Microporous to start construction in May on $1.35B Pittsylvania project

This week, Microporous gave the official word that it plans to begin construction this month on its $1.35 billion battery separator facility at the Southern Virginia Megasite at Berry Hill, located in Pittsylvania County.

“They’re looking to start blasting rock and doing that component, like the initial work, beginning on May 11,” Pittsylvania County Director of Economic Development Matt Rowe said in an interview Friday.

Microporous officials are planning a construction celebration at the site for the third or fourth week of May, he added.

Also on Thursday, Microporous, a Tennessee-based portfolio company of Trent Capital Partners, announced it has secured financing for the Virginia manufacturing project.

The funding, according to a news release, comes from Trent, a Florida-based venture capital firm, as well as Eagle Point Credit Management, a Connecticut-based investment manager, and Elda River Capital, a real assets investment firm which has offices in offices in Houston, Illinois and London.

“This is a pivotal milestone for Microporous as we move from planning into execution,” John Reeves, CEO of Microporous, said in the release. “With the support of Trent, Eagle Point and Elda River, we are accelerating our expansion and strengthening our ability to deliver high-performance separator solutions for the lithium-ion battery market.”

Microporous’ Pittsylvania County facility will produce battery separators for lithium-ion batteries. At full capacity, it is expected to support about 65 gigawatt-hours of battery production annually.

Battery separators are used in electric vehicles as well as industrial and grid applications.

The Southern Virginia Megasite at Berry Hill is owned jointly by the City of Danville and Pittsylvania County through the Danville-Pittsylvania Regional Industrial Facility Authority (RIFA). Both localities will share revenues from projects at the megasite.

During a groundbreaking for the Virginia project in November 2024, Reeves projected the Berry Hill facility would be fully operational by 2026.

That hasn’t come to fruition due to project delays. The first phase of the project involves building a 550,000 square feet facility, according to Rowe. Microporous aims to have that facility operational by the third or fourth quarter of 2027, he said.

Southern Virginia officials never doubted the facility would get built, according to Rowe.

“We’ve always had confidence,” he said. “We’ve had inside look at what’s been going on.”

Change in number of jobs

On April 24, members of the RIFA approved an amended local performance agreement with Microporous.

When the project was initially announced, Microporous expected to the Virginia facility would be a $1.35 billion investment that would create 2,015 jobs.

Under the new agreement, the capital investment remains the same, but the job number has dropped to 1,832 fulltime positions, a change the RIFA documents attributed to “changes in the marketplace.” The jobs will pay an average yearly base wage of at least $60,995.

A spokesperson for Microporous declined to answer questions Friday.

The company maintains production facilities in Piney Flats, Tennessee and Feistritz, Austria.

Former Gov. Glenn Youngkin received heavy criticism in 2023 when he took Berry Hill out of the running for a $3.5 billion Ford Motor Co. electric vehicle battery factory over concerns about a project partner’s ties to the Chinese government.

But hindsight is 20/20.

“I think we’re going to look back and we’re going to be so, so thankful that we were able to work with and selected Microporous as our partner,” Rowe added.

Although sales of electric vehicles have risen recently as gas prices skyrocketed, overall sales have plunged in the United States. According to Cox Automotive’s Kelley Blue Book, electric vehicle sales fell 27% year-over-year in the first quarter of 2026, and on Thursday, Nissan announced it would scrap its plan to produce electric vehicles in Mississippi.

Fortunately for Pittsylvania, Microporous has a more diversified market. “Pretty much all of the business being generated by Microporous right now for their products is the energy storage business, which is being driven by data centers and the transmission grid,” Rowe said.