(Reuters) – Manufacturers and developers of U.S. energy storage projects said their industry will invest $100 billion this decade to create a wholly domestic battery supply chain, but warned the goal was contingent on support from Washington.
The American Clean Power Association, a trade group that represents energy storage companies, said its members aimed to decrease the sector’s reliance on China, which today supplies the majority of U.S. batteries.
Storage projects, therefore, are poised to be hard-hit by President Donald Trump’s decision to impose tariffs of 145% on Chinese imports. The industry is pressing for a more nuanced approach to incentivizing domestic production.
“China stole our supply chain over a decade, we’re not going to get it back in 10 weeks,” ACP CEO Jason Grumet said on a call with reporters ahead of the announcement. “If the administration starts to view batteries as a critical national security technology, we will shift away from the kind of broadbased reciprocal tariffs, which are a very kind of blunt shock-and-awe attention-getter, into that kind of strategic conversation.”
Grid storage projects, primarily large lithium-ion batteries, can help resources like wind and solar energy by storing power when the sun is shining and the wind is blowing so that it can be used later.
U.S. utility-scale battery capacity rose 66% last year and was second only to solar in capacity additions to the nation’s grids, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.
But the clean-energy sector has been on high alert since Trump took office in January, pledging to boost fossil fuels and undo the climate and renewable energy policies of his predecessor, former President Joe Biden.
The $100 billion in investment will create 350,000 jobs and would include $10 to $15 billion in active projects, ACP said. Those include a Tesla battery cell facility in Sparks, Nevada, a Fluence cell factory in Tennessee, LG’s plant in Holland, Michigan, and a Weirton, West Virginia, facility by startup Form Energy.
(Reporting by Nichola Groom; Editing by Marguerita Choy)
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