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Sicona secures $45M ARENA grant for Wollongong battery plant
Sicona Battery Technologies wins AU$45M from ARENA to build a silicon-carbon anode plant in Wollongong, targeting 230 tonnes a year for commercial qualification.
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Sicona Battery Technologies won a AU$45 million grant from the Australian Renewable Energy Agency to build a production facility in Wollongong, New South Wales. The plant will make the company's silicon-carbon anode material, SiCx®, at an initial rate of 230 tonnes per year for customer qualification and commercial sales.
SiCx® lifts lithium-ion battery energy density by over 20 percent and cuts charge times by more than 40 percent compared with conventional graphite, the company said. The material works with existing battery production lines, which Sicona says shortens the path to customer qualification and offtake agreements.
The grant comes from the federal government's Battery Breakthrough Initiative, a programme designed to build domestic manufacturing capability across the battery supply chain. Darling Miller, ARENA's chief executive, said Sicona's technology had undergone independent testing and was already being evaluated by global battery manufacturers and electric vehicle companies.