Norwegian company Morrow Batteries opens factory

By Alimat Aliyeva

On Friday, Morrow, a battery cell manufacturer, opened Norway's first battery cell production site on the south coast of the country. It is planned to deliver the first batches by the end of the year and gradually increase production volumes, Azernews reports.

The production of battery cells is one of the new industries that Norway is seeking to enter, hoping to benefit from access to clean energy and proximity to European consumers seeking to purchase batteries away from China.

Founded in 2020, Morrow Batteries will initially use existing lithium iron phosphate battery (LFP) technology. According to the company's statement, this is the first production facility in Europe that produces batteries of this type.

"It is important for us to start selling batteries towards the end of the year," said Lars Christian Bacher, CEO of the company.
The company has entered into an agreement with Nordic Batteries for the supply of 5.5 gigawatt hours (GWh) for a period of 7 years, which develops customized energy storage solutions.

The CEO of the company added that the first months will be spent on debugging the process, improving quality and achieving stable production of battery cells.

"I would rather have problems in the launch process than have problems in two years when production is stable," said L. Bacher.
Each Morrow battery has a capacity of 340 Wh and weighs 2 kg, and the annual production capacity of the plant is 1 GWh, which is equivalent to about 3 million units.

According to Andreas Mayer, chief operating officer of Morrow, this would be enough to equip 20,000 small electric vehicles, whose battery capacity is usually 50 kilowatt hours (kWh).

However, as Bacher notes, supply agreements with automakers have not yet been discussed, since initial production volumes are too small. "It will take us years to get the right to sell batteries to car companies," the CEO stressed.

Nevertheless, Morrow plans to gradually expand production by building three more facilities in Arendal by 2029, each with an annual capacity of 14 GWh.

Morrow's first investors include local utility company A Energi, engineering companies ABB and Siemens, Danish pension funds PKA and Norwegian state-owned green investment company Nysnoe.