President Obama bets big on advanced battery industry in Michigan

President Obama, will make a trip to Holland, Michigan on Thursday, July 15, 2010 for the opening of a its groundbreaking LG Chem/Compact Power Inc.'s new $303 million battery cell manufacturing plant. The Obama administration has given Michigan almost $1.3 million in federal stimulus, including $151 million that was used to help develop the advanced battery industry with the creation of the LG Chem/Compact Power plant.

As the lithium-ion battery industry is mostly concentrated in Asian countries including Korea and Japan, Governor Granholm and President Obama are hoping Michigan will become “the battery capital of the world” among batteries specific for the auto industry that “[don't] exist anywhere in the world” according to David Cole, chairman of the Center for Automotive Research in Ann Arbor.

The new LG Chem/Compact Power plant will begin manufacturing batteries for the Chevrolet Volt extended-range electric car. It will eventually assemble batteries for the electric version of the Ford Focus but those parts are initially being manufactured in Korea as announced by Ford Motor Co. and Compact Power.

The opening of the plant is expected to employ more than 450 employees by 2013, according to the White House. The jobs created will only pay roughly $14 an hour, but it is one step along the path to reducing the unemployment rate and making Michigan a top alternative energy producing state. Financially backing the new LG Chem/Compact plant and creating new jobs are only small pieces of Obama's long-term economic strategy to not only turn around the United States economy but specifically Michigan.

 -Photo image credit, AP