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17/04/2021

Their Second US Battery Plant In Tennessee To Be Built By GM And LG Energy Solution




Their Second US Battery Plant In Tennessee To Be Built By GM And LG Energy Solution
A second battery cell manufacturing plant in the United States will be jointly built by General Motors Co and South Korean joint-venture partner LG Energy Solution, the companies said on Friday as the two companies unveiled their plans of building the plant with an investment of $2.3 billion in Spring Hill, Tennessee.
 
A total production capacity of about 35 gigawatt-hours, similar to the companies' Ultium Cells joint-venture plant in Lordstown, Ohio, and created a total estimated 1,300 jobs will be made at the planned new factory that will have an area of about 2.8 million-square-foot and is scheduled to open in late 2023. This new plant will help the companies to address the increasing demand for electric vehicles. The planned installed capacity at the new plant will allow manufacturing of battery packs enough to meet the needs of more than 500,000 electric vehicles a year.
 
"The addition of our second all-new Ultium battery cell plant in the U.S. with our joint venture partner LG Energy Solution is another major step in our transition to an all-electric future," GM Chief Executive Mary Barra said.
 
GM was asked by the United Auto Workers on Friday to make sure that union-represented workers were hired for the new plant to which the car maker has said that this issue would be determined by the employees.
 
LG Energy Solution unit will invest $933.5 million in the plant between this year and 2023. LG Chem said in a regulatory filing.
 
According to previous reports citing sources, a different, less-expensive battery chemistry would be used for making the car batteries by GM and LG Energy Solution in Tennessee which would make the cost of the batteries less than those that are manufactured by the companies in the Lordstown plant that opens next year.
 
In order to meet the growing demands for its electric cars, GM – the largest auto company of the United States, will need more battery plants beyond Tennessee, analysts have previously stated. According to projections, there will be sale of more than 1 million EVs globally in 2025. In the long term strategy of GM, the car maker plans to completely stop sale of the light-duty gasoline and diesel-powered vehicles by 2035.
 
Globally, most of the battery production is generally done in China and Korea while the US battery production is mostly controlled by Tesla and Japanese partner Panasonic.
 
Batteries for the Cadillac Lyriq crossover EV will mainly be made at the new GM-LG battery plant when production begins there. GM has previously said that the Cadillac Lyriq EV will be made starting next year at a factory that is under construction at its nearby Spring Hill assembly plant. Till then it is expected that LG will supply the batteries from Korea.
 
An investment of $2 billion in Spring Hill to build EVs will be made by GM, the company said in October. Announcement of $2 billion in Spring Hill to build EVs was made by the Detroit automaker last year.
 
(Source:www.nasdaq.com)

Christopher J. Mitchell

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