Stellantis, the parent company of Dodge, Jeep and Chrysler, plans to build a battery plant for electric vehicles in the United States. The news was announced Wednesday, with automakers planning to invest $ 4.1 billion in a new battery facility in Canada with South Korea’s LG Energy Solution.
The plant in Windsor, Ontario is the first of two planned battery plants resulting from a joint venture between Stellantis and LG, which was established last year by the merger of Fiat Chrysler and PSA Group. Construction of the factory will begin later this year and will begin operations in the first quarter of 2024.
At an event announcing the Windsor facility, officials said a second factory would be built somewhere in the United States (Via The Detroit News Breana Noble). Stellantis previously announced another joint venture with Samsung SDI to build a battery plant in North America. The location of the second factory will be announced within a few weeks.
The second factory will be built somewhere in the United States
Stellantis, which lags behind Ford and General Motors in adopting EVs, said it aims to sell 5 million EVs by 2030. Last year, the world’s fourth-largest car maker, the company will enhance its lineup with most brands, including the EV version of the Dodge Ram 1500, electric muscle cars, and multiple Jeep models. (Earlier this year, Stellantis previewed the Chrysler Airflow concept.)
As the automotive industry slowly shifts to electrification, there is a growing need to expand battery manufacturing capacity. Globally, battery production is expected to increase from 95.3 GWh in 2020 to 410.5 GWh in 2024, according to data and analytics firm Global Data.
Stellantis said the new Windsor plant will enable a production capacity of 45 gigawatt hours (GWh) per year. By comparison, Ford states that three new battery plants will enable an annual production capacity of 129 GWh. General Motors plans to have four new battery plants (including LG Chem) in the United States with a total annual capacity of 140 GWh. Meanwhile, Volkswagen aims to operate six battery cell production plants in Europe at a total of 240 GWh per year by 2030.
Tesla CEO Elon Musk said his company’s first battery plant in Berlin, which just opened this week, will eventually produce 250 GWh. This is about the same as the production capacity of battery cells in the world today.