The India Energy Storage Alliance (IESA) has announced its India Battery Manufacturing vision Aims to make to make the country a global hub for R&D and Manufacturing of ACC Batteries. The vision is aligned with the Prime Minister’s vision for a greener India. IESA has also recieved immense response from Niti Aayog, MHI and Ministry of Mines for this vision. The vision also states that Indian battery supply chain industry could scale to 1000+ GWh scale manufacturing capacity with enabling policy and regulatory framework.
Dr. Rahul Walawalkar, Chair, WESD, Founder and President of India Energy Storage Alliance and President & MD, Customized Energy Solutions (CES), India said, “India Energy Storage Alliance is anticipating that the first giga factories in India will start commercial production in 2024 and installed manufacturing capacity of ACC Batteries should scale to 50+ GWh by 2027-28. Based on current announcements, Indian giga factories should scale to 150+ GWh annual capacity by end of 2030. IESA has also set a vision to further scale this capacity to 500+ GWh by 2035 considering the demand growth for both stationary storage and emobility in India. In addition, there is a great opportunity for localising key components of giga factories such as Cathode, Anode, separator, Electrolytes etc. with the need for alternate supply chain in developed markets such as US and European Union.”
IESA marked a significant milestone at the World Energy Storage Day (WESD) 2023 Global Virtual Conference & Expo, where energy storage, clean tech and EV experts hailing from 70 countries came together and supported India Battery Manufacturing vision with one voice. Experts also discussed how energy storage and electric mobility can align with the Prime Minister’s vision for a greener India.
“India’s success in scaling shared mobility and electric bus deployment can serve as a blueprint for other regions, including the Middle East and Europe. The demand for passenger cars in developed markets like Europe and the US, coupled with government incentives and regulations, positions them as the next major markets for EVs after China.”, he further added.
The conference’s focus on e-mobility trends in the R2 region, encompassing India and SAARC nations, provided a powerful platform for stakeholders to delve into the nuances of EV adoption. “India is becoming a manufacturing hub for EVs, led by robust local manufacturing and an innovative ecosystem. Not just in terms of assembly, the country is spearheading innovation in the engineering and R&D front as well, especially in the E2W space, primarily led by the domestic demand”, said Swapnil Jain, CTO of Ather Energy.
Anmol Jaggi, Founder of Blu Smart, underscored the economic benefits of electric vehicles, emphasising substantial fuel cost savings for fleet operators. “People are able to do the math and even ready to pay high to reap the benefits of the EVs, but lack of charging stations inevitable brings range anxiety”, he said.
Anant Nahata, MD of Exicom Tele-Systems Limited, stressed the pivotal role of a robust charging infrastructure in India’s EV adoption journey. He said “India is witnessing a lot of in-house R&D to make the products more reliable and offer higher uptime. The current focus is to be on improving the reliability of chargers and enhance remote management and servicing of EV chargers”.
Dr. Imre Gyuk, from the US Department of Energy, recapped the growth of the industry over the past 2 decades. He expressed confidence that the industry did not face any major technological barriers to long-duration energy storage, which is necessary for net zero transition targeted by many countries.
Dr. Judy Jeevarajan, Vice President and Executive Director, Electrochemical Safety Research Institute (ESRI), UL Research Institutes, agreed that different chemistries serve different purposes and that stakeholders setting up energy storage capacities – be it companies or governments – will have to likely deploy a wide array of battery chemistries.
