EU invests €852 million in six innovative electric vehicle battery projects

This article is brought to you in association with the European Commission.

Today, the European Commission announced that six pioneering electric vehicle (EV) battery cell manufacturing projects will receive a total of €852 million in grants from the Innovation Fund,using revenues from the EU Emissions Trading System (EU ETS).These grants follow a first Battery Call under the Fund, launched in December 2024, aimed at accelerating the growth of and investment in the EU’s battery manufacturing industry.

With these projects, and in line with the Industrial Action Plan for the European automobile sector and the Clean Industrial Deal, the EU is making concrete progress toward its decarbonisation goals, while boosting industrial competitiveness and creating high-quality jobs across Europe.

The projects support innovation in the production of EV battery cells and the deployment of innovative and sustainable manufacturing techniques, processes, and technologies. The selected projects represent strategic investments that will support Europe’s transition to a clean, competitive, and resilient industrial base, reducing at the same time the dependence on imports and fostering the development of clean technologies, and industrial leadership.

The following six projects have been selected for funding:

• ACCEPT Automotive Cells Company European Production Take-off, located in France (Automotive Cells Company ACC)
• AGATHE – Advanced Gigafactory Aiming at Tempering greenhouse gases Emissions, located in France (Verkor)
• CF3_at_Scale – Scaling of innovative manufacturing processes for high-performance cells, located in Germany (Cellforce Group)
• NOVO One – NOVO One Gigafactory, located in Sweden (NOVO Energy)
• WGF2G – Willstatt GigaFactory 2 GWh, located in Germany (Leclanche)
• 46inEU –Powering the Future – 46 Cylinders, Infinite Possibilities in Europe, located in Poland (LG Energy Solution)

All projects are expected to begin operations before 2030. They will receive support that covers both their capital and operational expenditure and which will be disbursed upon meeting project’s milestones. Part of disbursement can happen before entry into operation to support the investment phase of the project. Over the first 10 years of operation, they are projected to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by approximately 91 million tonnes of CO₂ equivalent. Upon completion, these projects will have a combined manufacturing capacity of around 56 gigawatt-hours (GWh) of EV battery cells per year.

Next steps

Successful applicants are expected to sign their respective grant agreements with the European Climate, Infrastructure and Environment Executive Agency (CINEA) in the third quarter of 2025. 

Beyond the six projects selected for funding today, other promising but insufficiently mature projects can receive project development assistance from the European Investment Bank. 

Background 

The Innovation Fund 24 Battery call attracted 14 proposals from 8 countries, out of which 13 met the Call’s eligibility criteria. The six awarded projects were selected through an evaluation by independent experts against seven award criteria: the projects’ degree of innovation; their potential to reduce GHG emissions including the carbon footprint of the manufacturing process itself; operational, financial, and technical maturity; replicability; contributions to the EUs security of supply and cost efficiency.

Using revenues from the EU ETS, the Innovation Fund aims to drive investment in cutting-edge, low-carbon and net-zero technologies to support Europe’s transition to climate neutrality.  Since 2021, the Innovation Fund has committed a total budget of around €12 billion, supporting over 200 innovative projects across the European Economic Area (EEA).

The targeted Battery Call for proposals is part of a broader initiative to strengthen Europe’s battery value chain with up to €3 billion in financial support. It seeks to address key economic and technical barriers facing the sector, particularly in light of global competition and supply chain vulnerabilities.