U.S. Department of Energy – NAATBatt

In Memory of Imre Gyuk

Jim Greenberger — Fri, 25 Jul 2025 16:40:23 +0000

It is with great sadness that I report the passing of Imre Gyuk, one of the truly great figures in the field of energy storage. Imre served most recently as Chief Scientist, Energy Storage at the U.S. Department of Energy. But he made his mark on the world and on those of us who knew him in industry over the nearly 40 years before during which he served as the Director of Energy Storage Research at the Department of Energy.

Today storing electricity on the grid to use when needed is a mainstream technology with a market size in excess of $265 billion. It is therefore difficult to appreciate how novel, and indeed how absurd, the concept of large-scale electrochemical storage of electricity was 40 years ago. That was the world a small band of dreamers stepped into with Imre at their head. Any visitor to Imre’s tiny office buried deep within the bowels of the Forrestal Building could quickly sense the bet against being placed by policymakers at the time.

There is much debate today about the proper role of government in investing in new technologies. What Imre did with energy storage at the U.S. Department of Energy may well be a template for how to do it right. Imre investigated a wide range of energy storage technologies, some of which worked and some of which were less successful. But he focused heavily on demonstrating the feasibility of these new technologies in the real, commercial world. Energy storage became a mature technology not so much because electrochemistry improved, but because Imre identified and funded real-world demonstration projects that de-risked the technology in the eyes of those in industry who would eventually deploy it.

The de-risking of energy storage on the grid is what transformed a small band of dreamers into an important industry that today provides the backbone for delivery of clean and reliable electricity to the American people and increasingly to people all around the world. This transformation was Imre’s great accomplishment and will be his great legacy.

But Imre was more than just a government scientist. He was a thinker and a true intellectual. I always enjoyed dinners with Imre, where discussion would often turn to a wide array of new technologies, how they relate to one another, and their impact on the world. I will always remember Imre’s telling me that electricity storage was really just about creating a new dimension in energy. Electricity had no real value until Edison figured out a way to move electrons over space. With energy storage, we are simply figuring out a way to move electrons over time. It may be years until we fully understand the power and value of this new dimension.

I suspect that Imre today is busy discovering a new dimension. NAATBatt extends its condolences to Nora, to the rest of Imre’s family and to all of those in government and industry who had the privilege of knowing this interesting and extraordinary man. Rest in peace.

Li-Bridge and the Age of Electricity

Jim Greenberger — Fri, 18 Mar 2022 17:36:38 +0000

Good morning and good afternoon to those of you around the world who are joining this program. Thank you to the U.S. Department of Energy and the Federal Consortium for Advanced Batteries for giving me the opportunity to speak with you today.

The purpose of my talk is to introduce you to the Li-Bridge initiative. The Li-Bridge initiative is a public-private effort to develop a strategy for the United States to build a robust and sustainable lithium-ion battery industry and supply chain in North America. NAATBatt International, which I lead, together with our partner convening organizations, NY-BEST and New Energy Nexus, have been asked by the Department of Energy and Argonne National Laboratory to help facilitate private industry’s input into this important project. The convening organizations have in turn hired the Boston Consulting Group, one of the top management consulting firms in the world, to manage the project and coordinate industry’s input.

It is important to note that Li-Bridge is a strategic initiative, not a funding mechanism. Li-Bridge will not disburse any money and will not make recommendations to the Department of Energy as to which companies to fund. The goal of Li-Bridge is reach out to you in industry, you who are the experts in lithium battery technology and in running successful businesses. The U.S. government wants your advice as to how the United States can establish a secure supply chain and maximize job and value creation in the lithium battery industry over time. Li-Bridge’s job is to collect and transmit that advice to government.

Before I get into the details of Li-Bridge, I want to talk for a minute about lithium-ion technology and why it is so important. As we meet here today, the economy of the world is in a state of energy transition. The transition is from an economy that has for the past two hundred years relied on heat-based fuels to an economy that will rely on electric energy. There are good economic and technological reasons why this transition is taking place. Electricity is a far more efficient and flexible form of energy than heat. It is also cleaner and can, of course, be generated on a carbon-free basis.

The importance of the move to electric energy to the fight against climate change cannot be over emphasized. The technological transition from heat-based fuels to electricity may well be what saves humanity from the worst ravages of 200 years of unlimited carbon emissions. This is not, of course, without precedent. Human-created technology has a history of remediating human-caused environmental pollution. It is instructive to remember that 125 years ago the big environmental concern was that the streets of Manhattan would soon be covered in six feet of horse manure. Because of an obvious technological change that did not happen. So there is an important lesson here for all of us in 2022: Let’s embrace the change to clean electric power and get all the horse manure out of the air.

It would be great if I could credit battery makers and electric vehicle makers for this energy transition. But the real story behind the transition has more to do with the semiconductor than it does with climate change. Computers just don’t run well on gasoline. The move to electric power is inevitable and irresistible. Properly understood, the electrification of vehicle drive trains is not a revolution but an evolution. The electrification of vehicles has been going on for decades. It started with power windows, then power seats and seat heaters, then safety systems and navigation systems. Electrifying the drive train is simply the next evolutionary step. Electricity is the future of energy.

Batteries will play a critical role in the new electricity economy. Batteries are the primary means by which electric energy can be provided to any point in space without the need for a physical connection to a fixed electricity grid. Accordingly, battery technology will be critical to all the new mobile devices, systems and products that society will create and that electricity will enable in the new electricity age.

The advantage of lithium-based batteries, of course, is that they are based on lithium, the fourth lightest element in the universe. For the foreseeable future, lithium batteries will be the lightest and most efficient way to get electricity to any mobile device or system. Accordingly, lithium-based batteries will be critical to the operation and also likely to the development of all those new devices, systems and products. That is why lithium batteries are and will be the cornerstone of the new electricity economy.

Lithium battery technology was invented in the United States. It is not news to anyone, however, that American companies have fallen far behind in the competition to manufacture that technology. According to FCAB’s National Blueprint for Lithium Batteries, the United States, which has the world’s largest national economy and second largest automobile market in the world, produces only 8% of the lithium battery cells, 10% of the anode materials, 6% of the separators, 2% of the electrolytes and a negligible amount of the cathode materials used in lithium batteries.

The real danger to falling behind in the manufacture of lithium batteries is that it implies a parallel falling behind in lithium technology know-how. Building battery Gigafactories is easy. All you have to do is spend money. But building the know-how needed to operate those factories to produce the safest and most efficient battery technology possible is a much greater challenge.

We pride ourselves in the United States on being the most innovative nation in the world. And there is solid truth in that boast. We have and continue to produce some of the best scientists in the world. But there is truth too in the old adage that 90% of all innovation takes place on the factory floor. Lithium battery technology is a good example of that adage. Over the past decade we have seen a 90% drop in the price of lithium-ion batteries. This price drop has been driven not by scientific breakthroughs but by hundreds of small tweaks and efficiency improvements in the way that lithium-ion battery cells and packs are made. Manufacturing experience is an essential component of innovation. World-leading innovation in lithium battery technology—the cornerstone of the new electricity economy—is not realistically possible in the United States if we are only making 8% of the world’s lithium batteries.

The United States is not the only country to recognize the profound implications of the energy transition and the opportunities of that transition to reshuffle the world economic order. China has jumped into the electrification economy with both feet. More recently, so has Europe. A worldwide battle is shaping up for technology leadership and the best jobs of the 21st Century. The United States has not yet lost that battle. But we need to start fighting it soon and in earnest.

The competitive battle among manufacturers of lithium battery technology will influence not just where lithium batteries and their components are made but also where the devices, systems and products powered by those batteries are developed and made. Those devices, systems and products will form the core of the 21st Century economy. As in any economic competition, there will be winners and there will be losers. The goal of Li-Bridge is to give American companies and American workers their best possible chance to be winners in the new electricity economy.

Li-Bridge will be about figuring out how to win in that competition. It will seek to answer some very big and complicated questions, such as “What does winning look like?” “Where to play?” and “How to win?” Good answers to those questions will need to take careful account of the strengths, but also the weaknesses, of the American economy, political structure and legal system. Determining where not to play may turn out to be just as important as determining where to play.

The mechanism for answering those questions within Li-Bridge will involve six committees, each focused on a different aspect of the supply chain challenge. The first committee will focus on Technology, Innovation & Transparency. The second will focus on Demand, Supply and Availability. The third on Economic Competitiveness & Differentiation. The fourth on Manufacturing & Infrastructure. The fifth on Workforce & Communities. And the sixth on a Go-Forward Operating Model.

Each committee will consist of six to eight members drawn from companies selected by the Boston Consulting Group with the goal of including on each committee companies representing a cross section of the entire lithium battery supply chain. The individual committees, after study of their designated areas of focus, will meet in a series of four forums, running from April through July of this year, to discuss and try to reach agreement on how to answer the big and complicated questions I mentioned before.

From time to time during their deliberations, the committees will reach out to broader industry for input and comment. The listening program you are attending today is an example of the type of outreach that the Li-Bridge committees will be doing to make sure that Li-Bridge obtains the greatest possible input from industry.

The nominal culmination of the Li-Bridge project will be a White Paper prepared by the Boston Consulting Group summarizing the recommendations of industry about how to optimize the U.S. lithium battery supply chain. But the real culmination will be a go-forward plan, putting in place mechanisms to ensure that whatever recommendations Li-Bridge makes are taken seriously by government and attract sustainable bi-partisan support in Congress. Standing up a robust domestic lithium battery supply chain will not be done overnight. Whatever plans and recommendations Li-Bridge makes will need to survive multiple changes in administrations and Congressional delegations. We need to keep this firmly in mind as we take up this task.

I look forward to working with all of you in industry, as well as with NAATBatt’s partners at NY-BEST and New Energy Nexus in making sure that you in industry, the true experts in business and lithium battery technology, have a chance to share your wisdom and experience. Together we can all help move our country, its economy and the world as a whole in the right direction in this new age of electricity.

NAATBatt Statement on the White House’s 100-Day Supply Chain Review for Large Capacity Batteries

Jim Greenberger — Wed, 09 Jun 2021 13:20:18 +0000

NAATBatt International applauds the release of the White House’s 100-Day Review under Executive Order 14017 of the domestic supply chain for large capacity batteries (see: https://www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/100-day-supply-chain-review-report.pdf). The Review’s recommendations for building domestic demand for large capacity batteries, investing in the extraction and refining of energy materials, supporting private investment in cell and cell component manufacturing, encouraging battery recycling and doubling-down on next generation battery R&D are spot on. If the federal government follows through on those recommendations with consistent, bipartisan action, U.S. companies and U.S. workers will be able to compete, and perhaps one day to lead the world, in the manufacture of critically important advanced battery technology. The Review outlines the bones, and suggests some interesting sinews, on which a national advanced battery strategy can be based. It is now up to Congress to provide the muscle.

NAATBatt 2021 Suggests a Three-Part Plan for Building an Advanced Battery Industry in North America

Jim Greenberger — Fri, 12 Feb 2021 18:17:56 +0000

NAATBatt 2021 concluded on Thursday, February 11. It was the first, and hopefully the last, virtual annual meeting of the NAATBatt International organization.

By the standards of expectation, the meeting was a great success. NAATBatt 2021 managed to incorporate the usual high-quality content of past NAATBatt annual meetings despite the disadvantage of its virtual format. Most remarkable was the success of the networking sessions: the on-line breakfast table discussions and the meeting and greet sessions. Those proved immensely popular, proving that interactive sessions can work even in large virtual meetings and that good, productive conversations can still be had among participants.

The theme of the NAATBatt 2021 meeting was promoting the development of an advanced battery industry in North America, with an emphasis on lithium-ion battery manufacturing. Several panels and discussion groups covered that topic. It was clear that most all meeting participants had a clear understanding of the importance of developing a lithium-ion battery supply chain in North America. The important question is: How exactly do you do that?

Based on the conversations and content at NAATBatt 2021, I suggest a three-part plan to develop a robust lithium-ion battery manufacturing industry in North America. I would emphasize that the following is not the official position of NAATBatt International. It is only the musings of its Executive Director:

Increase Domestic Demand

The first and most important part of the plan is to ensure high demand for products powered by lithium-ion batteries in North America. It is pointless, and even arrogant, to talk about building an advanced battery industry and supply chain in North America if demand for lithium-ion batteries is centered off-shore. There are few examples in modern history first-world countries building new industries supported primarily by export markets. What few examples there are owe their success in large part to U.S. geopolitical considerations. To grow a domestic battery industry, the domestic industry must have domestic battery customers.

Since approximately 90% of demand for lithium-ion batteries is expected to come from electric vehicles, any significant domestic demand for batteries will be from the transportation sector. Demand for electric vehicles can only come from two types of customers: public sector customers and private consumers.

Public sector procurement of electric vehicle fleets is the most direct way the government can build a market for domestic battery production. The U.S. government operates the largest civilian fleet in the world with more than 640,000 vehicles as reported in the Federal Fleet Report (2015). In addition, as of January 2018, there were 66,116 transit buses, 69,316 demand response commuter vehicles and 15,670 transit vans deployed in the United States, the large majority owned by public agencies. Converting a sizable portion of the replacement vehicles for these fleets to electric drive each year would create a significant domestic market for lithium-ion batteries.

Incenting private consumer and commercial purchases of electric vehicles is the second way of promoting lithium-ion battery demand. The Section 30D tax credit for new qualified plug-in electric drive motors vehicles is old news and should be extended. But other effective financial incentives can be brought to bear. One take-away from NAATBatt 2021 is that electric vehicle makers (primarily bus and heavy-duty vehicle manufacturers) are increasingly looking to battery leasing business models in order to relieve themselves of warranty responsibility for the batteries and to lower the initial capital cost of vehicles to their customers. Permitting accelerated depreciation for vehicle batteries and other tax incentives for battery owners could help reduce the cost of electric drive for commercial fleets and consumers. Importantly, these tax incentives should only be available for domestically manufactured batteries.

Substantial thought must also be given to non-economic incentives. For example, in many urban areas electric vehicles have priority access to high-occupancy vehicles lanes. The federal government should consider mandating that same priority access on all federally-funded highways.

All around the world, governments realize that the race for electric drive is not just about a race for a better environment. It is about a race for dominance of many of the technologies that will shape the economies and workforces of the 21^st Century. For the United States even to be competitive in that race, there must be a robust market for lithium-ion batteries and the electric vehicles they power in North America.

Stand Up National Battery Champions

The second part of the plan is for the U.S. government to stand up one or two national champions in the large-scale lithium-ion battery fabrication business.

As I have written in this column before, the structure of the advanced battery industry is such that the fabricators of lithium-ion battery cells control much of the rest of the supply chain. The cell fabricator determines whose electrode materials are used, whose separator is used, whose manufacturing and testing equipment is purchased, and whose R&D is commercialized. Most of the social and employment benefits of advanced battery manufacturing are associated with those other enterprises and not with the fabricator itself.

The conundrum of lithium-ion battery manufacturing is that although the cell fabricator gets to choose the suppliers who will garner most of the social and employment benefits of battery manufacturing, the business of cell fabrication itself is a lousy economic proposition. Cell fabrication involves huge capital costs, wafer-thin margins and the assumption of large warranty liabilities. Every major North American company that has looked at getting into the business of high-volume lithium-ion battery cell manufacturing over the last twelve years has taken a pass on the opportunity. And for good reason. The only reason Asian companies have entered the cell fabrication business is because their governments understand the larger social benefits that accrue from those companies fabricating cells. The EU has done the same analysis and is proceeding down the same path.

A robust supply chain of lithium-ion battery production—including energy materials production and refining, electrode production, manufacturing and testing equipment production, and battery R&D—will only grow up in North America if there are one or more national champion cell fabricators willing to buy those products. To stand those national champion fabricators up the government needs to do two things: ensure that the fabricators will have a guaranteed, large scale customer for their cells and backstop any losses the champion companies might suffer as a consequence of being forced into the lousy cell fabrication business.

National battery fabrication champions will, of course, need to be true national champions. Although foreign technology assistance may be needed in the short term, the national champions will need to take direct responsibility for cell manufacturing. Under no circumstance can a national champion be allowed to lay off its manufacturing responsibilities onto a joint venture in which U.S. employees cannot even go into certain parts of the manufacturing plant. Lithium-ion cell fabrication is a know-how business. Critical to the success of the plan is insuring access of U.S. employees and engineers to battery cell fabrication know-how.

Who those national champions should be and what the nature of the economic backstop should be are questions beyond the scope of this article. But neither should be difficult to figure out.

Fund a Next Generation Manufacturing Consortium

The third part of the plan is to establish and fund a national consortium to develop next generation manufacturing technologies for lithium-based batteries.

At NAATBatt 2021, Chloe Holzinger of IHS Markit showed a simple but insightful slide illustrating the principal drivers of battery cost reduction. Basically, battery cost reduction is a function of three factors: decreasing material costs, decreasing manufacturing costs and increasing the energy density of the battery. Ms. Holzinger’s slide begs the question: Among materials costs, manufacturing costs and energy density improvements, which represents the best opportunity for reducing the battery cost?

Long term cost reductions in basic energy materials seem unlikely. As several speakers warned, increasing demand for lithium-ion batteries is likely to put substantial price pressure on energy materials, including lithium, Class I nickel and cobalt.

Improvements in battery energy density are certainly possible. This is the sexy part of the battery business. Investors are sinking billions of dollars into solid state technology, improved silicon anodes, high voltage electrolytes and a variety of other technologies intended to improve the energy density of cells. Some will succeed. But speakers at NAATBatt 2021 were in general agreement that there are no breakthroughs on the horizon that are likely to improve dramatically the energy density and overall performance of today’s lithium-ion battery technology.

That leaves battery manufacturing technology. As NAATBatt’s CTO, Bob Galyen, pointed out, the basic roll-to-roll process of fabricating battery cells and batch processing of energy materials, while subject to continuous refinement, is more than half a century old. Current lithium-ion battery manufacturing processes are by their nature inefficient, consuming large amounts of heat, space and time. Incumbent battery manufacturers have invested billions of dollars in current manufacturing technologies. Those investments are sunk costs, which have not been amortized. Accordingly, incumbent manufacturers have little incentive to invest in expensive new manufacturing technologies.

In short, battery manufacturing technology is ripe for disruption.

In 2008, NAATBatt advocated the formation of a national consortium, based on the example of Semitech in the semiconductor industry, to study and improve the manufacture of lithium-ion batteries in the United States. It is time to dust off and reconsider that proposal.

A national battery manufacturing consortium would study and develop next generation tools for manufacturing lithium-based battery cells at scale. The consortium would license and test manufacturing technologies from multiple North American-based companies. It would also draw on the expertise of U.S. semiconductor manufacturers, as next generation electrode printing technologies could draw heavily on manufacturing processes developed in the semiconductor industry.

It is worth noting that while the European Commission’s recent approval of $3.5 billion in subsidies for European battery supply chain companies threatens to leave their potential North American competitors behind, none of those subsidies appear directed towards developing next generation manufacturing technology. Advanced semiconductor manufacturing technology is also not an area in which China has world-leading expertise.

A North American battery manufacturing consortium would be expensive. Capital costs for battery cell manufacturing equipment are very large, just as in the semiconductor industry. But the consortium could generate revenue to offset its cost to the government by toll manufacturing battery cells for North American battery companies serving smaller markets. This would be an important resource for battery consumers in North America, most particularly for the U.S. Department of Defense, which has a critical shortage of domestically-manufactured lithium-ion batteries.

Establishing a consortium to develop next generation manufacturing technology for lithium-based batteries is the third part of an advanced battery industry plan for North America. While this is the longest-term part of the plan, it is the part that may one day make North American companies and workers leaders in the advanced battery industry rather than just consumers of other nations’ superior technologies.