Partner Article

Nissan’s plan motor’s forward

JAPANESE car giant Nissan has officially begun building a £210m plant in Sunderland to produce batteries for its electric cars.

The new facility will create 200 new jobs and initially produce 60,000 batteries for forthcoming electric cars, such as the Leaf, which is due in 2013.

The Leaf will also be built in Sunderland.A second battery plant will be built in Cacia, Portugal and there are plans to build more batteries at Renault’s Flins factory in France.

Sarah Green, Regional Director, CBI North East said: “It was great to see the development start on the Nissan battery plant which symbolises a new era for Nissan in the North East and represents a fantastic opportunity for the UK to lead on electric vehicles.”

A total of 50,000 Leafs will be made at Washington each year with UK pre-orders for the model set to open in June.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Ruth Mitchell .