In December, the Dürr Group acquired a major order in the growth business with systems for battery production. The mechanical and plant engineering company will supply four lines each for cathode and anode coating for the battery manufacturer FIB, a company of the Seri Industrial Group. The plant is designed for the production of lithium-ion battery cells with a total output of 8 gigawatt hours per year.
Reuse of solvents
In the production of electrodes, thin metal foils are coated with the cathode and anode material consisting of various chemicals. Dürr's system includes so-called tandem coaters, in which the foils are coated on both sides one after the other. Other system components include dryers, calenders for compacting the material and cutting devices for obtaining individual electrodes from the electrode foils. Dürr also supplies environmental technology systems to recover the solvents required for the coating process from the exhaust air and reuse them.
Batteries for electric cars, electronic devices and energy storage systems
Dürr has been active in the battery production technology business since 2018. The order from FIB is by far the largest project in this business area to date. "This major project is of enormous strategic importance and underlines the attractiveness of our range of solutions for the production of electrodes for batteries on a large scale," says Dr. Jochen Weyrauch, CEO of Dürr AG.
Increased expansion of own production capacities
Several factories for battery cells are currently being built in Europe, and this is likely to continue in the coming years. While battery cells used to be purchased almost exclusively from Asia, the trend is now towards building up in-house production capacities. "Europe needs its own battery industry in order to meet its demand. Many battery producers want European technology suppliers as an alternative to Asian suppliers to build the necessary factories," says Dr. Weyrauch.