A manufacturer of electric vehicle battery materials is scaling back plans for its facility under construction in western Kentucky.
Ascend Elements says it has come to a mutual agreement with the U.S. Department of Energy to cancel a $164 million federal grant for its mega factory in Hopkinsville.
In a news release, the company said due to changing market conditions, there are no longer plans to produce cathode active material, or CAM, a main component of lithium-ion batteries.
However, it will still produce precursor cathode active material, or pCAM, at a 140-acre campus in Christian County.
"I met with several of the leaders yesterday from Ascend and their intent is to ramp construction back up and finish the existing facility," said Christian County Judge-Executive Jerry Gilliam. "We're excited, but we're still cautiously optimistic. I guess the waters are unique in this situation with an administration change."
After he took office in January, President Trump said he would “eliminate the electric vehicle mandate." While there was no Biden-era mandate to force the purchase of EVs, the Democratic president’s policies were aimed at encouraging Americans to buy them and car companies to shift from gas-powered vehicles to electric cars.
Ascend Elements was originally selected for a total of $480 million in funding from two U.S. Department of Energy grants in 2022 as part of the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act—a $164 million grant for CAM manufacturing infrastructure and a $316 million grant for pCAM manufacturing infrastructure.
The $316 million federal grant to produce pCAM remains active and the company said it’s fully committed to finishing construction of the 500,000-square-foot manufacturing facility.
"We’re just not seeing significant market demand for CAM right now, but we have buyers lined up to purchase sustainable, domestically produced pCAM and Lithium Carbonate," said Roger Lin, VP of Government Affairs at Ascend Elements.
Most of the world’s pCAM is currently made in China and the Hopkinsville site will be North America’s first commercial-scale manufacturer or pCAM. It's scheduled to be operational in the third quarter of 2026.
