LG Energy Solution to Build $5.5B EV Battery Complex

Image by Adriana Pop

Seoul-based LG Energy Solution will invest about $5.5 billion to develop a battery manufacturing complex in Queen Creek, Ariz.

The project will consist of two separate manufacturing facilities: one for cylindrical batteries for electric vehicles (EVs) and another for lithium iron phosphate (LFP) pouch-type batteries for energy storage systems (ESS). The two facilities are valued at $3.2 billion and $2.3 billion, respectively, and will have capacities of 27 GWh and 16 GWh, also respectively.

Both will break ground later this year.

The project represents the largest-ever single investment for a stand-alone battery manufacturing facility in North America, according to LGES, which reportedly ranks among the world’s top five or six battery makers.

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The plans for this massive facility have been in the works for a while—and have grown along the way.

Almost exactly a year ago, a company widely identified as a surrogate for LG Energy Solution received approval from local officials to develop what was then envisioned as a $2.8 billion, 1 million-square-foot plant to manufacture only cylindrical EV batteries at the Queen Creek location.

Until its IPO in 2021, LGES had been a part of LG Chem Ltd., a unit of the LG Corp. conglomerate.

Higher wattage

As large as it is, this project is only one part of a surge of activity in the industrial battery sector.

In late February, LG Energy Solution and Honda announced the imminent groundbreaking on a $3.5 billion, more than 2 million-square-foot EV battery plant roughly 20 miles southwest of Columbus, Ohio, along I-71.

And keeping pace with battery gigafactories has been the growth of massive facilities to recycle the lithium and other metals from retired batteries. One will soon be under way in South Carolina, and another will be getting started in metro Phoenix.