Photo | Courtesy of Aspen Aerogels
Donald Young, president and CEO of Aspen Aerogels
October 16, 2024
Aspen Aerogels receives $671M federal loan for planned Georgia facility
Photo | Brad Kane
The sign for Aspen Aerogels' research facility on Donald Lynch Boulevard in Marlborough
Aspen Aerogel’s efforts in developing technologies to reduce the risk from electrical vehicle fires will potentially receive a big boost from the federal government, as the U.S. Department of Energy has issued the Northborough-based company a conditional commitment of up to $670.6 million in financing for a new manufacturing facility in the state of Georgia.
The new facility in the small town of Register, Georgia will produce aerogel blankets designed to help prevent thermal runaway propagation, an event where the overheating of one cell within a battery causes a chain reaction, resulting in a sudden and intense fire.
The conditional commitment would see the company pay an interest rate based on the applicable U.S. Treasury rate at the time of each cash draw. The loan is part of the DOE’s Advanced Technology Vehicles Manufacturing loan program.
“With this conditional commitment, we are pleased to announce that the proposed loan would fully fund the required CAPEX for our second aerogel manufacturing facility, which is expected to play a key role in scaling our PyroThin supply for our rapidly growing thermal barrier business," Donald Young, president and CEO of Aspen Aerogels, said in a Wednesday press release. "We believe that PyroThin, which can enable increased battery safety and performance, is a unique and differentiated product that solves an important and challenging problem.”
The new plant is expected to have a revenue capacity of up to $1.6 billion, creating 550 construction jobs and 255 full-time operations jobs.
Aspen Aerogels opened a thermal barrier research center in Marlborough in 2023.
The company announced conditional approval of the DOE loan as part of the release of its preliminary third quarter financial results, which saw the company have a quarterly net loss of $13 million.
Aspen Aerogel’s stock price on the New York Stock Exchange opened at $25.31 per share on Wednesday, up 12% from its price on Tuesday and significantly from $8.31 one year ago.
Eric Casey is a staff writer at Worcester Business Journal, who primarily covers the manufacturing and real estate industries.
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