Unfortunately GM does not have any factories in Europe. Although LG does have a large LFP battery manufacturing plant in Wroclaw, Poland (only 210km from EMN's mine), the plan is for the new LMR batteries will be made in USA from 2028. Bring production into Europe would certainly be a game changer for EMN.
Below are some excerpts from the press release.
"Lower-Cost, Simpler Design: With a typical high nickel battery cell, the chemical composition is roughly 85% nickel, 10% manganese and 5% cobalt. The composition of LMR cells is much different – around 35% nickel, 65% manganese, and virtually no cobalt. Here’s why that matters: manganese is cheaper and more plentiful than either nickel or cobalt. The material in these cells is much less expensive. The chemistry also lends itself well to larger cell sizes, which further reduces system cost, with fewer connective and structural elements in a battery pack.
LMR vs. LFP: GM estimates that our new LMR cells will get 33% more energy density at a comparable cost than LFP, or lithium iron phosphate, another popular lower-cost EV battery chemistry.
Bigger cells: With LMR, we’re going to build “prismatic” cells, which are rectangular in shape, rather than the “pouch” cells that lie at the heart of current high nickel packs. That makes them substantially more efficient to package in full-scale trucks and SUVs. Prismatic cells reduce both the number of required parts and the percentage of non-active materials. More specifically, prismatic cells reduce battery module components by 75% and total pack components by 50%.
Barriers broken: As noted, LMR cells historically have been subject to both a short lifespan and “voltage attenuation,” the tendency to suffer voltage loss over time. We’ve worked with our suppliers to optimize the materials in our LMR cells, adding proprietary dopants and coatings, along with particle engineering, process innovations, to achieve the right energy density and arrangement of battery materials inside the cell to keep them stable. The result is that our new LMR cells can match the lifespan of current generation high-nickel cells, with comparable performance but much lower cost.
Deep IP: We have a considerable and growing portfolio of LMR related intellectual property, particularly around cell production and integration, and our collaborator LG Energy Solution holds more than 200 patents around the world on LMR-related technology."
Could this be a dark horse quitely working away on a tech that competes with Chinese dominance... "GM has been researching lithium-ion battery cells with manganese-rich cathodes since 2015, with our work accelerating in 2020. By the end of 2024, we had coated about one ton of LMR cathode in our Wallace Battery Cell Innovation Center, testing hundreds of large format prismatic cells in 18 different prototype varieties and 3 different cell dimensions, testing them to the equivalent of 1.4 million miles of EV driving."
"Ultium Cells, a GM and LG Energy Solution joint venture, plans to start commercial production of LMR prismatic cells in the U.S. in 2028"
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