General Motors announced on Tuesday that it will invest $7 billion in a battery facility in Michigan and renovate an existing manufacturing plant west of Detroit to start producing electric pickup trucks by 2024, The New York Times reported.
According to GM, the investment will generate 4,000 employment and greatly improve the company’s ability to manufacture electric vehicles in the United States.
General Motors will receive $824 million in financial subsidies from the state of Michigan.
The investment proposal is the newest in the automotive industry’s efforts to increase electric car manufacturing. Toyota said in December that it will develop a battery facility in North Carolina that would employ 1,750 workers.
General Motors is building battery factories in Ohio and Tennessee, as well as retooling a facility in Detroit, where it recently began producing an electric Hummer truck. Electric cars will also be produced at a factory in Ontario and another plant in Mexico.
GM has stated that it plans to phase out gasoline-powered vehicles by 2035, although Ford has so far outsold General Motors in electric vehicle sales. For over a year, Ford has been selling an electric SUV, the Mustang Mach E, and has had over 200,000 reservations for the electric F-150 Lightning.
The new GM battery facility in Michigan, like the other of the company’s battery factories, will be a joint venture between GM and LG Electric. It will cost $2.6 billion to construct on the site of an existing facility in Lansing, with GM and LG splitting the cost.
GM will also invest $4 billion to allow the production of electric versions of its Chevrolet Silverado and GMC Sierra trucks at a factory in Orion Township, Mich. When pickup manufacturing begins, the business intends to add 2,350 jobs to the Orion facility while keeping 1,000 others.
GM anticipates the Orion facility and the Factory Zero plant in Detroit to be able to produce 600,000 electrified full-size trucks per year. According to the firm, it plans to have a total annual manufacturing capacity of one million electrified vehicles by the end of 2025.
General Motors also announced a $510 million investment in two Lansing automobile factories.