Human beings are known for a myriad of different things, but most importantly, they are known for getting better on a consistent basis. This tendency to improve under all possible situations has already fetched us some huge milestones, with technology appearing as a rather unique member of the stated group. The reason why technology’s credentials are so anomalous is largely based on its skill-set, which realized a reality for us that nobody could have ever imagined otherwise. Nevertheless, a closer look will reveal how the whole runner was also very much inspired by the way we applied those skills across a real-world environment. The latter component was, in fact, what gave the creation a spectrum-wide presence and made it the ultimate centrepiece of every single horizon. By having so much influence in literally all aspects of our life, technology was able to scale up the human experience in a significant manner, but even after achieving such a monumental feat, it will somehow keep on bringing the right goods to the table. The same, if anything, has only turned more and more evident in recent times, and truth be told, a new development around the automotive space should do a lot to make that trend bigger and better moving forward.

Redwood Materials, the battery recycling company founded by a former Tesla executive, has officially announced its decision to build a massive $3.5 billion facility in South Carolina. Located just outside of Charleston “in the heart of the ‘Battery Belt,” the facility is expected to span across 600 acres, and to support such a massive plant, the company will employ more than 1,500 people over the next ten years. Talk about what it will deliver; the facility will produce 100 GWh of cathode and anode components annually, with first recycling process poised to begin by the end of 2023. This is major development because the stated components, at the moment, are not manufactured in North America. As a result, the automakers are forced to import them from overseas and bear a substantial cost for doing so. Now, while Redwood’s domestic operation will do a lot to cut back on that cost, it will also, going by the company’s word, reduce emissions and global insecurity that has long remained associated with this trade. If we dig into some concrete figures, Redwood claims it can reduce CO2 emissions of EV battery materials by “about 80% compared to the current Asia-based supply chain that we are dependent on for these crucial materials.”

The new factory, of course, provides an interesting extension to a raging EV trend in the US, a trend which stems almost entirely from the proverbial $7,500-per vehicle tax credit that can only be availed if the EV is manufactured in the US. This has prompted giants like Ford, Honda, BMW, Hyundai, General Motors, and more, to announce US-based factory plans, and the list, to be fair, is only expected to grow over time.

Coming back to the development in question, why did Redwood pick South Carolina? Well, the biggest incentive for that came from the state’s decision to hand the company $225 million in taxpayer-funded debt, a figure which also stands out as the largest economic development deal in South Carolina’s history.