Planning permission has been granted for a 9GWh gigafactory that will be the UK’s first ‘at scale’ plant building batteries to support electric vehicle production.
The gigafactory will form part of a £1bn partnership between Nissan UK and battery firm Envision AESC at the International Advanced Manufacturing Plant (IAMP) in Sunderland.
Construction of the new building on IAMP – which spans land in South Tyneside and Sunderland – is due to begin in 2022 to support battery production in 2024. It also paves the way for a potential future investment of £1.8bn on the site to generate 35GWh capacity by 2030.
Envision AESC’s existing Sunderland plant has been supplying batteries to Nissan for the LEAF electric vehicle for the past nine years. The new scaled up gigafactory will produce batteries to power more than 100,000 EVs a year. The batteries will use new Gen5 battery cells with a third more energy density to improve range, efficiency and performance.
Envision AESC UK managing director Chris Caygill said: “We are immensely proud of the work we have done with our strategic partners Nissan UK and Sunderland City Council so far, which has laid the foundations for affordable EVs and sustainable growth in the region for the next generations.”
