25 Battery Tech Startups That Just Received a Share of $3 Billion in Federal Funding

The federal government will provide another $3 billion for battery technology startups.

The investment, which the Biden administration announced Friday, is the latest infusion of capital to come from $16 billion the Energy Department has earmarked to build local battery manufacturing, processing and recycling facilities. It is part of a broader Inflation Reduction Act that takes effect in August 2022 and includes incentives to bolster the country’s battery industry and reduce reliance on the world’s leading battery maker, China.

That round of funding went to startups in 14 states, but there were clear winners who would see the majority of the expected 18,000 jobs that would be created as a result. South Carolina companies secured the most funding, with five projects receiving $850 million. Cirba Solutions, for example, took home $200 million to build, own and operate a large-scale battery-grade salt processing facility to support the electric vehicle market.

Four Michigan companies have received a combined $355 million in grants. Mitra Chem, backed by General Motors, received $100 million from the DOE and another $25 million from the Michigan Competitiveness Fund. The company will partner with Sun Chemical to build a facility that will develop and manufacture lithium iron phosphate materials for electric vehicles and battery storage systems.

The Energy Department also awarded Ascend Elements, a venture-backed battery recycling startup, $125 million to build a lithium-ion battery recycling and cathode materials production facility in Kentucky. The facility will process graphite residue from lithium-ion battery recycling and cathode materials production into battery-grade graphite.

The loans and grants will go to companies operating across the entire battery supply chain, from mining key minerals to producing cathode and anode materials, from producing electrolyte salt to recycling batteries.

Here is a list of all the startups that raised funding: