Energy24.01.2025

Biggest backup battery factories in South Africa

Several companies are assembling backup battery packs in South Africa in 2025, with significant recent expansions in the industry driven by demand for renewable power storage.

Technically speaking, South Africa has no facilities that can manufacture batteries from start to finish.

That is because there is no plant producing the cells that form the basic building blocks of batteries.

These cells are made from raw minerals — many of which are not mined or readily available in South Africa — and are often exported from other African countries to China or the US.

MyBroadband recently spoke with Rubicon energy and e-mobility head Greg Blandford, who believes there is great potential in setting up a local factory to produce stationary and electric vehicle (EV) cells.

One company that aims to do that is Afrivolt, which hopes to make cells and associated components for EV batteries in Atlantis, Cape Town, in the near future.

However, several companies are already assembling batteries with cells imported from China and other components manufactured locally and abroad.

Solar MD operates the largest battery assembly plant in the country by annual production capacity.

Its 15,000m2 plant in Richmond, Cape Town, became the first gigawatt factory on the continent when it began operations in July 2024.

The facility can produce up to 3,000 megawatt-hours (MWh) or 3 gigawatt-hours of storage capacity per year.

It can output up to 300 batteries per day, compared to the 120 daily units Solar MD previously produced at its factory in Montague Gardens.

Solar MD makes lithium-iron phosphate (LiFePO4) batteries with a modular design suitable for residential, commercial, and industrial applications.

These can be stacked and combined for greater capacities, including in a cabinet configuration.

Among their standout features are 100% depth-of-discharge ratings and 98% efficiency.

Solar MD employee working on battery pack.

SolarMD also assembles high-voltage containerised BESS systems in containers with up to 5.8MWH of capacity.

The manufacturer’s plant is powered by a fully off-grid rooftop solar and containerised energy storage system.

Solar MD was founded in 2014 and has expanded to numerous African countries since.

It started distributing its products into central Asia in December 2024.

One more gigawatt assembler

The second-largest battery assembly plant is owned Balancell, which recently upgraded its production facility in Cape Town to support up to 1GWh output per year.

Balancell’s biggest customer is Toyota Material Handling, while other well-known customers include Cape Fruit, Clicks Nestle, Shoprite, Spar, and Pick n Pay.

It also supplies components to electric safari vehicle manufacturer Thula Solutions and solar rental company GoSlr.

Balancell’s products are designed with intelligent or smart capabilities front and centre. Among the typical products that feature its batteries are forklifts and fast battery swop-out systems.

35% to 45% of the content in Balancell’s batteries are made locally, when measured on the products’ value.

As of October 2024, Balancell had 70 full-time employees and employed 1,500 people indirectly.

Balancell executives demonstrating some of the company’s assembly operations.

A lone Gauteng player

The third-biggest local assembler is the only one among the major players based in Gauteng.

Freedom Won’s origins date back to its founders successfully completing the electric conversion of a Jeep Grande Cherokee in 2010.

The vehicle served as a testbed for LiFePO4 technology, which was still in its infancy at the time.

The company was officially founded and registered in 2012. In 2015, it began selling its LiTE home and business range with capacities ranging from 5kW to 80kWh.

In 2017, it expanded into the commercial and industrial segments with models offering 100kWh to 800kWh capacity.

As of November 2023, Freedom Won had around 500 employees and produced batteries with a combined capacity of roughly 65MWh every month, working out to about 780MWh per year.

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