Ford shifts gears to build batteries for datacenters • The Register
Automotive giant Ford has decided to start a business building big batteries, in part to cash in on the datacenter construction boom.
The company announced its plan on Monday, saying it will repurpose “underutilized electric vehicle battery capacity” at a Kentucky plant “to capture the large demand for battery energy storage from data centers and infrastructure to support the electric grid.”
“Ford plans to produce LFP [lithium iron phosphate] prismatic cells, battery energy storage system modules and 20-foot DC container systems at this facility,” the company’s announcement [PDF] states. “These systems are at the heart of the energy storage solution market for data centers, utilities, and large-scale industrial and commercial customers.”
Another Ford initiative will see the company create smaller batteries for residential energy storage.
Ford’s moves come after it decided to end production of the all-electric version of its iconic F-150 pickup truck, the Lightning. Its replacement, the F-150 Lightning EREV, will include a gasoline engine, which generates electricity to replenish the batteries that power the car’s electric engines.
The company framed the shift as necessary because it has struggled to sell large all-electric vehicles as “the business case has eroded due to lower-than-expected demand, high costs and regulatory changes.” Those issues meant the F-150 Lightning was not a profitable product. Ford hopes the EREV variant will be, and has also introduced several other smaller electric and hybrid vehicles to bolster its range.
Ford’s energy storage plans call for it to “deploy at least 20 GWh annually by late 2027,” which isn’t a huge quantity: Tesla signed a deal to provide 15.3 GWh of batteries to just one client in 2024, and The Register is aware of several multi-GWh projects around the world.
Energy companies and consumers deploy big batteries to help manage the shift in electricity production patterns that come with a move to renewable sources of generating capacity. Whereas energy sources like coal-fired generators and nuclear plants produce near-constant power, the output of renewables like solar and wind fluctuates – and can sometimes mean generators produce more energy than consumers require. Batteries can store that energy for later use, and provide it at lower prices.
Datacenters need energy 24×7, and analyst firm Gartner recently suggested that facilities lacking in on-prem power plants will fail.
Building electricity generation facilities is, however, a costly and complex task. Ford’s batteries could provide on-site power for less, and in a shorter time, than alternative technologies.
The auto-maker’s new products could also provide energy more cheaply than using gas generators to support the grid, according to recent data from Australia. ®
