United States-based XNRGI has announced that the company has opened a high temperature (HT) lithium-ion battery factory in Gurugram in India that can produce 240 MWh of battery production capacity.

The factory will be spread across 45,000 square feet of land. According to the company statement, “The factory has begun production of its HT Mobility Smart Telemetry Battery XM 5kWh for rickshaws, e-bikes, e-motorcycles, golf carts, solar and wind farms, and telecom tower UPS.”

XNRGI also has aggressive plans to scale capacity worldwide in the multi GWh range by 2022 with strategic relationships in different parts of the world.

The factory will produce XNRGI HT turnkey energy storage solutions (ESS). This will include battery packs, battery/energy management systems, optional tracking, and remote status monitoring hardware. These energy storage solutions are specially optimized for hot, humid tropical climates such as Southeast Asia, MENA (Middle East, North Africa), and the southern and central parts of North America.

According to the company statement, the unique advantages of the XNRGI HT batteries include that they charge to 80% capacity within two hours and can operate in more than 55-degree centigrade.

For rickshaws and similar applications, the batteries can be remotely monitored and tracked for safety reasons and to check their charge status.

The company has its fundamental cell research and development, manufactures its batteries through its preferred suppliers, builds battery and energy management systems, assembles energy storage systems in its automated factory.

Earlier, the Department of Heavy Industry invited proposals for deploying electric vehicle charging infrastructure in the country’s big and smart cities under the government’s FAME program. The cities have been categorized as million-plus cities, smart cities, satellite towns connected to metro cities of Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, Chennai, Hyderabad, Bangalore, and Ahmedabad.

In December 2019, Mercom reported that Ather Energy announced that it had signed a memorandum of understanding with the government of Tamil Nadu to set up a two-wheeled electric vehicle and lithium-ion battery manufacturing facility. The 400,000 square feet factory will be located at Hosur.

Meanwhile, in January 2020, it was reported that new research finding at IBM Research has come up with a new battery that does not use any heavy metals with sourcing concerns. IBM claims that the materials used for this battery can be extracted from seawater, and there is no need to use other invasive methods for extracting the materials, which makes it a viable alternative as compared to the standard batteries in use.

Image credit: NASA Glenn Research Center / Electrochemistry Branch / Public domain