Ford’s new Tennessee plant aims to build 500,000 electric trucks a year

By Paul Lienert

STANTON, Tennessee (Reuters) – Ford Motor (NYSE:) Co plans to build up to 500,000 electric trucks a year at its BlueOval City complex under construction in western Tennessee, the automaker said on Friday.

BlueOval City will assemble several versions of Ford’s next-generation F-series electric pickup, which the company calls Project T3.

The Stanton plant northeast of Memphis is part of Ford’s plan to have global EV production capacity of 2 million vehicles a year in place by the end of 2026.

Ford said BlueOval City will have a general assembly footprint that is 30% smaller than that of a traditional assembly plant, with a higher production capacity. Most current auto plants are designed to build 250,000-300,000 vehicles a year.

Tesla (NASDAQ:) earlier this month said its future electric vehicle plants will be up to 40% smaller than traditional plants.

Ford’s Project T3 pickup, a successor to the current F150 Lightning, is being developed on a new dedicated EV truck architecture.

Suppliers have said that new platform, which carries the internal designation TE1, will also underpin full-size electric SUVs in 2026 that could supplement or replace the current Ford Expedition and Lincoln Navigator.

The $5.6 billion BlueOval City complex, which is being jointly developed with Korean partner SK On, also will have a battery plant capable of producing about 40 gigawatt-hours worth of cells — enough supply up to half a million EVs a year.

(This story has been corrected to change the name of the truck to Project T3, not Project T, in paragraphs 2 and 6)