Nissan’s sprawling car factory in Sunderland will be at the heart of a £13 billion investment in electric vehicle development.
The Japanese carmaker said yesterday its UK plant “will be at the forefront of electrification” as it announced an investment that will help develop 23 new electric vehicle models by 2030.
“Europe will lead the way in worldwide electrification for Nissan,” said Ashwani Gupta, the group’s chief executive officer in Japan. “In Europe, Sunderland is the company that will lead in electrification.”
The sprawling Sunderland site is Britain’s largest car factory, employing around 6,000 people. It produces the Nissan Qashqai, one of the most popular cars in the UK, as well as the Leaf, the world’s best-selling electric car.
Yesterday, the automaker also released more details and concept images for its new electric crossover – dubbed the Nissan Chill-Out – that it will build in Sunderland, a vehicle Gupta calls it “the shape of things to come”, featuring “beautiful design, energetic driving, advanced safety technologies and a productive and comfortable interior space”.
This year Nissan announces £1 billion investment in battery plant as well as Sunderland plant update to produce new electric models. Boris Johnson hailed the move as a “critical moment” in the “electric vehicle revolution” in Britain and said it was a vote of confidence in the country after Brexit.
Nissan says it will target half of its production output to be electric by 2030. It will spend twice as much as a decade ago to increase its share of the electric vehicle market in the face of competition from rivals. competitors like Toyota and Tesla.
“The role of companies in addressing social needs is increasingly enhanced,” said Makoto Uchida, chief executive officer of Nissan.
He said that Nissan will “drive the new era of electrification, develop innovative technologies to reduce carbon emissions, and pursue new business opportunities. . . We want to make Nissan a sustainable company that is really needed by customers and society.”
Nissan says it wants to reduce the cost of lithium-ion batteries by 65% within eight years. It also plans to introduce fully solid-state batteries, with the potential to store more energy than lithium-ion batteries, by March 2029. Those commitments will make electric vehicles affordable for many more drivers, Uchida said.
