Reliance, Hyundai, Mahindra, Ola Electric, Amara, Exide, L&T Bid For Modi Govt's ₹18000 cr PLI Scheme For Advance Chemistry Cell Battery: Report

Reliance Industries, South Korea's Hyundai Motor Co, automaker Mahindra & Mahindra, Ola Electric, Larsen & Toubro and battery makers Amara Raja and Exide are among companies that have submitted bids under the India's ₹18000 crore Production-Linked Incentive (PLI) Scheme for Advance Chemistry Cell (ACC) Battery, Reuters reported quoting sources aware of the development.

In May 2021, the Union Cabinet approved the PLI Scheme named as 'National Programme on Advanced Chemistry Cell (ACC) Battery Storage’ for achieving manufacturing capacity of 50 GigaWatt Hour (GWh) of ACC and five GWh of niche ACC with an outlay of ₹18,100 crore.

Under the scheme, ACC battery storage manufacturers will be selected through a competitive bidding process. The manufacturing facility would have to be commissioned within a period of two years. The incentive will be disbursed thereafter over a period of five years.

Each selected ACC battery storage manufacturer would have to commit to set-up an ACC manufacturing facility of minimum five GWh capacity.

Furthermore, the beneficiary firms have to achieve a domestic value addition of at least 25 per cent and incur the mandatory investment ₹225 crore /GWh within two years and raise it to 60 per cent domestic value addition within five years.

The scheme seeks to incentivise domestic and foreign companies to set up a cumulative 50 GWh of ACC manufacturing facilities in India by attracting a direct investment of around ₹frs5,000 crore in ACC Battery storage manufacturing projects.

The scheme also aims to reduce import dependence. While several companies have already started investing in battery packs, though the capacities of these facilities are too small when compared to global averages, but there still is negligible investment in manufacturing, along with value addition, of ACCs in India. All the demand of the ACCs is currently being met through imports in India.

ACCs are the new generation of advanced storage technologies that can store electric energy either as electrochemical or as chemical energy and convert it back to electric energy as and when required.

The consumer electronics, electric vehicles, advanced electricity grids, solar rooftop etc. which are major battery consuming sectors are expected to achieve robust growth in the coming years. It is expected that the dominant battery technologies will control some of the world's largest growth sectors.