Renault continues to build its electric future. The Verkor startup has reserved most of the electric batteries produced by its future gigafactory in Dunkirk (north) for its diamond shareholder, the two companies said on Thursday. These new generation batteries will be used in particular by future electric models from Alpine.
The first delivery of batteries from the Dunkirk plant is scheduled for 2025, with capacity expected to increase from 16 gigawatt hours (GWh) in 2025 to 50 GWh in 2030.
Verkor will supply the Renault group with the equivalent of 12 GWh of batteries each year, enough to equip between 130,000 and 200,000 vehicles each year, depending on the size of the batteries used.
A factory of 2,500 million euros
These batteries will equip the vehicles of the upper segments of the Renault group brands, in particular Alpine’s small electric SUV, whose production will begin in 2025 not far from there, in Dieppe (Seine-Maritime).
“The trust that the Renault Group has placed in us from the beginning is now embodied in this long-term partnership,” said Benoit Lemaignan, Chairman of the Verkor Board of Directors.
“This is further proof of the attractiveness and credibility of our project, at a time when we are raising the necessary funds for the construction of our gigafactory in Dunkirk,” he added.
This factory represents a total investment of 2.5 billion euros and a potential of 800 direct jobs from the first phase of the project, indicated the Hauts-de-France region in 2022.
One hundred kilometers further south, in Douvrin (north), Stellantis, TotalEnergies and Mercedes will inaugurate the first battery factory in France at the end of May.
Renault must open its own factory with the Chinese group AESC-Envision in 2024, also in the North, in Douai.
Source: BFM TV
