UK – The money from the Industrial Strategy Challenge Fund (ISCF), equivalent to $160.9m, marks the next phase of a £246m investment in battery technology through the Faraday Battery Challenge, which is intended to develop suitable batteries for the next generation of electric vehicles. Business and energy secretary Greg Clark announced the recipients today at the Battery and Energy Storage 2017 conference.
Investment of £80m will go to the UK’s first development facility for automotive battery production, which is being set up in the West Midlands by the Warwick Manufacturing Group together with the Coventry and Warwickshire Local Enterprise Partnership. This follows a competition led by the Advanced Propulsion Centre, supported by Innovate UK. The facility will develop the processes required to manufacture pioneering battery technology in high volumes.
Clark said: “The new facility, based in Coventry and Warwickshire, will propel the UK forward in this thriving area, bringing experts from academia and industry together to deliver innovation and R&D that will further enhance the West Midlands’ international reputation as a cluster of automotive excellence.”
Around £40m of grant funding have been allocated to 27 projects involving 66 organisations, covering key technologies such as the development of battery materials and cell manufacture, the design and production of modules and packs, including advances in thermal management and battery management systems, plus the recycling of battery packs. The grants came through the ISCF run by Innovate UK.
Today’s new follows an announcement from Clark last month about the creation of The Faraday Institution, a multimillion-pound research facility to push forward battery technology. This was funded from the ISCF through the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council.
