U.S. lawmakers are seeking to review the license agreement between Ford Motor and a Chinese battery maker.
They are concerned that the deal will facilitate China’s global dominance in electric vehicle battery technology with American taxpayers’ money and increase America’s reliance on Chinese critical raw materials. According to the lawmakers, the Chinese battery maker’s supply chain in Xinjiang also raised a forced labor question, which is a potential violation of the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act.
In February, Ford announced that a new $3.5 billion plant would be built in Marshall, Michigan, 100 miles west of Detroit, to produce lithium-iron-phosphate batteries, better known as LFP, a type of battery cheaper but less energy-dense than the nickel-cobalt-manganese chemistry that currently dominates the market….