Japanese carmaker Nissan Motor Co plans to start producing electric vehicles in the US, a newspaper reported yesterday.
It would be the first time that a Japanese automaker mass-produced electric vehicles overseas, the Nikkei Shimbun business daily said.
The company is seeking low-interest loans from the US government to develop green vehicles and plans to invest US$518 million dollars, which could more than double depending on demand, the daily said.
Under the plan, Nissan will build electric-car assembly lines at a plant in Smyrna, Tennessee, the location of Nissan North America Inc’s headquarters, the newspaper said.
This facility will be capable of churning out 50,000 to 100,000 of the eco-friendly vehicles a year by 2012, it said.
In Japan, Nissan plans to assemble up to 50,000 electric cars a year starting next year, with some of these vehicles to be exported to the US, the report said.
It also plans to mass-produce electric cars in Europe and possibly in China, hoping to raise its production to 200,000 units a year by 2012.
Other carmakers are racing to produce fully electric cars.
US-based Tesla Motors has a prototype electric car that is scheduled to be produced by 2011. Toyota Motor Corp said it plans to sell electric vehicles in the US by 2012, while Mitsubishi Motors Corp will sell a new electric vehicle by 2012 priced at US$31,000, Nikkei English News reported on Thursday without citing sources.
In China, Dongfeng Motor Corp (東風汽車) and a Dutch-based company plan to cooperate in developing and making electric cars, the companies said on Friday.
Detroit Electric Holdings, a startup company that owns the electric drive technology to be used in the cars, plans to license it to Dongfeng for testing and use in its electric vehicles, Detroit Electric’s chairman and CEO Albert Lam (林光宇) said in an interview.
The two companies are also discussing forming a joint venture to manufacture, assemble, produce and supply the Detroit Electric’s electric drive technology to the Dongfeng Group and other vehicle manufacturers.
Financial details of the tie-up were not announced. Nor was there any word on when they hoped to produce the vehicles.
“The more I learn, the more I believe the electric car is the future,” said Lam, who formerly worked with Lotus and Ford Motor Co, among other automakers.
If it succeeds, Detroit Electric would be among the first to mass-produce an electric car driven purely by a noiseless battery-powered motor. It says its electric drive systems will enable extended-range models to travel up to 325km on a single charge.
China’s BYD Auto (比亞迪汽車) has introduced the plug-in hybrid F3DM for fleet sales in December.
It runs up to 100km on a single charge before reverting to its conventional gasoline engine.
Despite China’s endorsement of electric vehicles to reduce automobile emissions and limit the country’s growing reliance on imported oil, so far their use has been limited in China to a few experimental programs. Among other challenges, cities lack the infrastructure to enable consumers, most of whom live in high-rise apartments, to recharge the vehicles.
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