Since the technology for the "diesel", within a few years, will no longer be used by car manufacturers, in China many industrial realities for the construction of electric batteries for vehicles are emerging as "mushrooms". In Europe, few are thinking about the future. The good news came from a Franco-German project called Battery Airbus, with an initial investment of around 5 / 6 billion.
“This alliance will have strategic importance for Europe. It will make it competitive with the United States and China ”. So to Reuters the French economy minister, Bruno Le Maire, during a joint press conference with his German counterpart Peter Altmaier and with Maros Sefcovic, vice president of the European Commission with responsibility for energy. According to Le Maire, France and Germany have already requested and obtained from the European Commission the guarantee of a state subsidy of up to 1,2 million euros for the creation of the consortium. At least another four billion will come from 35 other private companies, including giant PSA Group, its German subsidiary Opel and Saft.
A pilot factory should be opened in the coming months in France with around 200 employees. An Opel plant in Kaiserslautern, western Germany, aims to be converted instead into a battery cell factory. The goal for the 2023 is the creation of two production centers in France and Germany for a total of 1.500 jobs. The objective is to protect that occupation at risk due to the transition from combustion engines to electrified vehicles. "Our goal is not just to meet the automotive industry's demand in Europe," said Altmaier. "We also want to export outside the continent, to show that the batteries with the label Made in Europe they are a guarantee of quality ". And he added that the consortia are made by States, not by individual Ministers or by the Commission.
The global market for electric battery cells should reach 45 billion by 2027. The goal of the European Union, according to the German minister, should be to capture a market share of 30 per cent. At the moment the segment is dominated by the Japanese Panasonic, the South Korean Samsung and LG and the Chinese Contemporary Amperex Technology (Catl). The EU had already launched the European Battery Alliance in the 2017, focused on the research and development of batteries for electric cars, but to date the largest investment program has been started by the Swedish Northvolt alone. The EU's objective therefore seems ambitious: according to Bcg research, Europe does not reach 1 per cent of global lithium ion cell production, compared to 60 per cent of China, 17 per cent of Japan and 15 percent of South Korea. Germany in particular must find a way to protect its manufacturing companies at a time when internal combustion engines seem doomed to extinction.
As if these numbers weren't enough to put pressure on Europe, last year Catl announced its plan to open a large factory in central Germany. The request for subsidies to the Commission, explained Le Maire, "shows that Europe is not destined to depend on imports from two super-powers such as the United States and China". The minister then added that the consortium is open to other European countries, and that Italy, Belgium, Poland, Austria and Finland have already expressed their interest.
We hope that Italy will participate as soon as possible in this consortium in the phase of its birth in order to involve Italian industries and make them a system in this revolution in the sector of vehicle propulsion which, as is well known, constitutes one of the pillars of the world economy.
Italy should not miss another possibility: participate as soon as possible in the FACS (French-German-Spanish) or English Tempest program for the construction of a sixth generation aircraft (ready between 20 years). Programs that are emerging today and that with the excellence we express in the defense industry we cannot leave in the hands of a few other European countries that are more far-sighted than us.
Alessandro Profumo, managing director of Leonardo, had said, in this regard, during an interview with Defense News: "it is one thing to participate in the recipe with its own ingredients, another thing is to have a product already packaged by others".
Leonardo, which has most of its industries in Great Britain, has already given positive signals for participating in the "Tempest" program without having received, yet, the support of the Italian Government which, however, is still discussing the F-35.