The $70m project built on an 18 acre brownfield redevelopment site in Battle Creek, Michigan, has secured a grant from the DOE under the Recovery Act – Electric Device Vehicle Battery and Component Manufacturing Initiative.
The project has also incurred the support of State of Michigan and the City of Battle Creek through economic development incentives related to high-tech jobs creation and brownfield redevelopment.
Toda America plans to build its manufacturing plant of cathode materials for lithium-ion batteries in step-wise fashion to meet the demand of its battery manufacturing customers located in Michigan and nearby states.
Phase 1 is scheduled for operation in 2011, and Phase 2 expansion is expected to be completed in 2013, reaching its full manufacturing capacity of 4,000 tons of finished product per year. The total sales volume based on the full capacity operation at the facility will be around $130m.
Tadashi Kubota, managing director of Toda Kogyo, said: “This is an important manufacturing investment in our quest to maintain our global leadership as the premier supplier of battery materials around the world, and now as a key local supply chain partner to the rapidly growing US battery industry.”
