UK clean tech startup Altilium has secured £18.5 million in government grants through the DRIVE35 Scale-Up Fund to build ACT3, Britain's first commercial EV battery recycling refinery in Plymouth, Devon. The facility will process 24,000 end-of-life EV batteries annually using Altilium's proprietary EcoCathode™ hydrometallurgical process, recovering over 95% of cathode metals and 99% of graphite, producing materials with up to 74% lower carbon emissions than mined equivalents. A second DRIVE35 grant funds a collaborative R&D project with JLR and Warwick Manufacturing Group to produce EV battery cells using both recycled cathode and anode materials. The initiative addresses UK supply chain vulnerability to Chinese and Indonesian dominance in critical battery materials, with a planned larger ACT4 facility in Teesside targeting 20% of UK battery material demand by 2030.
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The fund and what it unlocksWhat the ACT3 plant will produceWhy the supply chain case has become urgentThe roadmap and the partnershipsSort: