Northvolt and Scania have announced that they will be joining forces to jointly develop a battery cell for heavy electric vehicles.
In validation tests, the lithium-ion cell has demonstrated an outstanding lifetime resulting in the capacity to power trucks for 1.5 million kilometers – equivalent to the truck’s whole lifetime.
Produced with fossil-free electricity in northern Sweden, the cell’s carbon footprint is approximately one-third that of a comparative industry reference.
Back in 2017, Scania and Northvolt initially partnered to develop and commercialize a world-leading battery cell for heavy commercial vehicles. Now the partnership has evolved and the cell is being produced at Northvolt Ett gigafactory in northern Sweden.
Peter Carlsson, CEO and Co-Founder of Northvolt, comments: “At the outset of this partnership, Northvolt and Scania agreed to an ambitious timeline for the development of a high-performance battery cell which would enable their plans for electrifying heavy transport. To have proceeded through extensive development and validation phases, and now be delivering cells from Northvolt Ett which exceed our initial expectations in terms of performance is a tremendous accomplishment for everyone involved.”
Additionally, Scania will inaugurate a new battery factory in Södertälje, Sweden, where battery cells will be assembled into battery packs for the start of production of heavy-duty electric trucks, later this year.
Scania’s CEO Christian Levin says: “Today marks a milestone on the path towards a sustainable transport system. The future of heavy transport is electric, and to enable the shift and to continue delivering on our brand promise towards customers to be premium, Scania needs top-performing battery cells for our electric trucks. As the development of the battery cell started, we targeted high performance, low operating costs and long lifetime. We decided on a requirement for the cell to enable a 1.5 million kilometers long lifetime for a heavy-duty Scania vehicle. The tests show that this requirement can not only be met, but also exceeded.”
Press release: Northvolt
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