£86.9 million for scale-up and R&D of net-zero vehicle technology

09 October 2023 – The Advanced Propulsion Centre UK (APC) has announced the successful applicants of its latest funding rounds, sharing £86.9 million of government and industry funding into zero tailpipe emission vehicle technology.

The package of funding supports:

Collaborative Research and Development (CR&D)

• • 4 project consortia funded

Automotive Transformation Fund

• • 7 key feasibility studies that will produce decision-ready business cases, in preparation for projects which will develop large-scale manufacturing facilities in the UK.
  • 5 scale-up projects which will assess if businesses in the UK automotive supply chain are ready for growth and expansion.

APC Chief Executive Officer Ian Constance said:

“The 23^rd round of our collaborative R&D competition coincides with the APC’s 10^th anniversary. We have seen over £1.4 billion of investment into automotive projects since the APC was set up, and I am proud of the impact that we have made here in the UK. This latest announcement includes a diverse set of OEMs and suppliers that demonstrate the strength of UK automotive. They will further add to our portfolio of innovative projects and continue to drive the UK to deliver on its net zero ambition.”

Benefiting from this multimillion-pound investment under APC Collaborative Research and Development (CR&D) are consortia led by:

Aston Martin, to accelerate the development of a luxury battery electric vehicle platform, enabling a route to net zero, including vehicle lightweighting, a digital toolchain, and electrification training.

Yasa, the consortium is focused on creating an innovative combined electric propulsion & handling system which aims to revolutionise existing EV architecture standards and bring a new level of electrified performance.

Gestamp’s Autotech Engineering R&D UK, leads a consortium on a project to create new design methodologies, processes, and materials for reduced embodied carbon footprint in product designs.

Perkins, the British engine maker, subsidiary of Caterpillar, will develop a hydrogen-hybrid, integrated power system for off-highway vehicles.

This is the latest in Collaborative R&D support from the Advanced Propulsion Centre UK (APC), with a total project cost of £67.9 million, covering a range of different vehicle types to decarbonise each market segment they inhabit.

This includes a £33.9 million government grant combined with industry match-funding.

From luxury cars to workhorse excavators, the multi-year projects will capitalise on the expertise of the UK’s broad automotive industry by bringing manufacturers together with SMEs and academic partners.

Each will contribute to jobs and capability in the UK – estimated to create or safeguard more than 4,700 jobs in total across the R&D projects. It is also projected that 65 million tonnes of CO₂ will be saved over the next decade as a result of the work undertaken by these four alone.

Announcing a wider package of investment from the Department for Business and Trade, including Niche Vehicle Network funding, Minister for Industry and Economic Security Nusrat Ghani said:

“Together with industry, we’re providing a huge £89 million of funding to drive 20 groundbreaking net-zero tech projects which will help grow the economy and create UK jobs in the industries of the future. From net-zero tractors to cutting-edge battery projects, we’re taking decisive action to back the UK’s innovators and ensure we remain at the forefront of zero-emission vehicle technology.” 

Also within the package announced today, is an £11.3 million Automotive Transformation Fund (ATF) grant shared by 5 UK-based projects that will be funded through the second instalment of the SuRV (Scale up Readiness Validation) competition, plus 7 UK-based projects receiving funding through the ATF Feasibility Studies competition.

The Automotive Transformation Fund is a programme created to support large-scale industrialisation and the transition to net zero.

APC Automotive Transformation Director Julian Hetherington said:

“The Automotive Transformation Fund is supporting 12 new projects to scope out opportunities within the wider supply chain that could lead to significant investments in manufacturing here in the UK. Gigafactories are only part of the story, as much of the supply of materials is currently imported from carbon-intensive sources. If the sector is to transition to net zero and localise production, this funding can help to show where the potential is for expanding the UK’s capability.”

The five projects and companies funded through the SuRV2 competition are:

Helix
Hx-SuRV2: Validating Helix’s readiness for the scale-up of high power-density and scalable electric motor platforms focusing on ‘high-premium’ automotive applications.

Green Lithium Refining
Green Lithium plans to build a lithium scale-up plant in Teesside. The plant will support the commissioning and training of a skilled workforce for its full-scale plant in Teesside, which will produce enough refined lithium to enable the downstream production of over 1 million electric vehicles.

Advanced Electric Machines
Project SIMPLE aims to establish an efficient, scalable UK-based manufacturing process for sustainably produced traction motor systems in electric passenger vehicles.

Geothermal Engineering
Geothermal Engineering Limited will use this award to install Direct Lithium Extraction (DLE) at the UK’s first deep geothermal power plant at the United Downs Industrial Park in Cornwall.

Ilika Technologies
Ilika Technologies, UK Battery Industrialisation Centre (UKBIC) and MPAC are partnering in project SiSTEM to accelerate the scale-up of Ilika’s solid state battery technology.

This round of funding also includes the fourth round of the APC’s ATF Feasibility Studies competition.

The seven projects and companies funded through round four of the Feasibility Studies competition are:

Gaussion

Magneto-enhancement technology for solid-state batteries.

Talga Anode UK

Assessing the feasibility of production of anode materials from recycled graphite and a graphite-silicon composite anode material using in-situ silicates from Talga’s Swedish graphite ore.

Altilium

Partnering with Lunaz to develop an innovative and sustainable solution for the safe transportation and discharging of end-of-life EV batteries.

Strip Tinning

This project will study the feasibility of investing in very high-volume manufacturing of their Cell Contacting and Management System. The CCMS is a safety-critical component of the power electronics system of Battery Electric Vehicles.

Greenroc Mining

Establishing a graphite processing plant in the UK to produce anode material for EV batteries from graphite concentrate from the Amitsoq Graphite Project in southern Greenland.

Cornish Lithium

Focusing on commercial extraction of lithium and other battery metals in Cornwall, notably the Trelavour hard-rock lithium mica deposit near St Austell. Funding to understand in greater detail the lithium resource in the ground and how much can be produced and together with a life cycle assessment will quantify environmental impacts

Aberdeen Minerals

Study of innovative mineral processing routes to accelerate the low-carbon production of cathode raw materials from Northeast Scotland.

Further detail about the collaborative research and development projects:

Project ELEVATION (Electric Lightweight Vehicle Platform and Digital Toolchain)

• Aston Martin, Manufacturing Technology Centre, Expert Tooling & Automation, Creative Composites, Fuzzy Logic Studio and WMG (Warwick Manufacturing Group), University of Warwick.
• Total project cost £18 million, including a grant of £8.9 million

Project ELEVATION (Electric Lightweight Vehicle Platform And Digital Toolchain) aims to accelerate the development of a modular luxury battery electric vehicle (BEV) platform, and associated technologies, with UK-based assembly of battery packs and electric drive units with advanced vehicle lightweighting whilst enhancing digital toolchain, enabling a route to net-zero facilities and supply chain, and delivering innovative electrification training.

Project Additive: wheel motor and active suspension

• YASA, Domin and Cranfield University
• Total project cost £21.2 million, including a grant of £10.6 million

Project Additive combines the relative expertise of YASA, Domin and Cranfield University. The consortium is focused on creating an innovative combined electric propulsion & handling system which aims to revolutionise existing EV architecture standards and bring a new level of electrified performance.

Emissions Reduction via Generative Optimisation & Recycling (ERGO-R)

• Autotech Engineering R&D UK (Gestamp), JLR, iCOMAT, Cynet Texkimp, Longworth and WMG​, University of Warwick
• Total project cost £6.4 million, including a grant of £3.2 million

The project ERGO-R is focused on identifying how to reduce and eventually eliminate greenhouse gas emissions in vehicle design and production. Studies show that 75%-80% of embodied carbon footprint is locked into product at the design phase. Gestamp will review design methodologies, manufacturing processes, materials, energy costs, recoverability, re use and recyclability, to consider the full embedded/embodied carbon cost/impact across a vehicle’s lifetime to create a true circular economy for the automotive industry, reducing waste and ensuring optimised multiple life reuse to support a net zero future.

Project Coeus

• Perkins, Equipmake and Loughborough University
• Total project cost £22.4 million, including a grant of £ 11.1 million

The collaboration between Perkins Engines, Equipmake, and Loughborough University is to design, develop and demonstrate an innovative ‘drop-in’ pre-integrated, highly configurable electric hybrid power system capable of operating using hydrogen or lower carbon intensity fuels that a wide-range of customers can readily incorporate into their off-highway vehicles and machines.