Redwood Materials has announced plans to build a new battery materials and recycling facility on a 600-acre campus near Charleston, South Carolina.

Once built, the facility will employ 1,500 people and produce enough cathode and anodes components to supply 1 million EVs annually.

Redwood, a battery materials and recycling startup founded by JB Straubel, has agreed to spend at least $3.5 billion in the state within the next decade as part of the terms of its deal with the state. The company reports its South Carolina operations will not use electric fuel but will instead be 100% electric.

Redwood Materials reports the Camp Hall campus in Berkeley County will produce 100 GWh of cathode and anode components per year, enough to power more than one million EVs.

The company’s advanced battery recycling and processing capabilities enable it to capture key materials used in Lithium-ion batteries including cathode foils, lithium, nickel and cobalt.  

Redwood reports plans include the possibility of expanding operations on-site to hundred GWh annually to meet growing demand. The site sits in close proximity to key customers: Toyota, Volvo, Panasonic and Envision AESC.

Redwood will break ground in the first quarter of 2023 in a phased buildout. The company plans to have its recycling process running by the end of 2023 with anode and cathode component production to follow.

The growing company landed a multibillion deal to supply Panasonic Energy of North America with cathode material for battery cells earlier this year. The new $4 billion factory in Kansas, expected to be larger than the Tesla Gigafactory in Sparks, Nevada, is forecast to begin mass production of its “2170” cylindrical lithium-ion batteries by March 2025.