The upcoming transition to fully electric vehicles will not be possible without a heavy investment in new and preexisting manufacturing facilities. As Ford Authority reported in 2021, the automaker revealed its intentions to spend $7 billion on two sites tasked with eventually producing batteries and fully electric vehicles in Tennessee and Kentucky. The plan is part of the company’s larger goal of scaling up to produce two million EVs annually by 2026. Today, Ford reached a milestone with that particular project, as it announced that BlueOval City construction has officially begun.
The official groundbreaking occurred less than one year after Ford announced its plans to build BlueOval City and BluOvalSK, its sister site in Kentucky. Construction in Tennessee commenced with structural steel being erected. Before this latest development, crew moved 4.6 million cubic yards of soil and laid about 370,000 tons of stone. Additionally, 4,600 deep foundations have been installed in the run up to groundbreaking, a process that started in March 2022. The 6-square-mile campus is expected to create 6,000 jobs and cost $5.6 billion.
“We are building the future right here in West Tennessee,” said Eric Grubb, Ford’s director of new footprint construction. “This facility is the blueprint for Ford’s future manufacturing facilities
and will enable Ford to help lead America’s shift to electric vehicles.”
BlueOval City is currently hiring more workers amid a planned ramp up of operations leading up to 2025. Currently, a future F-Series product is expected to be built at the facility, although it might build other vehicles too. The site is part of a joint venture with SK On, which is Ford’s primary EV battery partner. Overall, The Blue Oval expects to spend $50 billion on platforms, technology, and facility contraction and upgrades on its path toward electrification. While first generation products aren’t considered profitable, future EVs from BlueOval City and other assembly plants are being engineered to generate profits for the automaker.
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Comments
So for 2023 2024 and 2025 ford can’t supply evs. Tesla wins. As battery tech gets better and demand grows ford won’t have limited vehicles to sell. They can’t even make enough Mavericks.
So their “green” plan includes leveling trees to make toxic battery vehicles – Brilliant
Nice lead pic. Haven’t seen an electric bulldozer before…. Amazing!!
Most of these comments here shows clear misunderstandings of where the auto industry is heading and why Ford needs to make these investments or die a slow death! Every single major automaker and even new comers are adapting to this new reality! As Lee Iacocca famously said, you can either lead, follow or get out of the way! Get use to it guys,electric vehicles are here to stay! Personally, I think there’s still a place for some combustion engine vehicles to provide some balance. Our power grid needs to be refurbished with substantial expansion to fully support both vehicles, homes and economic activities.
our power grid is stressed to the point of collapse and we’ll stress it further by shifting to EV tech without a total refurbish of our power grid infrastructure. cart before the horse really rings true here, battery tech is improving but what will we do with current tech batteries once they fail, ship them to 3rd world countries like we do with all our other haz mat waste? all the tree huggers that are jumping on EV don’t want to face that reality, protect a moth but kill a country/generation, need the manufacturers and consumers of EV’s to be forced into having to deal with this issue as part of their costs. why have we not shifted to Hydrogen Tech so much cleaner, most abundant substance in the universe, because they haven’t figured out how to make the money with it!!that’s why!! why do something that actually benefits us instead of the money mongers, thanks to the good ole boys
You are too kind Karl. Most of the comments here lie somewhere on the imbecility to ignoramus continuum.
Lessons from Henry Ford….when suppliers let you down…..you do it your self!
Happy for the people of kentucky that will benefit from this but sad for the wrong headed decisions by Ford for since 2019 when they began stockpiling unfinished vehicles without addressing the chip shortage with the same enthusiasm as they are showing for their battery plant. Shareholders as well as life long Blue Oval customers are paying attention to this.
Maybe EVs where a deal years ago, not anymore in the future. Remember back in the 70s, when diesel was cheap, and every manufacture pushed diesel powered cars? Not one sells one now. Remember back in the 80s when propane conversions were subsidized by the government? No one does now. Remember is the 90s when E85 ethanol was going to power ICE vehicles, and the government poured money into ethanol manufactures and made laws to support them? What happened to that?
The same thing is going to happen to EVs. Wasted government money and your tax dollars and increase costs to buy and own an EV. Wait until you have to pay road tax to compensate for lost gas road taxes. Before you know it, it will cost more to operate an EV then gas, just like all the above mentioned.
And wait until the government applies a recycle fee ( or tax ) for EV batteries and other computer components, just like when you buy a computer, tv, etc. because EV battery recyclers cannot make a profit recycling them.
To me, the financial future of EVs does not look good.