Ford is in the midst of a major electrification push as it spends $50 billion with a goal of producing two million EVs annually by 2026. This is especially true in Europe, where The Blue Oval plans to transition its entire European passenger vehicle lineup to EVs by 2030 or sooner after rolling out seven new Ford EVs by 2024. There, a number of Ford plants are in the process of being converted for the production of electric vehicles, including the Valencia Assembly plant in Spain and the Cologne Assembly Plant in Germany, which will build at least one and perhaps two new Ford EVs built on Volkswagen’s MEB platform. Aside from sourcing batteries from its own joint venture – BlueOvalSK – Ford will also need to secure those critical units from a variety of places, which is precisely what it plans to do, according to Automotive News.
In total, Ford plans to source its EV batteries from at least three different locations in Europe, in addition to its new BlueOvalSK plant that’s currently under construction in Turkey. That facility is expected to open in 2025 and offer a capacity of between 30-45 gigawatt-hours, but it cannot supply the automaker’s Craovia plant with enough batteries to support production of the Puma EV without breaking the European Union’s “rules of origin” that state EVs assembled in the EU must contain at least 55 percent locally sourced content, as Turkey isn’t a member of the EU.
“We need to buy most of our batteries within Europe, said Sue Slaughter, Ford’s head of supply chain sustainability strategy. “The reality is that we intend to source batteries for production for vehicles in Europe domestically in Europe,” added Stuart Rowley, Ford of Europe president. “That is a necessity due to the rules of origin requirements for both the European Union and the UK.”
Currently, Ford sources EV batteries from a number of suppliers across the globe, including CATL, BYD, and SK On as it continues to work on bringing that process in-house via its joint venture.
We’ll have more on Ford’s electrification plans soon, so be sure and subscribe to Ford Authority for ongoing Ford news coverage.
Comment
So quality will be all over the map. Then the customer will have to pay $15K to replace the battery outside of warranty. They fail to tell people how ungodly expensive EVs are to repair.