Facilities represent automaker’s largest investment
Ford is going all-in on electric vehicles, investing $11.4 billion in new factories in Kentucky and Tennessee that will manufacture electric F-Series pickups and lithium-ion batteries in partnership with Korean battery maker SK Innovation. They represent Ford’s largest investment ever in monetary terms and its first factories built from scratch in 50 years.
When the plants go online in 2025, they will be carbon neutral with zero waste to landfill. The three battery plants will each produce about 43 gigawatt hours of electricity annually, enough to power a million EVs.
In a statement, executive chairman Bill Ford called the investment a “transformative moment where Ford will lead America’s transition” that will let the automaker “achieve goals once thought mutually exclusive — protect our planet, build great electric vehicles Americans will love and contribute to our nation’s prosperity.”
Ford said that by 2030, 40 to 50% of its global vehicle manufacturing will be EVs.
All told the facilities will add 11,000 jobs.
“The UAW looks forward to continuing our long-time partnership with Ford as consumers transition to make electric vehicles in the right way,” United Auto Workers president Ray Curry said in a statement. “The UAW has always taken a lead in manufacturing innovation with our employer partners. We look forward to reaching out and helping develop this new workforce to build these world-class vehicles and battery components.”
In addition to the $7 billion that it will invest in the Kentucky and Tennessee plants, Ford will spend $525 million on a nationwide job training project beginning with $90 million in Texas to train skilled technicians to service EVs.
The Blue Oval City campus in Stanton, Tenn., will include a battery plant and F-series manufacturing plant accounting for approximately 6,000 jobs and $5.6 billion in investment, with twin battery factories in Kentucky accounting for 5,000 jobs and $5.8 billion in investment.
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