German battery giant to quadruple production to 5GWh a year by 2020

Published by

Leading German battery maker BMZ has started work on a €45 million expansion of its manufacturing plant near Frankfurt, that will quadruple its production capacity to around 5GWh of energy storage capacity a year, in anticipation of the coming global energy storage boom.

Already Europe’s largest independent lithium-ion battery system manufacturer, BMZ says the expansion will increase the size of its Karlstein facility to 55,000m2 by 2020, to produce up to 80 million lithium-ion batteries a year of varying sizes.

According to German Trade & Invest, construction of the new BMZ plant will take place in a number of phases and, once complete, will house 1,500 workers.

Last year, BMZ invested €14 million in research and development and turned over €300 million. The company expects to achieve an annual turnover of €500 million by 2020.

According to energy storage market expert Tobias Rothacher, the timing of the German battery maker’s expansion is spot on, with the latest figures from the KfW development bank showing the number of PV-battery system installations increased by 50 per cent over the last year.

“Over 20 per cent of new PV systems under 30kWp now include batteries,” Rothacher said.

Grid-scale installations are also on the rise, with total battery capacity for primary control provision increasing more than 20-fold in Germany in the last three years.

Sophie Vorrath

Sophie is editor of One Step Off The Grid and deputy editor of its sister site, Renew Economy. She is the co-host of the Solar Insiders Podcast. Sophie has been writing about clean energy for more than a decade.

Share
Published by

Recent Posts

AEMO reports surge in grid registrations for wind, solar and battery projects

The rate of grid registrations for wind, solar and battery projects has surged in the…

11 February 2025

High winds detach another serrated edge from turbine at Australia’s largest wind project

Heavy winds detach another piece of serrated edging from a turbine at the country's biggest…

10 February 2025

Australia’s oldest commercial wind farm to close as cost of repowering is too high

Australia's oldest commercial wind farm will be decommissioned in 2027 as it owner says the…

10 February 2025

Flexible exports and solar soaks: Network shoots for “flat bills” as electrification era takes off

AusNet seeks approval to spend $3.5bn on upgrading its network over a five-year period it…

10 February 2025

Australia formally misses UN climate deadline, only one country makes pledge close to 1.5°C

Australia, as expected, has missed the official but largely symbolic deadline for its 2035 emissions…

10 February 2025

“Freedom from blackmail:” Baltic states cut their link to Russia grid in dramatic switch to EU network

Workers cut transmission lines to Russia grid and hand out chopped wire to bystanders in…

10 February 2025