Groningen battery plant put on ice

Plans for a battery factory in the Eemshaven area in Groningen have been put on hold, the Investment and Development Agency for the Northern Netherlands (NOM) confirmed to Dutch newspaper Het Financieele Dagblad. In August, Anglo-Korean battery company Eurocell announced that it had reached “the final stages of discussions” and that it expected to confirm the exact location the gigafactory “in the near future.” That was a boost for the Northern Dutch region, which previously unsuccessfully campaigned to land Tesla’s European gigafactory that ended up in Germany. But due to discord among shareholders, Eurocell still hasn’t made the announcement.

Eurocell EMEA is a joint venture of three Korean technology firms (including battery company Eurocell) and five European investors. Calling for an initial investment of nearly 800 million euros, the company plans to build a factory to produce batteries that will be used for energy storage, automotive and e-mobility applications. Those batteries are claimed to last over ten times longer than conventional lithium-ion cells.