Gigantic New Electric Truck Battery Factory Coming To The USA

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In yet another chapter in the book of green jobs making strange bedfellows, the deep red state of Mississippi is set to host a new battery factory for electric trucks featuring new lithium iron phosphate (LFP) technology. The Mississippi Development Authority worked long and hard to beat out other states for the win, deploying “Project Poppy” funds approved by the state legislature. If all goes according to plan, the new venture will help push diesel fuel off the roads while serving as the biggest single job creation engine in state history.

Mississippi Wins New Electric Truck Battery Factory

The new electric truck battery factory comes under the umbrella of Amplify Cell Technologies, a new joint venture that joins three of the heaviest, legacy-ist hitters on the US truck manufacturing scene: PACCAR, Daimler Truck North America, and Cummins’s zero-emission branch Accelera.

The 2-million square-foot factory will sit on a 500-acre site at the Chickasaw Trails Industrial Park Megasite near Byhalia, in Marshall County. Once operational in 2027, it is expected to produce 21 gigawatt-hours’ worth of LFP batteries annually, along with more than 2,000 manufacturing jobs.

“This project is the largest payroll commitment in state history, and it will bring an incredible 2,000 new jobs to this community,” enthused Mississippi Governor Tate Reeves upon the occasion of a groundbreaking ceremony on July 1.

“This fantastic investment from these industry leaders will help to further charge Mississippi’s electric economy,” Governor Reeves added.

Not just any old jobs, either. As reported by Memphis TV station WREG, the expectation is that salaries will average $65,000 a year.

Super Truck 3 & The Electric Truck Of The Future

Two US startups, Tesla (batteries) and Nikola (fuel cells), have been edging into the electric truck field, but it’s still wide open and PACCAR is among the other truck makers also aiming for a foothold in both the battery and fuel cell field.

PACCAR traces its roots back to the early 20th century railroad industry and it has changed with the times. Here in the 21st century, PACCAR has hooked up with the National Zero-Emission Truck Coalition. The company is also involved in Super Truck 3, a program of the US Department of Energy. Earlier iterations of Super Truck focused on diesel fuel efficiency. The third round ditches diesel in favor of electrification.

Under Super Truck 3, PACCAR has been working on both fuel cell trucks and battery-electric trucks through its Kenworth line (the company’s umbrella also includes Peterbilt and DAF).

Daimler Truck also won a Super Truck 3 award in 2021, but that one focused on fuel cell trucks.

LFP Batteries For Electric Trucks

Cummins’s Accelera branch has already been pivoting into LFP (lithium iron phosphate) battery technology. The company first announced that it is bringing LFP technology into its fold back in 2023, alongside three types of NMC (nickel manganese cobalt) batteries.

“The LFP solution gives customers access to faster charging and longer-life batteries, targeting the medium-duty truck and school bus markets,” the company explained.

LFP is a relatively new formula in the electric vehicle battery market. It was developed in the 1990s, but earlier versions could not compete against new EV batteries on energy density and performance.

“Nevertheless, research on iron-based batteries continued apace,” CleanTechnica observed last year. “The Energy Department’s Brookhaven National Laboratory was among those picking up the iron battery torch in 2015. The US Army also chipped in for follow-on iron battery research at Brookhaven, published in 2018.”

In addition to improved performance, LFP chemistry also avoids supply chain baggage associated with cobalt and manganese, one emerging issue being the impact of deep-sea manganese mining on the marine environment (see more LFP background here).

The Amplify venture has tapped the global electric vehicle battery supplier EVE Energy to contribute its “industry-leading battery cell design and manufacturing expertise” to the effort. Working the domestic manufacturing scene, EVE has a US headquarters in Ohio.

If EVE rings a bell, you may be thinking of the Israeli startup StoreDot, which has licensed its fast-charging EV battery technology to EVE.

Project Poppy Brings Green Jobs To Red State

Amplify is starting life with a bang. The joint venture aims to be the biggest manufacturer of batteries for medium- and heavy-duty trucks in the US.

That’s somewhat ironic, considering that some Mississippi state officials have been pushing back against ESG (environment, social, governance) investing. Still, the new factory puts Mississippi squarely on the growing list of states in which economic development agencies are investing many public dollars to attract fossil-killing manufacturers, despite the anti-ESG rhetoric.

When Amplify announced the selection of Mississippi for its new electric truck battery factory earlier this year, John O’Leary, the president and CEO of Daimler Truck North America, stated that his company is “grateful to the state of Mississippi and the Marshall County community for joining us…and helping to realize our shared climate goals.”

Shared climate goals! As for the money, Magnolia Tribune reporter Frank Corder broke down the ESG-worthy investment by the Mississippi Development Authority under Project Poppy, a special fund supported by state legislators.

“Coined ‘Project Poppy,’ the package includes a $186.7 million grant that breaks down to $120 million of “inside the fence” reimbursements, $40.7 million for land stabilization and pad construction, $24 million for training, and $2 million for Mississippi Development Authority implementation and state agency expediting fund,” Corder reported last month.

Corder also took note of various tax exemptions and incentives, along with the potential for additional state-funded infrastructure including a new $127 million highway interchange.

The MDA is of course pleased as punch to win a new job-creating factory to support the electric truck revolution. In a press release earlier this year, MDA Executive Director Bill Cork stated that the new factory will go beyond benefiting the state’s economy to create “world-changing technology” that will “shape the future of mobility and industrial processes.”

Governor Reeves apparently did not get his own memo. Last year, he signed Mississippi on to a multi-state anti-ESG coalition spearheaded by Florida Governor Ron DiSantis.

“The proliferation of ESG throughout America is a direct threat to the American economy, individual economic freedom, and our way of life, putting investment decisions in the hands of the woke mob to bypass the ballot box and inject political ideology into investment decisions, corporate governance, and the everyday economy,” reads the establishing letter signed by Governor Reeves and 17 other governors.

Woke or not, the electric truck of the future is right around the corner, thanks to a hefty investment by the taxpayers of Mississippi.

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Image (cropped): The US truck maker PACCAR is among the US firms pursuing a foothold in the electric truck field, and it is part of the new Amplify Cell Technologies LFP battery venture in Mississippi.