You have to choose between your ego and your fees. This was a phrase I heard while listening to the Redefining Energy podcast episode “Northvolt - Epitaph.” It sums up perfectly the choice Europe is facing in the battery industry. Here is why.
This year, I’ve actively traveled around Europe, meeting with battery industry players. I was representing my client, a Korean company specializing in the most difficult part of battery manufacturing - making anode and cathode electrodes. While I’ve struggled to get my EU counterparts to listen, my colleagues were doing fine in the US, where potential customers quickly saw the benefit of cooperation.
We’ve discussed this between us and wondered why we struggle in Europe, where battery manufacturing has historically been more active than in the US. And then I read a quote in an article about Northvolt, that exemplifies the attitude that Europe has towards making batteries: “Europeans don’t perceive their battery industry as weak. They believe they just haven’t tried yet, and if they did, they would undoubtedly do better.”
Since I joined the battery industry in 2019, I’ve looked up to EU battery manufacturing. I was expecting that by the time I complete my gigafactory, the EU producers would churn out gigawatt hours. They do, but all are owned by Asian players. None of the names I learned in 2019 - Freyr, Morrow, Verkor, and, of course, Northvolt, are making anything giga, except, of course, Northvolt - a gigafailure.
The European battery industry was in for a rude awakening this year. There is a way to make European batteries, but European engineers and managers would have to learn a bit of humility first.