'We're going all in': how France raced ahead of UK on electric car batteries

Forty miles from the coast of Britain, where the government was again told this week that without urgent action it risks losing the electric vehicle race, "Battery Valley" is taking shape in northern France. Battery Valley has the enthusiastic support of the French president, who this week unveiled a raft of green measures and tax credits - including electric vehicle subsidies - aimed at attracting billions of euros in new investment to "Reindustrialise" France, create jobs and increase manufacturing from 10% of the country's economic output to 15%. "There's obviously a deep-rooted tradition in France of using a combination of hard money and soft support for industry in this way - far more so, generally speaking, than there is in Britain," said a UK-based expert on the European automotive industry, who asked not to be named. "France is developing a proper, thought-through industrial policy for the green transition. If it all plays out as planned, its EV battery cluster in northern France should be one of Europe's biggest." The country's carmakers, Renault and Stellantis - which owns Peugeot and Citroën, as well as Vauxhall and Fiat - have promised to build at least 2m EVs in France before 2030, and they will all need batteries. ProLogium's plant, the largest of the four northern gigafactories announced to date, represents an investment of €5.2bn. By 2030, a planned workforce of 3,000 should be producing about 48 gigawatt hours of batteries on its 180-hectare brownfield site in Dunkirk, enough to power between 500,000 and 750,000 cars a year. The Brexit trade deal struck between the UK and EU at the end of 2020 contained "Rules of origin" aimed at boosting domestic electric car battery production to reduce dependence on Asian imports, but new factories have not sprung up quickly enough, meaning some carmakers may face the prospect of tariffs on exports in January. Ultimately, industry experts predict, if all four French gigafactories are up and running as planned by 2030, France will become one of Europe's major battery hubs behind leaders Germany and Hungary, by which time Chinese output - currently accounting for as much as 80% of Europe's EV batteries - should have fallen to nearer 60%, and the EU's risen to 25%. Several countries are competing for the sector's favours, and offering huge subsidies: according to some reports, ProLogium may be receiving as much as €1.5bn from France, while Germany has promised €1bn in state support to Northvolt to help persuade the Swedish company to build a new plant in the country's east.