The government yesterday (5 September) pledged £9 million in funding for a new R&D centre for developing electric vehicle battery technology.

The new £13 million ‘UK Energy Storage R&D Centre’, which will also be funded by industry (to the tune of £4 million), has been created to help tap into the growing electric and hybrid vehicle battery market. This market is forecasted to be worth £250 million in the UK by 2020.

The pledged funding reflects the government’s commitment to investing £400 million in the UK’s automotive industry throughout the next four years.

“I’m pleased to announce this joint government and industry project to develop an energy storage R&D centre at the University of Warwick. It will put the UK in a much stronger, competitive position to capitalise on a growing worldwide market for low-carbon vehicles, alongside other world leaders in the field including the United States, Japan and Germany”, said Business Minister Michael Fallon.

“This £13 million facility will help accelerate the development of battery cells for the next generation of vehicles, is a vital investment in the future of the automotive sector. It complements over £5.5 billion that global vehicle manufacturers have committed to UK projects in the last 18 months.”

The centre will be based at the University of Warwick’s High Value Manufacturing (HVM) Catapult (opened in 2011 to combine university research with commercialisation of new technologies). The purpose of the centre is to develop new high performance batteries that will be more economically viable and stable, and will yield more energy than their predecessors.

Initially, the centre will focus on creating batteries for low- and ultra low-carbon vehicles, but it has potential to expand its research into batteries for commercial and off-road vehicles, rail and marine, and even fuel cells.

David Bott, Director of Innovation Programmes at the Technology Strategy Board, said: “The establishment of this centre will help to increase the global competitiveness of the UK’s emerging low-carbon vehicle’s industry.

“By locating the centre within the new High Value Manufacturing Catapult, it will be possible to draw on capabilities that have already been developed in energy storage and help to speed up the commercialisation of new products. The benefits that this centre brings will also spill over into wider markets.”

A representative from the automotive industry, Jerry Hardcastle, Chairman of the Group and Global Chief Marketability Engineer at Nissan Motor Company, applauded the cooperation between government, industry and academics to achieve the R&D centre: “The announcement of the UK Energy Storage R&D Centre is great news and is further evidence that collaboration between the government, industry and academic institutions in the UK continues to create opportunities to increase innovation and further develop the supply chain in the automotive industry.”

The Automotive Council Technology Group, along with the government, helped to secure funding for the R&D centre.