The Volkswagen Group is unveiling more electric future plans today during ‘Power Day’. For example, much more battery production capacity is needed in Europe and Wolfsburg is committed to a significant expansion of the charging network.
This decade, the electric car must conquer the European roads and of course the Volkswagen Group hopes that as many BEVs as possible will come out of its stable. In order to respond to this, the group will significantly increase battery production here in Europe until 2030. In total there must be six battery factories on our continent in that year. Work is already underway with Northvolt on a battery factory in Skellefteå, Sweden. A second battery factory of Nortvolt and Volkswagen is being built in Salzgitter, Germany. So there will be four more before 2030, although their location has yet to be determined. In total, the factories must be good for an annual production of 204 GWh of battery capacity by 2030. In Sweden, battery production will start in 2023.
In the same year, Volkswagen presents a new generation of batteries. They must be easier to produce, have a higher return and, above all, be cheaper. Volkswagen says it can get the costs of batteries ‘well below € 100 per kWh’. “That makes electric mobility affordable and the dominant form of drive,” said board member Thomas Schmall, responsible for technology within the group. By 2030, 80 percent of the Volkswagen Group’s range must have such batteries on board. In the cheapest models, the cost of batteries should have dropped 50 percent by then.
Charging network
To prevent the growing number of BEVs from being stuck in traffic jams for charging stations, Volkswagen is also increasing the use of charging points. It does this through Ionity, among other things, where it collaborates with other car manufacturers. It was recently announced that Ionity wants to expand considerably in the coming years. BMW, Volkswagen, Daimler, Ford and Hyundai belong to Ionity and each invest around € 200 million in the expansion.
The Volkswagen Group is also investing another € 200 million in collaboration with various filling stations for the installation of charging points. In our part of Europe, Volkswagen does this together with BP. A total of 4,000 150 kW fast chargers are to be added at BP and Aral filling stations in this region and in the UK. In Spain, Volkswagen works with Iberdrola for the installation of fast chargers and in Italy with Enel. In total, Volkswagen wants to have 18,000 public fast chargers in Europe by 2025. The group estimates that that number is about one third of the total European demand for fast chargers in that year.