity of more than 130GWh. The batteries produced at the second plant in Tennessee, which began delivery this time, are expected to be installed in GM's third-generation electric vehicle models such as the Cadillac Lyriq. The plant plans a total investment of $2.575 billion (about 18.642 billion yuan), and plans to expand the annual production capacity to 50GWh. In addition, the first plant in Ohio is currently in continuous steady production, and the third plant in Michigan is expected to open next year. The second is to start construction of a wholly owned factory in Arizona, USA. On April 3 (local time), LG New Energy announced that its battery plant in Arizona, USA, has begun construction and is expected to be put into production in 2026. The plant, with a total investment of 7.2 trillion won (about 37.8 billion yuan), is LG New Energy's second independent plant in the United States and the first dedicated cylindrical and ESS (energy storage system) battery plant. The total capacity is planned to be 53GWh, including 46 series cylindrical batteries for electric vehicles (36GWh) and lithium iron phosphate soft pack batteries for energy storage systems (17GWh). Including the above four plants, LG New Energy has now landed eight battery factories in North America, with a total planned capacity of 352GWh, the remaining four are three joint ventures with Hyundai Motor, Honda Motor, Stellantis, and the first independent plant in Michigan.
LG New Energy's eight North American production plants are planned as follows (green for sole ownership, red for joint venture) :
Expansion of production base in China
According to Jiangning District financial media news, in late March this year, Jiangning Binjiang Development Zone signed a contract with LG New Energy on production projects such as power and energy storage batteries, with a total investment of about $800 million (about 5.792 billion yuan).
This means that LG New Energy plans to expand the production of power and energy storage batteries in China. According to the data, in August 2018, LG New Energy settled in Jiangning Binjiang Development Zone and invested 3.3 billion US dollars in battery projects, focusing on providing batteries for Volkswagen and other enterprises. In 2023, Jiangning Binjiang Development Zone and LG New Energy signed the "LG New Energy GM Project", mainly for the production of exclusive power batteries for GM. At present, LG New Energy has three battery factories in Nanjing, with a total capacity of 62GWh. LG New Energy has said it plans to expand the capacity of its Nanjing plant from 62GWh to 145GWh by 2025.
Ensure the production of lithium iron phosphate batteries
Lithium iron phosphate batteries are the technical route that LG New Energy is betting heavily on. At the end of last year, LG New Energy began to fully produce lithium iron phosphate batteries for energy storage systems at its Nanjing plant in China, and those for electric vehicles are ready for mass production in the second half of 2025.
At the same time, LG New Energy has begun to establish a sound supply chain to secure and expand the production of lifepo4 battery. On February 22, LG New Energy issued a statement saying that it had signed a long-term supply contract with Changzhou Lithium Source for lithium iron phosphate battery cathode materials for electric vehicles and energy storage systems. According to the contract, from 2024 to 2028, Changzhou Lithium Source will supply a total of 160,000 tons of lithium iron phosphate cathode materials to LG New Energy. This is equivalent to the production of 1 million electric vehicle batteries with a range of more than 400 kilometers. In addition, the two parties also agreed to use their best efforts to negotiate and determine the additional supply and sale of 360,000 tons of lithium iron phosphate cathode material products during the period 2025-2028, which is a non-binding quantity, and the parties will confirm the final quantity by June 30, 2024. The core product of Changzhou Lithium Source is lithium iron phosphate, which was established by Longpan Technology in 2021, and the company holds about 69.17%. In addition, other shareholders of Changzhou Lithium Source are also very promising, including the companies of Ningde Times and Beitre. Among them, Ningde Times equity participation company Fujian Times Mindong New Energy Industry Equity Investment Partnership holds 6.97%; Ningbo Meishan Free Trade Port Zone Wending Investment Co., LTD., a wholly-owned company of Ningde Times, holds 6.39%; Bettre holds 4.37%. Up to now, Changzhou Lithium Source has five domestic production bases in Changzhou, Jiangsu, Tianjin, Suining, Sichuan and other places, with an annual production capacity of 310,000 tons of lithium iron phosphate. At the same time, it also set up a project company in Indonesia, Indonesia Lithium Source, invested in the construction of 120,000 tons of lithium iron phosphate project, the first phase of 30,000 tons is planned to be put into production around 2024. In fact, this is not the first cooperation between Changzhou Lithium Source and LG New Energy. In September 2023, the two sides have "hand in hand" - signed a Memorandum of understanding, agreed to jointly establish a new joint venture company or use Indonesian lithium source as a joint venture company to operate a positive electrode material plant in Indonesia.
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E-mail:sales@topnewenergy.com
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