WASHINGTON —
President Joe Biden’s administration is providing more than $3 billion to U.S. companies to boost domestic production of advanced batteries and other materials used for electric vehicles, as part of an ongoing U.S. effort to reduce China’s global dominance in the production of batteries for electric vehicles and other electronic products.
The grants will fund a total of 25 projects in 14 states, including battleground states such as Michigan and North Carolina, as well as Ohio, Texas, South Carolina and Louisiana.
The announced grants mark the second round of EV battery funding under the bipartisan infrastructure law passed in 2021. An earlier round allocated $1.8 billion for 14 projects that are underway. The totals are lower than amounts announced by authorities in October 2022 and reflect a series of projects that were withdrawn or rejected by US officials during sometimes protracted negotiations.
The money is part of a larger effort by President Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris to boost production and sales of electric vehicles as a key element of their strategy to curb climate change and strengthen American manufacturing. The companies that receive the money process lithium, graphite or other battery materials, or make components used in electric vehicle batteries.
“Today’s awards bring us closer to the federal government’s goal of building an end-to-end supply chain for batteries and crucial minerals here in the United States, from mining to processing, manufacturing and recycling, which is vital to reduce China’s dominance in this critical sector,” said White House economic advisor Lael Brainard.
The Biden-Harris administration is “committed to manufacturing batteries in the United States that will be vital to powering our grid, our homes and businesses, and America’s iconic auto industry,” Brainard told reporters Thursday during a White House call. .
The awards announced Friday bring the total to nearly $35 billion in U.S. investments to bolster supply chains for batteries and critical minerals nationwide, Brainard detailed, citing projects from major lithium mines in Nevada and North Carolina to factories of batteries in Michigan and Ohio and production of rare earth elements and magnets in California and Texas.
