BYD accelerates investment in battery production in Brazil
Chinese electric vehicle maker BYD is expanding battery production in Brazil, a senior executive told Reuters, focusing on local manufacturing for its electric cars while preparing to invest around R$500 million in storage systems to support the national electricity grid.
The new manufacturing capacity in the vehicle segment is part of a broader effort to achieve 50% domestic content in its Brazilian-made cars by early 2027, BYD senior vice president Alexandre Baldy said in an interview on Monday.
"We are localizing, bringing local content, so that we can actually become a Brazilian manufacturer", said Baldy. "The battery is another item, an important component."
To comply with government rules and reduce its tax burden, BYD is accelerating local content at its factory in Bahia, with the aim of becoming the best-selling car brand in Brazil by 2030.
The company is also preparing to invest up to R$500 million in a new Battery Energy Storage Systems (BESS) production line, as Brazil prepares to hold its first battery auction in December.
Storage batteries are seen as a solution to a growing problem in the renewable energy sector: the Brazilian electrical grid is unable to absorb all the solar and wind energy generated at peak times, forcing the energy produced to be wasted and driving investment away from the sector.
"This truly opens up a new frontier for a new battery segment," said Baldy.
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BYD will decide in the next 90 days whether to use the investment in BESS to add a production line to the company's factory in Manaus, currently focused on bus batteries, or whether to open a new unit, focused on BESS batteries.
At the same time, BYD is investing between R$50 million and R$60 million to expand a battery production line for buses. The production of car batteries in Brazil is part of an existing plan to invest R$5.5 billion in the company's main factory in the country, in Camaçari (BA).
Although the Chinese automaker has invested in mineral rights in areas of a lithium-rich region in Brazil, the company has no plans to develop these areas for now, given the low price of the mineral used in battery production, according to the executive.
"It's not in the plans, it's not the subject of internal discussion," he said. "We are focused on consolidating our passenger car factory for BYD cars and investing to expand our electric bus manufacturing capacity as well."
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Source: CNN