Northvolt’s Champions Are in No Rush to Save Swedish Battery Firm

The ailing EV supplier was hailed as a green-industry beacon during its rise, but the government is reluctant to bail out private companies

A Northvolt battery.Photographer: Andrej Ivanov/Bloomberg
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When Northvolt AB’s clean-energy star was on the rise, Sweden’s political class took every opportunity to bask in its glow.

Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson called the battery-making startup one of the “European giants in the green growth engine,” alongside sustainable producers of steel and critical raw materials. “Sweden can show the way” in the climate transition, Kristersson said in a November 2022 parliamentary speech.