Thai renewable energy company EA to open RM 760m, 1 GWh EV battery plant in December

Thailand’s Energy Absolute Plc (EA), a renewable energy developer and service provider company will be opening a THB 6 billion (about RM 760 million) battery plant new month in December.

The plant will be located in Thailand’s Chachoengsao region and will be a crucial step in the company’s move to join the electric vehicle (EV) supply chain.

The plant will have an annual production capacity of 1 GWh but can be scaled up to produce 4 GWh.

Locally-assembled electric buses, which EA also makes themselves, will absorb the bulk of EA battery plant’s output. The company has already received orders for 500 electric buses and has already delivered 100 units since.

EA also operates a fleet of electric boats. About 40 units are serving as river taxis along the Chao Phraya River in Bangkok.

EA Anywhere is the company’s EV charging service provider. It has over 400 charging stations, including DC fast chargers, across Bangkok.

Apart from EVs, the batteries produced in Chachoengsao will also be supplied to solar farms and wind farms, which the company also operates, to be used as energy storage systems (ESS).

ESS are a crucial part of solar and wind farms because output are unstable, heavily influenced by weather conditions. Storing excess energy in ESS is necessary to stabilize power output.

EA currently has 4 solar farms, with a combined capacity of 278 MW, and two onshore wind farms, with a total capacity of 386 MW.

Thailand had originally targetted to have 30 percent (or 750,000 units) of domestic vehicle production be electric vehicles, including battery electric (BEV), hybrid (HEV) and plug-in hybrid (PHEV) cars, electric tuk tuks and motorcycles, by year 2030. However, this was later revised to 50 percent (or 1.25 million units).